How To Be The Most Confident Version Of Yourself

In today's video, you'll learn four habits that will let you feel confident in almost any situation. We'll do this by analyzing some clips of Jake Gyllenhaal, someone who effortlessly projects a fun, confident attitude.

This sweater is destroyed. It's done. Or it's the new rage puppy ripped sweater.

The first step if you want to be confident in any situation, is to learn to laugh at yourself. For an example, watch Jake. In this next clip, he's being forced to read something he said about Hugh Jackman to you. Jackman.

His strength comes from an engine of vulnerability. An engine of vulnerability.

Gotta love that.

Wow. Wow. Us actors are really pretentious, aren't we?

When you laugh at yourself, you sub communicate to the people around you that your imperfections don't bother you. More importantly, when you can laugh at your mistakes, you stop worrying about making them. Because confidence isn't thinking you're perfect. It's being comfortable with the ways you are imperfect. So how do you build this habit if you aren't currently comfortable with your imperfections? The easiest way to start is by telling funny stories from your distant past. For example, listen to how Jake tells the story of bombing his Lord of the Rings.

I had a scene with Lyons and I didn't have an accent. Everyone has a British accent in that, and I didn't do an accent for it. And he literally, he turned to me, he's like, you are the worst actor I have ever seen. He's like, did anyone tell you you're supposed to have an accent? I was like, no. He was like, we'll fire your agents.

It's easier to laugh at stories from your past because there's a time separation. You could be a totally different person today. So you get to practice laughing at yourself without highlighting today's insecurities. Learning to laugh at yourself has another benefit. It trains you to feel confident even when someone is teasing you. But there's a difference between friendly teasing and someone trying to put you down. If you think someone is being rude, the confident thing to do is give yourself permission to call out behavior you don't like. Watch these next few clips to see how. First, Jimmy Fallon brings up a gossip magazine that was critical of Jake.

Anyways, this has got an itch. At one point, the Brokeback Mountain star used his fork to scratch his own back in a rather uncouth manner.

Laughing wouldn't be bad here if you thought it was funny. But Jake doesn't find it funny, so he's unapologetic and he holds his frame?

Yeah. Did you scratch your. Do you scratch your back with a fork? Yeah, man.

You did. That was you?

Yeah.

Yeah, totally.

Why is that weird? Uncouth. Let me say something. Let me just say something. Yeah, like, oh, they determine what's couth and uncouth. You. You take a picture behind my back and then call me uncouth in your own life.

The key is to call out the behavior, not the person. Calling out the person would be something like, hey, don't be a dick. That's likely to make them defensive. Calling out the behavior would be something like, hey, I don't like when you do that. Please don't do it again. Now, in addition to calling out line crossing behavior, you also want to become comfortable calling out awkward moments. Most people don't think to do this because they believe calling attention to an awkward moment will only make it worse. The truth is, awkward moments get more awkward when you try to pretend they aren't happening. It's like that viral interview from a few years ago where the guest did didn't acknowledge that his kids had walked in.

Shifting sands in the region. Do you think relations with the north may change?

I would be surprised if they do the Pardon me. So next time you find yourself in an awkward situation, acknowledge it with a joke and a laugh. Pretending it isn't happening only enhances the awkwardness. Here's one more example, this time with Jake and Ellen DeGeneres.

We were just saying you are such an amazing actor and you choose such diverse roles and that you were a nightcrawler and you had lost all that weight because you wanted to be coyote like. And in southpaw, you're a boxer and your body is insanely good.

Ellen acts like she's going to talk about his acting skills, but quickly makes it all about his body. Jake feels weird about it, so he laughs and calls it out.

And now you're doing what?

What?

No, it's funny. You're like, you're a good actor. You're so good and your body is so good. Yeah, like, I guess that's acting.

Yeah. You can also do this when you're the one responsible for the awkwardness. Like Jake is here. There's a great scene where you're at your wedding, your character's wedding, and you're breakdancing.

Yes, I am.

And you do a complete breakdance routine.

Yes, I am.

Jake's reaction is a little odd, and you can tell Conan isn't sure how to respond. If you find yourself in an awkward situation like this, here's how to instantly turn things around.

Yes, I am.

How do you feel about your. You look at it now and you're feeling good about your breakdance routine, I expect.

I expected a bigger response from that one. Yes, I do. Break dance.

By calling it out with a smile, Jake breaks the awkwardness. Now, you won't have a studio audience to applaud you, but the principle still applies in your life. For instance, let's say you just told a joke and it bombed and now there's an awkward silence. You can smile and say, I'm not gonna lie. I thought that would get a bigger laugh. This will very likely get a laugh and diffuse the awkwardness caused by the bad joke, which, because you've acknowledged it, the confidence to call yourself out comes from a mindset shift. Most people focus on trying to impress the person they're talking to. Instead, make your focus in conversation to have fun.

What does this do? Press to operate. No, don't touch. I like how your names are on the chairs. It says Jake and Russell. You guys know which chair to sit? No, we're idiots. Let's be honest. I had to put this on here. It was like, how high are we? How high are they? By the way, when the next interviewer comes on, I'm taking mine off and you keep your soaking back. Ryan always needs his name designated.

Jake will even extend some interviews and be late to others because he's having fun.

One more, one more. This is so. This is fun. Just one more. Let's waste so much time. Just one more. Ready?

Now. A lot of people want to have more fun in conversation, but they aren't sure how. Maybe you don't think you're funny or maybe you feel like your mind goes blank whenever you try to think of something clever to say. If that's you, then the easiest thing you can do is be a heightener. Keep an eye out for someone else to make a joke, and then laugh. Jump in and double down on it. This will help you be more playful in conversation. And as an added bonus, whoever you're heightening will feel good that you liked their joke. Here's a fun quick example of how to do that with Jake and Ryan Reynolds.

You're gonna see, like, little red dots, like, come up little laser sights with a tranquilizer dart.

Yeah, I got him the leg.

And then just slowly. Actually, the thing about it is the.

Scary now everything we've talked about is much easier when you've internalized one mindset. Social confidence doesn't demand that anyone specific like you, it trusts that enough people will over time, this mindset lets you take the pressure off any single introduction date or job interview because you realize you only need some of your conversations to go well, not all of them. So you can afford to make a few bad impressions in the pursuit of focusing on having fun. If you can adopt this abundance mindset, you will be way more confident in any conversation. Now, you might think building the habits in this video will take you a long time, or maybe you think it's impossible for you that you could never actually put this stuff into practice. But building confidence is way easier than you think. With the right game plan, you can become significantly more confident in just a few weeks. If you want the fastest way I know to take your confidence and charisma to the next level, you should check out our program Charisma University. Rather than tell you about the program myself, here are a few things that past members have said. I had confidence in some areas, but not in others. Then Charisma University changed that for me. Since beginning the program, I have seen noticeable changes in my life. It has helped me unlock the confidence that comes from knowing that I can go into any social situation and crush it. Another member wrote in I've always been bad at expressing myself in situations that weren't one on one. In conversations, I'd find myself hesitant to speak or I'd get caught in my own head overthinking things. After cu, I am now way more confident in saying what I think. I feel much happier all the time. I was even able to talk to a woman I've had a crush on for about a year and made a great first impression. Overall, I love this course and I keep going back to it when I need a refresher on the Daily Action modules and the last one writes thank you so much for this program. After going through charisma, I've made more friends, have higher self esteem, and can more easily talk to people I don't know. I've solidified my values and I know who I am. The program is literally guaranteed to change your life. That means you can take the entire course and if you don't think it was worth every penny, you can give yourself a full refund from inside the program. If you want to see if Charisma University is right for you, click the link on screen now or in the description below. Either way, I hope you enjoyed this video. I really appreciate you taking the time to watch it and I hope to see you in the next one.