How to Have Maximum Interview Confidence

Do you have butterflies in your stomach when you go for interviews? It's hardly surprising when the outcome is so important to your future life and prosperity and that of your family and loved ones.

You've already laboured over writing your resume and now you must face the prospect of an interview. A feeling of trepidation is understandable although many people have a careless attitude that can be just as damaging to your prospects.

Either way, how much better it would be if we could go into every interview brimming with confidence. Not only will it be a more pleasurable experience but it will also have a very positive effect on the interviewer with the result that your chances of success are dramatically increased.

The good news is that the solution is surprisingly simple to learn. In fact it's so easy that you may be sceptical, so please bear with me whilst I explain.

You know how a particular tune will instantly remind you of an important or enjoyable event in your life? Maybe it's a tune that was popular when you met your partner. You may even refer to it as our tune. Or songs from when you were young bring back happy memories, which is why nostalgic compilation albums are so popular.

When you hear these tunes again they act as a trigger that immediately puts you back in the happy frame of mind that you remember from the past.

As well as happy and positive triggers, most of us also experience negative triggers. This often happens when someone, often a close family member, repeats something that always irritates us. At best we may just be irritated but, at worst, we may be sent into a rage that we find hard to control.

Once you understand that your brain is reacting subconsciously to both positive and negative triggers, it's easy to take action to change your reaction if it's not what you want.

The first step is to decide that the very mention of an interview will no longer bring on feelings of insecurity or despair. You will make a conscious decision to consider it a wonderful opportunity to promote yourself. Now here is the important part...

Sit quietly with no background noise or distraction and think of a time when you felt supremely confident and happy. If you are a sport player, it might be a recent event when you or your team had a great success. It might be an event in your childhood when you first accomplished something. The joy you felt when you learnt to swim or ride a bike. Or the applause you received when you were in the school play or choir. It might simply be when a parent said what a clever person you were.

Whatever the event, remember it now and replay it in your mind. See yourself on a movie screen re-enacting the event. Remember what was said. Hear the sounds around you. See the scene play out in Technicolor. Remember the feelings you had. Notice what smells there were - whether sweat or flowers, dust or smoke.

The trick is to relive the experience as vividly as you can. And as you relive that happy moment when you were so filled with confidence and the feeling that you could conquer the world I want you to clench your fist.

I want you to repeat this every morning and again every evening. This is most important. If you have time and a quiet place to be during the day, you can repeat it as often as you like but please do it at least twice a day. Remember that on every occasion you must be sure to relive your happy and confident event as graphically and vividly as possible and on every occasion, when you are at the height of the experience it is vital that you clench your fist.

Once you have done this exercise a few times try this. As you are going about your daily business I want you to clench your fist. And when you do you'll find something quite amazing happens. You'll immediately feel happy and supremely confident.

What you have done is to train your brain to associate the trigger of the clenched fist with a feeling of happiness and confidence.

If it doesn't work straight away, don't give up. Repeat the visualisation and try extra hard to relive it using all your senses. See it. Feel it. Hear it. Smell it. Even taste it.

Some people will find that they only need to do the exercise two or three times for the clenched fist trigger to work. For others it might take more practice. But the trigger will work for everyone because that's the way the brain works.

Now when you are invited into the interviewer's office stand straight, walk tall and clench your fist. Your brain will react to the trigger and a feeling of supreme happiness and confidence will flood over you.

Sensing your happy and confident disposition, the interviewer will react favourably towards you. And the interview will be an enjoyable experience for both of you. Even if you are asked to take an aptitude testyou can do so with the utmost confidence. Goodbye butterflies, hello golden future.