15 Ways to Strike a Balance between Confidence and Arrogance

15 Ways to Strike a Balance between Confidence and Arrogance

The issue of striking a balance between confidence and arrogance is always going to be a controversial one considering the fact that most people don’t see them from the same point of view.

That’s why it’s important you read through this article to know how to do so.

In striking a balance between confidence and arrogance, it is important you first of all understand that from a literal view or understand, the two words may not have so much difference between them.

So, we will look at the best ways to do so:

How to Strike a Balance between Confidence and Arrogance

1. Understand the basic difference between the two

Basically, confidence is different from arrogance and the two don’t achieve the same goal.

Confidence can build while arrogance can destroy whatever you have built over time.

Confidence deals with self-assurance or certainty about something.

There is nothing bad about being sure about yourself or what you are doing.

That will certainly help you throw doubt and fear out of the window.

Confidence builds your ability to do better in whatever you do.

Arrogance on the other hand is an extreme pride in which someone thinks highly of himself.

In other words, an arrogant person has passed from self-assurance to extreme pride and in most cases thinks he/she is infallible.

So, understand the difference between the two.

This will help you know when you are confident and when you are just being arrogant.

2. Be real

Arrogance sometimes shows up when one tries to show off.

Showing off is one sign of arrogance or pride.

Don’t push yourself to portray what you are not.

This could harm your confidence and in the process put you in a bad light more than you can imagine or handle.

So, being real entails being yourself, not trying to copy others or showing off.

This is helpful as it becomes easy for people to approach you and relate well with you.

But once they sense your arrogance through portraying yourself to be what you are not, then coming close to you becomes difficult.

Be simple in your approach to matters and say things the way they are.

Even though you should respect the opinion of others, however that does not entail you going into your shell simply because you don’t want to be misinterpreted or misunderstood. Keep it real.

3. You don’t need that unnecessary competition

Though competition is the name of the game in today’s world, survival of the fittest as we know but it, however, not all competitions are necessary.

It is in the process of unguided competition that some people begin to exude arrogance, mistaking it to be confidence.

If you must compete, then let the competition be a healthy one where you improve on your skills and also help improve other people.

Any other form of competition that does not accomplish the feats mentioned above is not a healthy competition.

When you get involved in unhealthy competitions, you tend to think highly about yourself and in some cases forget that you have flaws.

Arrogance wouldn’t allow you make the necessary corrections; rather it makes you think that you have it all.

4. Don’t hide

This is similar to open-mindedness but differ a little. In different walks of life, there is always room for correction and improvement.

This entails that we are expected to learn everyday actively and not hide under the guise that it happens to every other person.

That is arrogance.

Arrogance makes you feel that you are good to go despite your flaws and suggestions that people bring to you.

You just don’t want to consider whatever anybody has to say. As long as it looks good to you, you are alright.

Sometimes, some people do this unknowingly simply because they don’t want to get criticized.

Some people go to the extent of relinquishing responsibilities.

It may look like you are avoiding problems but that is arrogance because you think you don’t deserve to be criticized.

5. Be open-minded

The line between confidence and arrogance is a thin one, so care must be taken not to cross the line from confidence to arrogance.

This could happen without one knowing that it is so.

One can be arrogant and mistaken it to be confidence. It happens all the time in all facets of life.

One of the ways to keep yourself in check is to ensure that you allow people to advice or criticize you when and where necessary.

If you want to be better and watch your confidence, then you must allow people to give you feedback on what they think about your actions.

Sometimes, it can be difficult considering the fact that not many people in the society are blessed with the gift of constructive criticism.

However, with open-mindedness, you can digest the most important ones and work on yourself.

6. Be constructive

This is when you are in a position to criticize others.

Do it in a constructive manner with the understanding that every human being has a flaw.

When you understand that even you criticizing someone else has flaws, then you will do it lovingly.

Arrogance in criticism is when you criticize giving the impression that you cannot make mistakes.

This could be the height of arrogance.

As much as you are good in whatever you do, remember that there was a time you were struggling to get to the level you find yourself now.

So, there is nothing wrong in criticism but what is not acceptable is when you do it destructively or out of arrogance.

Showing superiority is not necessary and may not achieve the desired goal.

Be cool, calm, and friendly when dealing with people’s flaws.

7. Compete with yourself and not others

This may seem strange, but it is the truth.

Competition abounds but the best person to compete with is yourself.

When you compete with yourself, you build confidence but when you try all you can to compete with everyone out there, you may be building arrogance.

Nothing gives joy rather than knowing that you are better than who you used to be.

Everyday take out your time to improve yourself all round and remove your eyes a little bit from what others are doing.

That could breed jealousy and arrogance in you.

When you look at what others are doing and you feel you are doing better than them, then it becomes difficult to curtail your confidence so that it does not snowball into full blown arrogance.

That’s why the most important person to compete with is yourself.

8. Value others

Most times a confident person thinks about themselves and also about others while an arrogant fellow does not care about how other people feel or rate them.

This is quite bad as the opinion of people should matter to you if you really want to be excellent in whatever you do.

You cannot value what people have to say if you don’t value them.

The value you place on people is what determines how lightly or seriously you take their feedback.

Most organizations today don’t joke with customer feedbacks because they believe that the customers matter in the continuity of the organization.

When you value people, you will be careful not to exhibit arrogance before them.

This has nothing to do with age.

When you value people, you make them feel special at any given opportunity.

Otherwise, when you don’t value people, you will be tempted to neglect them.

9. Don’t be overly self-reliant

Being independent is not a bad idea, but it becomes a bad idea when you think that the inputs of other people don’t matter.

Understand that people are the most important tools you will need to succeed with in whatever you do.

Remember that a tree does not make a forest. It has never and never will.

In the business world, this is seen in a lot of multilevel marketing schemes or networking.

You will discover that in network marketing, it is heavily dependent on the individual efforts of members of a team.

This is the secret of network marketing.

Trying to do things all by yourself is a sure way of exhibiting arrogance.

It may look like confidence initially, but at the end you will discover that you have been under the influence of arrogance.

Learn from other people and also contribute to the knowledge of others.

That’s what confidence should help you achieve.

10. Be observant

This is like taking good stock about yourself.

This is necessary if you desire to stay within the confines of confidence without crossing over to arrogance.

You need to evaluate and reevaluate yourself on daily basis to ensure that you are on the right track.

The first point in this article discussed the difference between confidence and arrogance.

The essence of that point is to help you evaluate your speech, thoughts, and actions and know where each falls.

This will help you keep yourself and your activities in check.

This self-evaluation should be done on regular basis preferably daily.

This will help you tackle any atom of arrogance even at the earliest stage.

Observe your actions and learn to be sincere with yourself whenever you get it wrong. This will put you in check always.

11. Learn from people’s mistakes

This is where arrogance becomes dangerous. Arrogance whispers some frivolous things into your mind.

Things like: that guy was not good enough that’s why he failed, you cannot fail even if you make the same mistakes that guy made.
This may sound true but that is not the case.

Not learning from the mistakes of the past made by people that brought about failure could also bring about your own failure.

This has contributed to the downfall of many people in different spheres of life.

However, when you learn from those mistakes, it shoots up your confidence and keeps you on a good pedestal to succeed.

Arrogance says, “No, there is no need for you to go through the stress of learning from the downfall of people”, while confidence says, “You have a lot to gain if you can learn from their mistakes”.

12. Be humble

Humility is a key factor to maintaining a balance between confidence and arrogance.

In fact, the truth is that there is no arrogant man or woman out there that can boast of being humble.

This is because, humility is in sharp contrast to what arrogance represents.

Arrogance is simply confidence in the absence of humility.

You can be doing well in your field, but when your confidence is void of humility, you will degenerate into arrogance.

So, in evaluating yourself every day, humility is the yardstick to use.

To ensure that your confidence remains pure and steady, always ensure that you are humble.

And also understand that humility is not all about age.

Without humility, you cannot learn and if you cannot learn, you cannot teach, neither can you lead.

13. Talk less about your past achievement

Your personal achievements should be a source of confidence.

In fact, your achievements should be one of the things that should spur you into doing better in whatever you do.

Your achievements can lift your spirit into believing you can do better.

However, care should be taken so that your achievements do not turn you into an arrogant person.

It is possible to rely on what you have achieved in the past and think it is great.

If making reference to your past achievements does not help you do better, then it is time to let go.

Many people are not doing well today simply because they believe that the achievements they made in the past are enough.

So, because of that, you hardly sense any kind of improvement in what they do.

14. Accept your mistakes

This is important too. Mistakes are normal and can happen again.

However, your approach or attitude is what will portray you as being confident or arrogant.

Arrogant people don’t accept their mistakes because they don’t see their mistakes as anything serious.

When you accept your mistakes and make the necessary corrections, you will not degenerate or enter the trap of arrogance.

This is because arrogance somehow makes one unteachable, and because one is unteachable, such a person cannot learn.

This sometimes could be an individual problem, meaning it could be a negative trait found in an individual, which always has a spillover effect on the person’s general life.

If you discover it in you, it is time to seek for help on how to get over it.

15. Develop your interpersonal skills

As one of the points above stated clearly, people are the most important tools you will need if you are to succeed in any aspect of life.

This is so true because there is nothing we do with ourselves and the society without having something to do with people.

You may know this fact but another important problem one can face is how to get across to people and share your ideas with them, and get to know what they think and feel about it and you.

This is where you will need some good interpersonal skills.

Understand that nobody wants to associate with an arrogant person.

This is one of the reasons why you may not be having people come around you always.

You need to have interpersonal skills so that you can accept people for who they are and they in turn can accept you and work with you.

Conclusion

Striking a balance between confidence and arrogance will always prove to be one of the most difficult things people can do.

This is because the line between confidence and arrogance is so thin that it takes being meticulous to spot out the difference between the two.

This article has been able to show you how to strike a balance between confidence and arrogance.

Understand that if you are not able to spot out the differences between the two, you may find it difficult to know when you move from confidence to arrogance.