quotes and quotations on confidence

They are able because
they think they are able.

Virgil

Nothing splendid has ever been achieved except by those who dared believe that something inside them was superior to circumstances. Bruce Barton

If one burdens the future with one's worries, it cannot grow organically. I am filled with confidence, not that I shall succeed in worldly things, but that even when things go badly for me I shall still find life good and worth living. Etty Hillesum

It is only a person's own fundamental thoughts that have truth and life in them. For it is these that he or she really and completely understands. To read the thoughts of others is like taking the remains of someone else's meal, like putting on the discarded clothes of a stranger. Arthur Schopenhauer

I believe that in our constant search for security we can never gain any peace of mind until we secure our own soul. And this I do believe above all, especially in my times of greatest discouragement, that I must believe--that I must believe in my fellow people--that I must believe in myself--that I must believe in God--if life is to have any meaning. Margaret Chase Smith

Self-distrust is the cause of most of our failures. . . they are
the weakest, however strong, who have no faith in
themselves or their own powers.

Christian Bovee

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Confidence . . . thrives on honesty, on honor, on the sacredness
of obligations, on faithful protection and on unselfish
performance. Without them it cannot live.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

What I must do is all that concerns me, not what the people
think. This rule, equally arduous in actual and intellectual life,
may serve for the whole distinction between greatness and
meanness. It is the harder, because you will always find those
who think they know what is your duty better than you know
it. It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinion; it is
easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great person is
one who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect
sweetness the independence of solitude.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

If you doubt you can accomplish something, then you can't
accomplish it. You have to have confidence in your ability,
and then be tough enough to follow through.

Rosalynn Carter

Kill the snake of doubt in your soul, crush the worms of fear
in your heart and mountains will move out of your way.

Kate Seredy

Our belief at the beginning of a doubtful undertaking is the one
thing that insures the successful outcome of our venture.

William James

Underlying the whole scheme of civilization is the confidence people
have in each other, confidence in their integrity, confidence
in their honesty, confidence in their future.

W. Bourke Cockran

The confidence which we have in ourselves gives birth
to much of that which we have in others.

La Rochefoucauld

confidence 2

Whatever you are by nature, keep to it; never desert your own line
of talent. Be what nature intended you for, and you will succeed;
be anything else and you will be ten thousand times worse than nothing.

Sydney Smith

Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance
and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted
for something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained.

Marie Curie

Be like the bird
That, pausing in her flight
Awhile on boughs too slight,
Feels them give way
Beneath her and yet sings,
Knowing that she hath wings.

Victor Hugo

Class is an aura of confidence that is being sure without being cocky.
Class has nothing to do with money. Class never runs scared.
It is self-discipline and self-knowledge. It's the sure-footedness
that comes with having proved you can meet life.

Ann Landers

Believe that with your feelings and your work you are taking part
in the greatest; the more strongly you cultivate this belief,
the more will reality and the world go forth from it.

Rainer Maria Rilke

Nobody holds a good opinion of a person
who has a low opinion of him or herself.

Anthony Trollope

I build confidence when I practice a variety of shots--hitting it
high or low, working the ball. A lot of golfers go to the range
and just hit full shots. That doesn't build on-course confidence,
because you won't always hit full shots out there. My
confidence is built on knowing I can effectively work the
ball in any circumstance.

JoAnne Carner

Confidence is that feeling by which the mind embarks in great
and honorable courses with a sure hope and trust in itself.

Marcus T. Cicero

Articles and book excerpts on confidence:

Alex tom walsh
Getting away from Comparisons Alan Loy McGinnis

confidence 2

There can be no great courage where there is no confidence or assurance,
and half the battle is in the conviction that we can do what we undertake.

Orison Swett Marden

"I never seek to defeat the man I am fighting," he explained. "I seek
to defeat his confidence. A mind troubled by doubt cannot focus on
the course to victory. Two men are equals--true equals--
only when they both have equal confidence."

Arthur Golden
Memoirs of a Geisha

It's so important to believe in yourself. Believe that you can do it, under
any circumstances. Because if you believe you can, then you really will.
That belief just keeps you searching for the answers,
and then pretty soon you get it.

Wally Amos

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Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we
are powerful beyond measure. It is our Light, not our Darkness, that most
frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented,
fabulous? Actually, who are you NOT to be? You are a child of God. Your playing
small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightening about shrinking so that
other people won't feel unsure around you. We were born to make manifest
the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone.
As we let our own Light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

Marianne Williamson
(often attributed to Nelson Mandela,
who used it in his 1994 inaugural address)

Faith is a living, daring confidence in God's grace, so sure and certain that
a person would stake his or her life on it a thousand times. This confidence
in God's grace and knowledge of it makes people glad and bold and happy
in dealing with God and with all his creatures; and this is the work of
the Holy Ghost in faith. Hence a person is ready and glad, without compulsion,
to do good to everyone, to serve everyone, to suffer everything,
in love and praise of God, who has shown him or her this grace.

Martin Luther

We often become what we believe ourselves to be. If I keep on saying to
myself that I cannot do a certain thing, it is possible that I may end by really
becoming incapable of doing it. On the contrary, if I have the belief that I
can do it, I shall surely acquire the capacity to do it
even if I may not have it at the beginning.

Mohandas Gandhi

Believe in yourself! Have faith in your abilities! Without a humble but
reasonable confidence in your own powers you
cannot be successful or happy.

Norman Vincent Peale

Somehow I can't believe that there are any heights that can't be scaled by a
person who knows the secrets of making dreams come true. This special
secret, it seems to me, can be summarized in four Cs. They are curiosity,
confidence, courage, and constancy, and the greatest of all is confidence.
When you believe in a thing, believe in it all the way, implicitly and unquestionable.

Walt Disney

Because of the self-confidence with which he had spoken, no one
could tell whether what he said was very clever or very stupid.

Lev Tolstoy
War and Peace