Understanding Confidence, Self-Confidence, and Self-Esteem

Terms like confidence, self-confidence, and self-esteem are often used interchangeably or in confused ways, but don't mean the same thing. These simplified definitions will be useful throughout this course. To bring you these clear definitions, I combined a number of more complex definitions from various official sources in psychology, researchers, and Wikipedia.

Confidence

Confidence is about a specific event or skill. This can be confidence about some outside event outside of your control, or about your own ability at some event, skill, or subject matter.

Self-Confidence

Self-confidence is about your overall ability to gain skills, learn skills, or accomplish tasks. This relates more to yourself and whether you're confident in your ability to do something, not just a specific thing.

Self-Esteem

Self-esteem refers to your feeling of overall self-worth.

Key Points

• Confidence: Specific event or skill
• Self-Confidence: Overall ability to gain skills and accomplish tasks
• Self-Esteem: Overall self-worth

There is natural overlap among these terms, which is why in pop culture and everyday life, there's often confusion about when to use each term and what each one means. By understanding these simplified definitions, you will be able to use them correctly throughout the course and in your everyday language. This will help you process your internal dialogue, relate to various situations, and make correct assessments and plans for the future. You will be able to make yourself more confident, more self-confident, and have higher self-esteem overall.

Using the correct terminology will enable you to reason correctly and make accurate plans for personal development. This will be very useful for us throughout the course as we refer to these terms in a correct manner.