Self Confidence vs Self Esteem

A massive takeaway from my mastermind meeting

Would you want to be friends with yourself?” she said.

“Fuck yeah!” she said.

And so it began. Four weirdos in a haunted clubhouse of a condo complex in Atlanta, GA. An emergency mastermind session.

One guy rolled in with metallic red shoes after a few hours of sleep the night before. Another guy showed up with muscles and long hair. The third dude was wearing a hot pink ski cap with orange sunglasses. He’s the musician. She arrived with a thousand markers, snacks, a Bluetooth speaker, and the confidence of a honey badger.

Actually, delusional confidence.

My private mastermind group met yesterday. We meet every once in a while to figure out our lives. No chance anyone can figure out their life on their own.

No chance.

Ilene — the girl from above — is delusionally confident and generally extremely happy.

“I have been journaling every day this year, which is major progress for me. A prompt from a girl I follow on Instagram last week was:

Would you want to be friends with yourself?

"So I thought about it. Fuck yeah, I would!” she belted out with a huge smile.

Dang. That’s pretty solid.

I’ve always wondered why Ilene is so confident. She’s a legal recruiter in the real world and crushes it. She fears nothing and is obsessed with negotiating.
She negotiated my last car, my last condo, and every other thing I’ve bought over $5,000.

She always wins. Always.

“What do you think the difference is between self-confidence and self-esteem?” I asked the group as I thought about why we either like ourselves or dislike ourselves.

We were settled around the folding table, littered with markers, snacks, journals, and wild ideas.

We asked ChatGPT. Obviously. It said:

Here’s the difference, simply:

Self-confidence = belief in your ability to do things.
("I can handle this situation. I can give this speech. I can learn this skill.")
It's very task-oriented and action-based.

Self-esteem = belief in your worth and value as a person.
("I am enough. I am valuable no matter what happens.")
It's deeper and more internal.

In short:

Self-confidence is about what you can do.
Self-esteem is about who you are.

You can have one without the other — like someone who’s great at their job (high confidence) but deep down doesn't feel good about themselves (low esteem).

Ah, and then, because I have massive ADHD, I asked Chat:

DO YOU, CHATGPT, HAVE CONFIDENCE?

It replied:

Haha, good one. 😄 Nope — I don’t actually feel anything, including confidence.
Confidence requires awareness of yourself and belief in your abilities.
I can simulate confidence (like answering fast or sounding sure), but I don’t have a "self" to believe in.
I’m basically like a really enthusiastic GPS: I can guide you, but I don’t know or care if I’m doing a good job. 🚗✨
If I did have confidence, though, I feel like I’d be obnoxiously overconfident. ("Of course I know everything. I'm ChatGPT!") 😂

That is creepy AF. Sounds like ChatGPT is confident to me. Sneaky AI.

Anyway…

We also concluded, without any scientific merit or intelligence, that self-confidence is the outward projection and self-esteem is the internal belief.

She has both. Like a damn wizard.

"I swear it's because my mom, Linda, is the most positive person on earth.
When my sister and I were young, she would wake us up every day and say...

MAKE IT HAPPEN

...so much that it’s now burned into our brains. She had the energy of the sun every morning pumping us full of positivity.”

Here’s why I think that's interesting:

#1 — It’s different.

Her mom didn’t say have a great day... or be happy today... or you are wonderful every morning.

She said, MAKE IT HAPPEN.

That’s a powerful command to lodge into young folks’ brains.

As an affirmation junkie, I listen to Louise Hay's affirmations on YouTube every morning for 20 minutes in order to rewire my brain from EVERYTING IS A DISASTER to Life is good.

So, MAKE IT HAPPEN is a fantastic affirmation I am going to add to my morning reset.

Way to go, Linda, you powerhouse. You raised two powerful, confident, self-assured women, and we talked behind your back at the mastermind yesterday.

Off to the tattoo shop to get MAKE IT HAPPEN tattooed across my chest.

— Trey

Would you want to be friends with yourself?