I Spent Years Performing Confidence
Soft Power Project
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Description
For most of my life, I thought confidence was a performance. The right body language, the right phrasing, looking sure of myself on stage even when I was terrified.
I learned that version growing up between two worlds. In Taiwan, humility was the virtue: speak up only when you have something worth saying. Then I studied in North America and got the opposite lesson: just speak, it barely matters what you say. I spent years getting good at performing confidence. I never had much fun doing it.
Now I teach communication back in Taiwan, and I keep meeting people with PhDs and real experience who still feel like it isn’t good enough.
So I’ve been rethinking the whole thing. Maybe real confidence isn’t the loudest voice in the room. Maybe it’s the soft power of trusting yourself enough to speak the truth without softening it, and to say “I don’t know” without flinching. It’s the question I keep coming back to on the Soft Power Project, and I’m still figuring out what it looks like in 2026.
If you’ve ever performed a certainty you didn’t feel, this one is for you.
What does confidence mean to you?
0:00 - The Journey of Understanding Confidence
4:03 - Cultural Perspectives on Confidence
7:54 - Redefining Confidence in the Modern Age
#SoftPowerProject #Confidence #SelfTrust #PersonalGrowth #SoftPower
Leave a comment and share your thoughts: https://open.firstory.me/user/cm5etbvm00a1i01sl6k6h99de/comments
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For most of my life, I thought confidence was a performance. The right body language, the right phrasing, looking sure of myself on stage even when I was terrified.
I learned that version growing up between two worlds. In Taiwan, humility was the virtue: speak up only when you have something worth saying. Then I studied in North America and got the opposite lesson: just speak, it barely matters what you say. I spent years getting good at performing confidence. I never had much fun doing it.
Now I teach communication back in Taiwan, and I keep meeting people with PhDs and real experience who still feel like it isn’t good enough.
So I’ve been rethinking the whole thing. Maybe real confidence isn’t the loudest voice in the room. Maybe it’s the soft power of trusting yourself enough to speak the truth without softening it, and to say “I don’t know” without flinching. It’s the question I keep coming back to on the Soft Power Project, and I’m still figuring out what it looks like in 2026.
If you’ve ever performed a certainty you didn’t feel, this one is for you.
What does confidence mean to you?
0:00 - The Journey of Understanding Confidence
4:03 - Cultural Perspectives on Confidence
7:54 - Redefining Confidence in the Modern Age
#SoftPowerProject #Confidence #SelfTrust #PersonalGrowth #SoftPower
Leave a comment and share your thoughts: https://open.firstory.me/user/cm5etbvm00a1i01sl6k6h99de/comments
Youtube
Instagram
Would you like to share your life stories?
Please fill out this form. See you there~