Confidence, the golden ticket: Why it's so important and how to (re)gain it.

What is confidence? It is believing in oneself. Don't confuse it with arrogance. Arrogance is projecting an attitude of self-importance or believing oneself superior. Truly confident people are almost never arrogant. A confident person has no need to feel better than others, has no need to put on airs.

Few experiences erode self-confidence like unemployment. Does that statement need explanation? I think not.

The problem is that you never need confidence as much as you do when you're out of work. Why would any potential employer believe in you if you don't believe in yourself?

So how do you get your mojo back after being kicked off the island? Here are three ideas (feel free to leave yours in the comments because I'm sure I'll miss some):

• Challenge yourself daily. Do something that is difficult for you to do. Learn something. Go for a run. Get on the phone. Why is this important to confidence? Because difficult things become easier with practice, and as difficult things become easy, your self-confidence grows.
• Get out and talk to people. It doesn't matter who -- old friends, mentors, students, people standing in line at 7-11 -- just extend yourself. This builds confidence because we tend to forget that people aren't going to bite our heads off when we're sequestered away from the workplace. People can be very nice and interesting and helpful. Approach them with that attitude, and that's usually what you'll get back. I have gotten jobs that started with conversations with total strangers, but that's not your goal in talking to people -- it's just to remind yourself that you can.
• Reprogram your mind. The way we act is determined by the way we think. We all have an "internal monologue" that acts like a computer program. Unemployment can turn your internal monologue into, "Life sucks. The world sucks. People suck. I suck." and that's an infinite loop that accomplishes nothing useful. You need to turn your internal monologue into something like, "Life is beautiful. The world has plenty of opportunity for me because I have a lot to offer, and people see it." It may be hard to believe at first -- you have to flush a bunch of old garbage data before your new program starts to work -- but just keep looping it until it takes.

If you do those three things every day for a month, your life will start to change. In my experience, it doesn't even take a month.

Go forth with confidence, unemployed person! You are valuable, and your life is a gift!