Are you nervous about an upcoming final? Job interview? A big proposal presentation at work? You need to make sure your stress is dissolved out before you start to perform; you should have enough confidence in yourself and in your abilities to do well. If you don’t and proceed with a stressful brain, you won’t do any good.

The brain has two different sets to work with during a nervous time: the confident brain with all the information stored and the nervous one that just produces chemicals to fight the stress and gets too busy doing that it forgets all the information stored. Think of your brain as a computer, stress as a virus and confidence as its anti-virus. if your computer is virus free or is infected with a couple of viruses, the anti-virus will fight back and the computer will run smoothly. On the other hand, if your computer is full of viruses, and the anti-virus is broken, it will freeze every five seconds.

indexPaul McKenna is an English hypnotist, a holder of two Ph.D.’s, a television broadcaster and an author of 12 international bestselling self-help books on techniques to boost your confidence. In his second chapter of Change Your Life in 7 Days, he mentions one of the very useful techniques that really helps you boost your confidence before a nervous event titled ‘Instant Confidence Booster’. The exercise goes as the following:

518cAuuio3L1. Close your eyes. Hold your head high and keep your chin up to give yourself a sign of power and high self-esteem. Relax your back, shoulders, neck and the rest of your muscles. If any of your muscles are tense, relax them. Inhale deep breaths and slowly exhale. In this position, you must be feeling confident and your self-belief must be high.

2. Recall a moment where your confidence was high. Perhaps a time when you approached someone attractive or when you were confident that you would win a certain challenge or game. If you don’t have such a moment, imagine one. Imagine a time where your confidence is so high; you could achieve the impossible.

3. Color the moment; paint it with sound and motion. Make it detailed in your mind while your eyes are still closed. Color every little detail including the ones that were not colored. Make this feeling flow throughout your entire body.

4. Enrich the moment. Give it a little more detail and life. Perhaps, enlarge it in your mind. Make it cover your entire blindness. Edit the colors in your mind to intensify the moment and feeling. Make that moment become now and live it. You are the most confident person in the world right now.

5. Keep repeating steps 1-4 either with the same moment, or a more confident one. Keep repeating until you kill the stress. You already killed it with reviving your confidence. Now, go rock the event like never before. You are now high on your own confidence.