The School of Greatness - 7 Science-Backed Frameworks That Will Rewire Your Brain for Unshakable Confidence

Episode Date: September 10, 2025

Andrew Huberman will be on stage at The Summit of Greatness, happening September 12 & 13! Get your ticket today!What if I told you that the reason you've struggled with confidence your whole life has nothing to do with motivation and everything to do with your nervous system? After 12 years of interviewing the world's top experts and my own journey from crippling insecurity to building a media empire, I've discovered that confidence isn't who you are – it's what you practice. In this episode, I'm sharing seven science-backed frameworks that will rewire your brain for unshakable confidence, from hacking your nervous system with physiological sighs to building proof through failure. These aren't just mental tricks; they're biological and chemical shifts that will transform how you show up in the world. By the end of this episode, you'll have a complete blueprint to go from self-doubt to unstoppable confidence in just seven days.Make Money Easy: Create Financial Freedom and Live a Richer LifeThe Greatness Mindset: Unlock the Power of Your Mind and Live Your Best Life TodayThe Mask of Masculinity: How Men Can Embrace Vulnerability, Create Strong Relationships, and Live Their Fullest LivesThe School of Greatness: A Real-World Guide to Living Bigger, Loving Deeper, and Leaving a LegacyIn this episode you will:Discover how to hack your brain for confidence using Dr. Andrew Huberman's physiological sigh technique to calm your nervous systemTransform your relationship with failure by learning to collect failures as fuel and treat them as feedback dataBuild a "proof journal" to stack undeniable evidence of your capabilities until no one – not even you – can question themBreak free from the trap of waiting to "feel" confident by learning to trust data over fleeting emotionsMaster the art of stepping into discomfort to expand your comfort zone and build resilience through exposure therapyFor more information go to https://lewishowes.com/1822For more Greatness text PODCAST to [phone]More SOG episodes we think you’ll love:Dr. Andrew Huberman – greatness.lnk.to/1073SCDr. Tara Swart  – greatness.lnk.to/1629SCDr. Kevin Tracey –greatness.lnk.to/1812SC Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy!Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

We just confirmed that Andrew Huberman is coming to the Summit of Greatness, along with some other amazing speakers. We've got Dr. Terrace Sward, Brendan Bershard, Gabby Bernstein, Amy Purdy, and some huge entertainers and performers. Make sure to get your tickets right now. Summone of Greatness is happening September 12th and 13th here in Hollywood. I can't wait to see you there. What if I told you that you do not lack confidence, but instead you lack the blueprint

that unlocks confidence. Confidence is a skill. It's a muscle and even a brain state that you personally, yes you, can start to train. And in this video, I'm giving you seven frameworks for building lasting confidence backed by therapists, backed by neuroscientists, elite athletes, and world class experts in this field. The first hack is to hack your brain for confidence. So what if the reason you've struggled with confidence, your whole life has nothing to do with motivation and everything to do with your nervous system. There's a great quote out there by Dr. Andrew Huberman who says stress is not always bad. It can be a powerful motivator and help us perform at our best. Huberman shows that reframing stress as excitement, it actually shifts your nervous system

response. It has this kind of controlled techniques like physiological size where you do a double inhale and a longer exhale. This helps calm the system and create resilience. And I want to share a quick clip when I interviewed Dr. Andrew Huberman right now to explain this exact hack for you. Let's watch this right here. Double inhales followed by an extended exhale are the fastest way that I'm aware of to bring the mind and the body into a more relaxed state. Two, inhales through the nose, and then exhale slow through the mouth. One to three of those repeated will bring your level of autonomic arousal down basically to baseline. But I think for anyone that experiences anxiety from time to time, which is everybody,

knowing that you can consciously take control over these neurons that control the ratio of carbon dioxide and oxygen in the lungs, et cetera, Even if you don't remember any of that, it's just two inhales through the nose. What you're trying to do is maximally inflate those little sacks in your lungs and then exhale long through the mouth because you're blowing off karma dioxide. I love this clip from Huberman and we've had him on this podcast a few different times. We'll link up the full episode below so you can see more about that. But another guest that we've had on, one of the most elite tennis players of all time, Novak Djokovic, often describes games. day nerves, not as fear, but as energy-fueling performance. And again, when we feel insecure,

when we feel nervous, when we feel embarrassed, I remember so many times where I just felt like when I was nervous or felt like someone was going to, you know, laugh at me. It's like I was sweating through my pits. My hands were clammy. It was like you just kind of over-analyzing. You're in your head. You are the opposite of confidence. You're the opposite of cool, calm, and collected, you're hot, you're sweaty, you're bothered, but not in the good ways that I'm talking about. You're just like overwhelmed with anxiousness, anxiety, fear. And it's almost like you feel crippled. You don't know what to say. You don't know what actions to take. You feel stuck. You feel trapped in your own psychological wounds and your nervous system feels

like it doesn't feel safe. And therefore, you don't have the confidence. For me, you know, it's it's really about making sure you can learn a certain strategy in your mind to breathe and that's why this one technique that dr huberman talks about is when you feel anxious when you feel overwhelmed when you feel stress the moment can feel so big sometimes whether i'm playing uh at a at a big stage playing football or playing on my handball journey of trying to get the olympics the moment can feel so big and daunting that you have to to bring it back into the moment of breathing, a double inhale and then a longer exhale to calm your mind and your nervous system at the same time. Because when you feel anxiety, stress, and overwhelm, you're in fight or flight. It's like, ah, how can I be cool, calm, and collected where, you know, babies, you know, want to be in my arms and the opposite sex is constantly laughing at me every word I say and opportunities come to me and I'm just this relaxation of being. When I'm constantly stressed and anxious in my mind. So we've got to be thinking about calming down the mind

and the nervous system at the same time. When you see confident people speak, they're not speaking really fast like this and they're not doing that style. They're really calm. They're really relaxed. They're able to have silence in between their sentences. They're able to say something and pause and think about it they don't have to have the answer right away they can just sit there they can have eye contact they can smile they can take a moment and then they can finish their sentence and it's almost when you're on when you're at an event or a conference and you see someone speaking on stage with such confidence and such command it's almost like they can walk around on stage, and they can pause after every word and get you captivated by what they're going to say next.

And they are calm in their cadence. Now, it doesn't mean you always have to be calm because that will be boring if you're always speaking like that. But they have moments where they can be relaxed and how they approach their communication style, their speech. And it exudes confidence because you don't have to always say something in order to get your message across. So I want you to try this strategy. Every morning, in the morning, I want you to take three deep physiological size, these breaths, that Dr. Huberman is talking about where you're taking these breaths in posture. So you're not taking a physiological sigh where you're kind of like hunched over and like

anxious, but more in a state of positive being. You're in a state of positive posture. You're taking three deep breaths in the morning when you wake up. And you're allowing your nervous system to calm. in your posture of confidence. Then you can say, this is energy and I show up in confidence. This is empowering energy, even if you feel nervous and anxious and stressed, but speak to yourself in a way that is talking about the fear or the anxiety, I turn this into excitement. I turn this into positive energy so I can show up my full self. And you also have to know that you don't

have to be perfect all the time. You don't have to have everything figured out at all the times in your life. You don't have to say the perfect thing. You don't have to look the perfect way to be confident, because confidence is a body language. It's a way you present yourself. And you don't have to have all the answers to present yourself as a confident person. You don't have to have all the success in the world to present yourself as confident. You don't have to make all the money. You don't have to make all the money in the world to present yourself as confident. It's a knowingness about you that you're going to be okay no matter what happens. And when you live in stress and fear and anxiety of, well, what happens if I make a mistake, then what will happen? It shows a lack of

poise. It shows a lack of acceptance of yourself on your own journey. So use the physiological sigh, breath, in posture, in a positive posture. and allow yourself to practice that in the morning. When you can apply this strategy, apply this psychological strategy backed by neuroscience that is proven to give you results right now, this one action step, you will start the process of feeling more confident

and then acting more confident. Confidence isn't only mental, it's chemical, it's biological. You shift your brain's default to, one of readiness and presence. And if you're able to stay ready in your life, you don't have to get ready. So a lot of times when the moment happens, people feel like, I'm not ready for this moment

or this unexpected request of me. I don't know what to do because I'm not prepared. That's why you always want to prepare your mind and your nervous system to be ready so you don't have to get ready. And if you're always in a state of readiness, I'm prepared. Maybe it's not going to look perfect, but I'm confident in my ability to show up as myself,

to not abandon myself, to create boundaries. I don't have to say yes and people please everyone else. That's not confidence. Confidence is being able to make a decision based on your values, not based on others' values. And when you constantly live in that place, you're going to show up as a confident human being. And that's just one step, one key. So the first key is to hack your brain for confidence. You can do that by the physiological sigh.

Using that sigh as a practice in the morning, a practice before you go on stage, a practice before you speak to your boss, a practice before you ask a person out, whatever it might be. Use that to hack your brain for confidence. the second key. And if you've ever tried this, I want you to let me know what the result has been for you. In the comments below, let me know if you've done this before, this physiological

sigh breathing technique, let me know if it's worked for you, how it's worked for you, how it's supported you. Leave a comment below. And if you, if this is your first time hearing this, then do this practice right now three times and see how it makes you feel. Just do two, two breaths in through the nose and then a longer exhale and do that three times. I already feel more relaxed doing it one time, more calm. You're bringing oxygen into the brain throughout the body and you're relaxing the brain as well with that longer exhale. This is biology and neuroscience combined.

So try this right now. I want you to take action. Confident people take action in their life. and I know you are an action taker as well because you're watching this video. So that is key number one. Key number two. And a lot of these things, you know, I'm curious your thoughts on this. I'm curious your comment below because a lot of these things I'm going to talk to you

about, you've probably heard in some way, shape, or form, but you maybe not have put them all into sequence, all seven of these at the same time, every single. single day in your life to build unshakable, unwavering confidence. So maybe you've heard this, maybe you've tried some of this, but you still feel insecure. That's okay. We're here to give you the framework so you can apply these seven things every single day for the next seven days and then build this into your life. I want you to have the frameworks, the tools, the inspiring stories, the lessons that back these stories as well so that you can apply it daily. This This is, as much as this is for you, this is for me as well to constantly remind myself.

The reason I create this content, the reason I have books like the greatness mindset, and the reason I write this down is because it's everything I've learned over decades of my own personal experience as an elite athlete, playing professional football, being a two sport all-American, being on the USA men's national handball team in my pursuit of the Olympics right now in three years. years to building a massive media empire, having multiple New York time bestsellers, having 20 million followers on social media on all my platforms, and interviewing over 12 and a half years of some of the top leaders in the world. The reason I keep showing up to learn and keep showing up to create content for you through this video, through these books, is because I want the constant reminder. Sure, I've heard a lot of this stuff. I've known. I've heard a lot of this stuff. I've known a lot of this stuff since high school when I was studying sports psychology in high school to try to get to the collegiate level and then the professional level

study this stuff for my own insecurities because again I was extremely insecure and doubted myself daily and it was crippling. I was always insecure and so I continue to do this because I like the constant reminder. I could easily fall into default of insecurity, self-doubt with the best of them. And this is a reminder for me to continue these practices. So you might have heard some of these before, but you're probably not doing all of them consistently with this specific framework.

And the second hack is that confidence is a muscle. Confidence isn't who you are. It's what you practice. Stop waiting to feel confident. Start practicing it until, your brain has no choice but to believe you. Let me say this one more time. Confidence isn't who you are. It's what you practice. Stop waiting to feel confident. Start practicing it until your brain has no choice but to believe you. This is a powerful thing. And there's a

quote that I like that is from Vanessa Van Edwards. It says, the path to more confidence is in your hands. Confidence doesn't grow without water, fertilizer, and a little TLC. Now, here's an example. Neuroscience shows that repeated actions physically rewire the brain neuroplasticity. Again, Vanessa Van Edwards teaches that microbehaviors a clear voice, eye contact, open body language, an open posture, shift how people perceive you, and how you internally feel. So let me explain this again. Neuroscience shows repeated actions physically rewire the brain's neuroplasticity. Okay.

So it teaches that microbehaviors a clear tone in your voice, eye contact, the ability to look at people in the eye. In a world where we've got cell phones where no one's looking at each other when we're hanging out over lunch or dinner or on a walk, people are on their phones looking at the phone rather than the person next to them. We have lost the ability to build confidence because we are susceptible to devices that hold us back and break these emotional abilities. So if you're unable to have eye contact when someone's speaking to you, you don't come across as a confident person. When you're able to look someone in the eyes, not in the creepy way, or some like stalkery way, but in a calm, confident way with open body posture, open body stance, not, you know, closed off like a hunchback here, you know, with your arms cross,

your legs cross and like this insecure little puppy dog, but just a relaxed open body position on open posture. You internally, your nervous system, your brain shifts how people perceive you and how you internally feel. Isn't that fascinating? Body language, eye contact, clear voice, these micro behaviors Vanessa Van Everis talks about, shift how you perceive yourself and how others perceive you.

So I want you to do an analysis right now of yourself. Do you speak with a clear voice, with a clear tone? I know I struggle with this most of my life. When you're shy and insecure and you doubt yourself, you talk like shy and insecure and your body language follows. it mimics the belief about you. So this is a process of overcoming this to build unshakable confidence.

But you have to ask yourself, do I speak with a clear tone? Do I look in people's eyes when they're speaking to me or when I speak to them? Do I have an open body posture? Or do I have an FU across my face that says, do not talk to me

and I cross my arms anytime someone talks to me? How you show up is how you're perceived. And it's if you're perceived, confidently or not. So something I want you to try is to execute three confidence reps today. So after you watch this or listen to this episode, I want you to have three confidence reps today because confident people take action now. They don't say, I want to start this next week or next month or next year. They take action immediately on what they're given to them so they can implement this and anchor this into their life because they're going to have to

repeat it over and over again for the habit to become second nature. So right after this episode, three confidence reps. Number one, hold eye contact. The next person you see, I don't care if you go get a coffee at the coffee shop. You got to connect to the person who is taking your order and you're going to look them the eyes. You're not going to look down the whole time. You're not going to look at the menu and say, here's my order, blah, blah, blah,

and not even look at them. You're going to look at them. If you can, look at the name tag and say, hi, Jeff. and speak clearly and give a genuine compliment. Hold eye contact, speak clearly, and give a genuine compliment. And if you add into saying the person's name, it creates a stronger confidence connection with that individual. Anytime you hear your name, it makes you light up.

It makes you spark. It makes you feel appreciated, seen, valued, and validated. That breeds confidence. in the other person as well as in you. You're speaking it to someone and someone speaking it to you. Comes across as a more confident, genuine person. So three confidence reps today. Hold eye contact, speak clearly, give a genuine compliment.

Bonus, if you say the person's name, whether it's a friend, family member, whoever might be. So the key takeaway is confidence strengthens through repetition. Again, you've probably heard a lot of these things before. but confidence strengthens through repetition. Neural pathways become smoother, just like lifting weights builds muscle. Again, you've probably heard the analogy of lifting weights

and getting stronger and building the muscle over time. It has to, you have to be willing to put in that effort. You have to be willing to stretch the muscle and almost strain it a little bit. So it has a micro tear and then heals and builds and build stronger. The more you build your confidence muscle, the more you become unshakable in the psychological warfare of life. Whatever it is that you're doing at your career, your job and your business and your relationship and walking around the world, the psychological warfare of

life, when you are confident with you, you have emotional range, physical range, psychological range, that you are more flexible to what the world throws at you. You are less fragile. And fragile people are not confident people in general. When you have thin skin and any time someone says something critical of you, hits you and affects you emotionally, it doesn't show that you're confident if you're reacting to people criticizing you. If you're online, you know, being a keyboard warrior trying to do,

defend yourself by someone judging you. It shows that you have very weak, thin skin, and it's easy to penetrate to get into your psyche, to get into your mind and into your heart. And when you have confidence and you build the muscle, you're able to be more pliable. It doesn't mean you're going to be this perfect human being that's never affected by, you know, something hurtful in your life. But you want to be more resilient emotionally. And we had a neuroscientist and brain surgeon on the show.

Dr. Raul Jendial, and I asked him, he did over a thousand brain surgeries, and he was also a neuroscientist, so a neurosurgeon and a neuroscientist studying the brain and the mind. And I said, what's the number one skill that all human beings should have to improve the quality of their life more? And he said, emotional regulation. The number one skill from a brain surgeon and neuroscientist was emotional regulation. Because when you can learn to regulate your emotions, you become unstoppable in life. And I'm not saying to not have emotions.

I'm not saying to be, you know, this stoic person who never feels anything. But your goal is to not be overly reactive to life's stresses, not allow a response out of yourself from the stimulus of life. And again, allow yourself to have a range of emotions, but to not allow those emotions to control and consume you where you lack the confidence and the clarity to take action in your life. So confidence is a muscle. That is number two. If this is resonating so far, if this is making sense, if it's landing for you, if it's adding value, leave a comment right now and let me know what part of this is landing for you so far. and again we've got five more keys here that again if you if you implement these seven keys

it is going to transform your life and you're going to come back to me you're going to message me on instagram or you're going to email me or you're going to come back to this video in the next seven days and you're going to say louis i did all seven of these things and you know animals started coming to me everyone wanted to hand their babies to me i was giving opportunities left and right why is life feel so much more effortless? You're going to come back and you're going to leave a comment in seven days and say, I actually did all seven of these things. I implemented them.

And look how much better my life is. That's what I want for you. I want you to feel that. I wish I had this when I was a teenager because I was so insecure and afraid and shy about life. And this next key is something that gave me an incredible unlock in my life. And I wish I'd done it sooner because everything got better, more confident after key number three. And the third key is to step into discomfort as often as possible. You could even call this exposure therapy. Now, let me give you a story here in a second

on how this transformed my life. Confidence doesn't come from comfort. It comes from surviving discomfort and realizing you're stronger than you thought. Confidence is built in discomfort and every time you face the challenge and push through, your mind learns, I can handle this. Every time you face the challenge and you push through your mind learns and believes, I can handle this. I can handle this challenge. This isn't too overwhelming. This isn't too scary. This isn't too daunting. Wow, I actually did it. What else can I do? And then you're just stacking confidence and confidence on top of itself for other areas, opportunities, and challenges in your life. For the last 20 years, believe it or not, if this is one of your first times coming to my

videos or my podcast, and you haven't heard me talk about this, I have been salsa dancing for 20 years, believe it or not. Social salsa dance. Not like ballroom style, but what I actually think is more scary, which is in social settings. And what that means is you going into a salsa club or a salsa social or just finding someone who's salsa dancing when there's music around and you walking up to a complete stranger that you don't know and saying, let's dance and actually going for three and a half to five minutes of improvised. salsa dancing that looks like you've choreographed it for years. That's what I'm talking about. Understanding a language of a dancing style so well that is ingrained in your body's makeup, yourselves, that when you hear the music, you, it's like you are the music and you can step into it and you can ask anyone to dance at any moment who also understands the language and you can look

like rock stars together. That's what I'm talking about. And I, used to live above a jazz club when I was in college. I had a little studio apartment. It was $250 a month. I could barely afford it with my senior year in college. And there was a, my brother's one of the top jazz musicians in the world. He's a jazz violinist, the number one jazz violinist in the world. And I was looking for an apartment and he knew about this jazz club in Columbus, Ohio,

that had a little apartment up top for the musicians that would kind of come in and play gigs in the venue. And he knew the owner of this club and said, hey, my brother's looking for an apartment. She gave me a great deal, $250 a week. Now, I lived in a little studio apartment

and I would go down, you know, in the evenings and listen to jazz music and listen to different types of music that would come in. But once a week, they would have a live salsa band and all the salsa dancers from all over central Ohio would come out and start salsa dancing. And I remember I was like hearing this music upstairs

that was downstairs and I went down and I was in the corner and I was like immersed in this whole new world of Latin culture, Latin music, Spanish-speaking individuals from all over Latin America and just a different energy. It was like entering a different world. Here I am, you know, this. tall white kid, you know, college athlete going into a salsa, Latin, Spanish speaking world right downstairs from where I was living. And I was just thinking, what is this? This is

incredible. And the most terrifying thing at the same time. I don't understand the language. I don't understand the music. I don't understand how to dance. I don't understand the culture. I don't understand any of this. I'm a completely different human being. It's like, I don't know, a duck trying to hang out with a group of, you know, horses or something. I don't know. It's like, I'm just a completely different animal in this world. And for three months, I would go down once a week and watch in the corner hiding because I was just like so mesmerized by the dancers, the music, the drums, the rhythm.

It was just like, this is incredible. And it's the most terrifying thing I've ever experienced. And I started to get to know people over these kind of three months because you start to see familiar faces. And people would ask me to come dance. And I always said no, because I was so terrified of being humiliated. I was terrified at what people thought about me. I was terrified of messing up. I was terrified of making people look bad.

All these excuses. I had no confidence in this world that I did not exist in, that I was not from, that I did not understand. And eventually, after three months, this one girl dragged me, literally, had to drag me onto the dance floor. And I was like pushing and I was like, no, I'm like kicking her. I'm like, I cannot go out on this dance floor. No, this is so embarrassing. And somehow dragged me out there was a busy night and she pulled me right into the middle. So I'm trapped.

There's, I don't know, 100 people dancing around us. I'm trapped. And she's like, just follow the basic steps. and I'm looking down in her feet and she's like just follow my feet and I'm following in and I'm stepping on her and I'm hitting people next to me on accident and I just feel like I am horrible right now. This is the most embarrassing thing I've ever done in my life. I'm a failure, you know, all this stuff. And after about two minutes of this, she tells me, Lewis, look up, look up and look around you. She was like, no one is looking at you. No one cares. No one cares.

about how bad you are right now. Everyone's just having fun and they're listening to music and they're dancing and no one's looking at you and pointing a finger and laughing at you. This isn't elementary school all over again, right? No one is doing that. And sure, maybe a couple people when I started and was stumbling all over the place was looking at me and thinking, oh, this person doesn't know how to dance. Who cares?

But in that moment, no one is looking, no one was judging. And after that moment, I said, I'm going all in. I overcame this first initial step of the fear of humiliation and the fear of not being confident. But that's what you're going to need to do. Confident people take action, even when they're not great at the thing they want to do. They take action, and they allow themselves the space to fail, to be humiliated, to not be perfect, and to be a beginner. They take action even when they know they're not great in the beginning. And after that, I was a salsa dancing machine, and I did not look pretty.

I did not look good. I did not fit in. I was this tall white dude who still didn't know how to dance. But I started listening to salsa music. I started going to group lessons, then private lessons, and going out any night of the week that I could to salsa dancing, you know, events in the city. And I was just obsessed for months until eventually. I became fluent at the art of salsa dancing.

Now, I'm not the best salsa dancer in the world and I'm not performing on stages and doing all these crazy things, but I can dance with anyone at any moment and have a great time and feel good about it and not feel insecure. I've learned and mastered a language that I didn't once know,

but I would have never done it had I not initially taken that first step. And so your mind learns, can handle this when you're willing to face the challenge and push through the fear even when you're scared and terrified. So I want you to try something. I want you to face one small fear today. I want you to speak up when you know you want to talk about something, but you're afraid of people responding or reacting. I want you to ask for feedback on something. Ask a friend. Ask your family member. Ask your boss. Ask whoever and say, can you give me feedback on this thing? And getting

feedback is not fun until you learn how to receive feedback and not take it personally or I want you to start a tough conversation. If you face one small fear today by speaking up, asking for feedback or starting a tough conversation, it's just going to get you through that insecurity. It's going to get you through that and you're going to start feeling, oh, I can do this little thing that creates a lot of fear. I got through it. What if I did this every single day? Just like I did with salsa dancing every day for three months when I was terrified, I still did it anyways. And now I have the skill for life. And here's the cool thing.

When you overcome something that you're afraid of and you push through it and you get all the way through where it doesn't make you fearful anymore, you now have this new tool in your psychological tool belt where you said, oh, wow, I overcame this thing that I thought I would never do. I never thought I would speak up to this person. I never thought I would have this tough conversation. I never thought I would start practicing a new language. I never thought,

whatever. I never thought I would do this. And I did it. I can freaking do anything. It's like, that's what your mind starts to believe. Oh, you did the thing that was the most terrifying for you. You can do anything. And it builds this unshakable confidence in you

where you feel like, I know I can do the next hard thing. And it's okay. And it's okay to fail at it at first. So the key takeaway here is that resilience builds confidence. So make sure you push through boundaries to expand your comfort zone. And you'll start to create unshakable confidence. Listen, I wrote a whole book called The Greatness Mindset.

Unlock the power of your mind and live your best life today. It's a New York time bestseller. This is the book that I wish I had when I was 16, living in total fear and insecurity, constantly feeling humiliated not enough doubting myself it's everything i wish i had when i was younger it's everything i wish i had 10 years ago as well and at new stages of life because this book has all the tools from the top minds in the world around neuroscience around therapy and around healing to help you build unshakable belief in yourself because self-doubt is the killer of dreams But when you believe in yourself by going through hard times, by exposing yourself through fears, and going all in, you build unshakable confidence.

So make sure you get a copy of this book as well. We'll have it linked below. But the greatness mindset is the playbook for the next step for you in your life and building unshakable confidence. It's all about the greatness mindset. Key number four is to build confidence. through failure. Gosh, most people in the world do not like this. Most people think failure destroys confidence. But the truth is, it's the fastest way to build confidence. And if you're afraid to fail, then you're probably going to fail. This is a quote from Kobe Bryant,

who we had on the School of Greatness, and is one of my favorite interviews I've ever done. He said, if you're afraid to fail, then you're probably going to fail. And a lot of people I talk about this, there are three main fears in life, three fears in life, the fear of failure, the fear of success, and the fear of judgment. And if you're afraid to fail, which 70 to 80% of people in every room I go into with thousands of people, and I say raise your hand if you're afraid to fail in your life right now, usually 70, 80% of people raise their hand. if you are afraid to fail, then you're probably going to fail.

And so, again, this whole book is teaching you how to overcome these three main psychological fears, the fear of failure, the fear of success, and the fear of judgment, which is other people's opinions about you. When you live in those three fears, you're always going to be blocked and you're not going to feel free to be you. So again, if you're afraid to fail, then you're probably going to fail. Kobe, Brian, Michael Jordan, under the coaching of Tim Grover, who we've had on this podcast as well, their coach back on the day that trained them physically and also mentally, they treated failure as data, learning and adapting from each setback. For me, I've always said that failure is feedback.

failure is feedback it's just the information that you need to give you the tools the wisdom and the knowledge on how to be successful in the next step so we must be reframing failure not as making me i'm a loser but more this is a lesson this is a lesson teaching me that i need more information i need more practice i need more time to be successful with the thing i'm trying to do. The people with the most confidence aren't the ones who never fail. They're the ones who can fail in public and still have their own back. Because if you only like yourself when you win, you'll never truly feel confident. And that is a key. And truly, if you only like yourself when you win or when other people are celebrating you, you'll never truly feel confident.

You need to be able to celebrate yourself when you fail, when you make mistakes, when you mess up. You need to say, okay, I made a mistake, I messed up, and how can I improve? What's the feedback? Failure is feedback? How can I apply the feedback and take action the next day in a better way? And this is a powerful thing for us, okay? It's a powerful thing. We've got to be thinking about failure as feedback.

So here's something I want you to try. I want you to identify one failure today and write down its lessons in a sentence or two. So think about a failure you've had recently or a failure today or a mistake you've made. And then just write down one sentence with the lesson that you've learned from this. And how can you learn from today and get even just a little bit better for tomorrow? And stop thinking of it is self-criticism and judgment. and just make it more neutral. Okay, I made a mistake.

I failed. I put this thing out online. It didn't do well. Stop attaching the failure with you as a loser and start looking at failure as a really positive thing and say, all right, this is the process, this is the step. This is what I need to keep failing because it's getting me closer to success. But I need to learn from the failure and take it as feedback, information, like Kobe and Michael talk about as data.

Takeaway is to collect your failures as fuel. Every stumble is a step towards stronger confidence. So make today's ceiling tomorrow's floor. And you'll keep stacking confidence on top of it. That's number four. Build confidence through failure. Number five is to find proof and become undeniable. Confidence isn't about feeling ready.

It's about stacking undeniable proof. until no one, not even you, can question it. This is key. The exciting thing about this is that neuroplasticity, the brain's ability to change itself and form new connections, proves it's perfectly possible to make the leap from self-criticism to self-belief. It's simply a question of determination and proactive, positive thinking, in a focused and consistent way.

This is a quote by Dr. Tara Sourke. Swart, who's been on this show a couple of times. It's a neuroscientist that is blown up online and has some incredible books and work as well. So an example around this is tennis legend, Venus Williams, who we've had on the School of Greatness as well, one of the top tennis players of all time. She didn't build confidence from hype. She built it match by match, practice by practice, swing by swing.

And a growing ledger of proof that she could prefer. form under pressure. She built the proof rep by rep day by day. And that mindset led her to seven grand slam titles, 14 more grand slam double titles. She crushed it. And you've got to stack the reps and stack the evidence and stack the proof. You can't just hype yourself. You can't just fake it to you make it. You can't say, I'm going to jump in this thing and I'm going to be confident right way, even though I haven't mastered the skill yet, you've got to put in the reps and master the skill. But a lot of people have mastered the skills but still aren't confident because their mind gets in the way when there's pressure and there's an audience you have to perform in front

of. So we have to train ourselves to be able to handle pressure and the performance so we don't choke. You want to be in clutch mode, not in choke mode. So something I want you to try is to begin a proof journal, a proof journal. I've got a gratitude practice, but this is something you can add in your gratitude journal where it's a proof journal. This is something where you're building evidence and you're writing down and tracking the proof, whether it be the time that you're committing to a something to develop a skill, whether it be the amount of mistakes you've made and the lessons you've learned from this. Each night, record three wins. Every night I talk about three things I'm grateful for, but I want you to record three wins.

When you win in life, you build confidence. You build a more prideful body language. Even micro victories count. It could be the smallest thing. Smallest thing could just be like, I did what I said I was going to do today. I showed up on time to this thing that I wanted to go to. I followed through on my plans. I made mistakes today.

That is a proof journal. That's great. Okay. That means you actually tried. You acted. You took action on the thing you were trying to take action on. Instead of just thinking about it, resisting it, hiding from the thing you took action. So create a proof journal. And the key takeaway here is over time, your brain leans on real evidence. And you'll start to be like, wow, I'm stacking this evidence. Look at this day by day, page by page look at all the reps and you'll look back three months six months six years and you'll have journals stacked of proof not emotion but proof to validate your confidence that's what we need real evidence for ourselves because a lot of the times you watching right now you've created a lot in your life you've done a lot in your life but you still discount yourself you constantly discount your abilities, even though you went through some hard challenges in your life.

You accomplished some great schooling. You learned. You developed accomplishments. You have skills. You have the ability to connect with people. You have done some incredible things in your life. I don't care if you're 18 or you're in your 50s or 60s. You have done some amazing things.

And sure, there might be things you haven't done that you want to do right now, but you have to look back at your life through your own memory proof journal if you haven't documented it yet and start just reflecting where was I five years ago 10 years ago oh man maybe I'm not where I want to be but I've also farther than where I was back then and start using that even if you feel like you've missed out on opportunities you still have proof and evidence start leaning on that in your life and that is key number five find proof become Undeniable. Number six, this is a big one, and this is probably not one that you're going to like.

You don't want to hear because we're living in a world right now where this is what everyone talks about. But the sixth key is don't trust your feelings, trust the data. Most people wait to feel confident, but feelings lie. Confidence comes from the data you build. with every rep. And sometimes we wait until we feel like, ah, I'm ready or I feel ready or I feel confident. Man, feelings are going to be up and down. They're going to come and go. It's going to be hard. And I like this quote. I'm going to share the quote from my guy Novak Djokovic, again, one of the best tennis players of all time who we've had on the podcast. Great episode on the

podcast. He said, normally, when you are feeling down, that's when you have an opportunity through those trials and those tribulations to grow stronger, better, and to use those lessons to become a better version of yourself. It's a constant evolution. The example that Novak talks about is he acknowledges bad feeling training days where stats revealed improvement anyway. And this is sometimes, you know, as an athlete, I've had so many days of practice in my life in sports. sports, great practices, bad practices, all these different things. But you can't allow your feelings to get in the way of the data and the improvement that you're making. And great performers, great athletes, great artists, great musicians, they show up and they play their music even if they

sound bad. They play their sport even if their shots off. They make their art, even if the strokes are out of their alignment. Whatever it might be, the great performers in life show up anyways, even when they're not feeling great. And that's the difference between someone who's building confidence and someone who's living by their feelings and saying, I don't feel a certain way. I don't feel confident. I don't feel good today. So I'm not going to put my art out there.

I'm not going to express myself. I'm not going to have the challenging conversation. I'm going to give some part effort today because I don't feel good. This is just going to hold your back in the future with your confidence. We've had another great therapist on Dr. Madiel Bouquet. She explores how our emotions can distort reality. Now, this is research from a therapist. Our emotions can distort reality.

But data is objective. Dr. Maria Bouquet talks, her work encourages us to acknowledge this interplay and actively work towards emotional healing to foster a more grounded an accurate understanding of ourselves and the world around this. Here's the thing. I wish I knew this sooner. I wish I had these tools sooner because when I was studying sports psychology, again, how we think and feel in life's biggest pressure-filled moments of our own personal lives

around sports, performance, performing in front of an audience, performing when there's a test, when there's something on the line, can you show up and give your best? That is what we all want to learn how to do. And what happens with that is in sports psychology, you learn about what's in between your mind and how you think in those moments will dictate a lot about how you feel in those moments. And how you think and how you feel in those moments of pressure will determine and influence how you show up, how you perform.

And if you're distracted, if you're living in self-doubt, self-criticism, worry, fear, what are people thinking about me? You're living in one of those three fears, the fear of failure, success, or judgment. And you're not living in the present when you're living in self-doubt. You're living in worry about what will happen if I fail. What will happen if I succeed? What will happen when people judge me and criticize me? So you're not living in the present. A lot of sports psychology that I learned from the past had great strategies about visualization, about breathwork, about meditation, and all these tools I would use, and they would all help me.

They all help me perform better. They'll help me get back into the present. They all help me not stress about what was happening around me, but more be now, be here, and just give my best. because when you're here and the now, you get into flow. And flow state is where confidence exudes out of you. You flow, you respond in a natural state of being rather than stress, anxiety, worry, what are they going to say, what are they going to think about me, what happens if I fail, what happens if I succeed, what happens if people judge me?

That cripples us. That cripples confidence. That cripples you. And the big thing that I learned over the last decade of doing this podcast, of interviewing the world's leading psychologists, therapists, meditators, healers, and individuals that understand the chemistry of the brain, the chemistry of the heart, the nervous system is I realized that there was something else that we needed to unlock, something that I wish I would have learned when I was a teenager because I was living in a lot of fear.

even though I had the tools to overcome those fears, I always needed the tools, but I still never felt fully confident within me. They were hacks that got me a certain level, but I still went back at night and stressed out in my bed. And it wasn't until I did over 12 years of research, 1,700 episodes on this podcast, where I learned the keys were in this book

that I created from all these top experts. around healing the nervous system because you can have all the hacks that we've talked about here. You can read all the psychology books that give you the tools for performing better in life and being more confident.

And you can do a lot of these things that will get you a certain place. But if you still don't feel emotionally and psychologically whole in your heart and in your mind, and if you still look at yourself as a bad human being with a lot of shame, with a lot of guilt,

from all your mistakes or all your thoughts you've had in the past that you feel are bad and wrong. And you believe you're a bad and wrong person. You're going to live with a hole in your heart. Your nervous system is going to be out of alignment. And it's always going to be shaking. Little shakes in your nervous system throughout the day. And you'll use these tools, you'll use meditation,

you'll use all these other tools, visualization, manifestation techniques all these things are great tools but when you're using them at a place from out of alignment versus aligned harmony where your nervous system and your body and your whole system from the ground up is vibrating in harmony and alignment then it's building this unshakable energy within you that has more poise and confidence it doesn't mean you're not going to fall off at times and make mistakes and react in life situations at times. I'm still not perfect, right? I'll never be perfect. But it means you hopefully have more inner peace, more wholeness through a process that I call inner healing. And when this whole book

is around the greatness mindset is getting to a place of wholeness and healing first. And we give you the entire strategy in blueprint in here on how to create inner peace, inner heal. and a sense of wholeness within you so that when you go out into the world, you have more confidence in you, knowing you're going to make mistakes, knowing you're not going to be perfect. It doesn't mean you're never going to doubt yourself. You are at times. But when you learn to have wholeness within you,

you can always come back to you and feel good. When you're out of your alignment in your nervous system and you feel like you're a bad person, which is what I felt for most of my life, I'm a bad and wrong person. I made this stupid mistake when I was younger. I thought this bad thought. I had this harmful thing to think about someone else.

Whatever it might be, I had this judgment and therefore I'm bad and wrong. Your nervous system is going to believe it. And then you're always trying to override what your body truly believes. Your mind is going to try to control your body. And then your thinking and your emotions are going to be constantly in conflict. And so, yes, these hacks are important. They've helped me accomplish things, achieve goals, build relationships. But if you don't do the inner healing work, everything I talk about in the greatest mindset,

the whole process is in there. If you don't follow the process of inner healing, you will never have inner peace. And if you don't have inner peace, it's hard to have outer confidence. So this is a big step. And it's deeper than the mental. hacks of building confidence that we're talking about. But something I want you to try is when doubt creeps in is open up your proof journal and read yesterday's wins out loud.

When you read what you did yesterday and then you say it out loud, you start to speak into your nervous system and into your heart and start to build a little bit more belief, a little bit more confidence, saying, oh, I did these three things yesterday. Maybe you did 20 things yesterday. Great. Read them out loud. almost like someone else is reading them to you. Imagine someone who's like your mentor, your coach,

or a parent that you really admire who's reading these things to you. You did this really well. You had this accomplishment. You made this mistake, but you took the action. And it's like someone is speaking it to you. You're building that inner relationship of, yeah, look at this proof that I have for myself. It's almost like you have to speak to your mind, your heart, and your nervous system all at the same time.

so they can give back in alignment and in harmony. If you're watching this, maybe it seems like some crazy talk to you. Maybe it seems like, ah, I don't know what Lewis is talking about. But if it makes sense to you, if you're like, yeah, there's something he's saying there. I don't like it. I don't like that he said that. But probably the reason why I don't like it is because there's some truth to it. That I need to find a way to create more healing and harmony within my body,

within my psychological thinking, within my heart, and within my nervous system. Because when you heal, that is confidence, that is calm, that is cool, that is collected. You know, healing energy is what attracts opportunities. Healing energy is what attracts babies to want to like, stop crying when they're in your arms. It's what attracts the opposite sex to you that says, yeah, I love to give you my number and go out on a date. Sure, because you have this healing, calm energy about you. It attracts career opportunities. It tracks synchronicities in your life to flood to you because you have a sense of inner peace.

And I'm not saying you're going to be like this peaceful Zen master every single moment of your life. I am not. I still have moments where I freak out. I spazz out. I react to people. And I'm not proud of those moments. That's why I do this and I create this as a reminder to me to keep practicing these things just as much for you. because I'm completely flawed

and I've got to constantly stay on top of these things in my own life. That's why I created the greatest mindset because this is the book that I wish I had for myself 10, 20 years ago. So confidence comes from facts, not fleeting mood swings. And unfortunately, in a today's world where everyone's on their phone all day long, reacting to the stresses and to the highlight reels of everyone's life, the feelings take over our body and our minds more than anything. And we have to learn how to manage and regulate our emotions

because emotional regulation is the greatest skill that you can have in order to build confidence. So don't trust your feelings, trust the data. And the seventh key to this process of building unshakable confidence is that your circle shapes your confidence. confidence isn't built alone it's contagious so surround yourself with believers and your self-belief will multiply now what does this mean let me share a quote with you your circle is either an anchor or an elevator one drags you down and the other one takes you higher than you thought

possible i love this example again from serena williams i love to have her on the show some day she's amazing what she's created in her life. She credits her sister, Venus, and her dad, and her trusted team for keeping her grounded and resilient through both triumphs and setbacks. And neuroscience reveals that supportive relationships help regulate stress and strengthen self-identity, making confidence more sustainable and resilient over time. So again, I'm trying to back everything here for you personally through personal stories with myself. through examples from people we've had on who are at the highest level or other inspiring people who have achieved incredible success and from science, research, or neuroscience that backs the principle.

I want you to not just have some fluff or here's some motivation. I want you to have principles, exercises, research, science, personal examples from me, personal examples from others. So you have multiple ways of seeing this. So something I want you to try is to build yourself. a confidence circle again this might sound a little weird and ah i can do everything on my own and i don't need other people or whatever it might be i'm telling you the people you surround yourself matter look at you know the greatest athletes you think Kobe brian when he won his

first NBA championship said to himself you know what i think i've got all the skills i've got all the tools i just won the championship i'm the best player in the world now i don't need a team I don't need a coach. I don't need support. I'm just going to do it all in myself now. No. He doubled down on saying, we need the best coaching.

We need the best coaching staff. We need better players around me. I need better recovery. I need better mindset training. I need better all these things. He's surrounded himself with people that could take him higher and keep winning.

It's hard to get to the top. It's harder to stay at the top. So I want you to build your confidence circle. And write down three people, people who lift you up, whether it's family, friends, or mentors, or even someone that you don't know yet, but someone you admire from afar, that you can follow their content or read their books as a, as kind of a silent mentor. And I want you to choose one person and reach out for encouragement or accountability this week. And I want you to be thinking about nurturing

that connection. I have had coaches my entire life, from my parents to my older siblings when I as a kid to then coaches and teachers. And now for the last, you know, 15, 20 years, I'm hiring coaches. I'm seeking mentors in different disciplines of life who can continue to give me tools, feedback, wisdom, insights. And do I need them? No, I don't need them. I mean, I could live my life without them and I could get results and I could accomplish things and learn on my own, probably but man it sure as heck helps a lot it makes it better it makes it more enjoyable to not try to put all the pressure on myself and say i'm going to learn everything on my own and i'm only going to do this myself it's exhausting life is meant to be lived with other people and shared with

other people and then no way do i think i'm like you know i'm confident enough to know that i don't know what I need to know about a lot of things. And I think confident people lean on mentors, coaches, guides, family, friends, support, and they ask questions. Confident people don't have it all figured out. They're willing to say, I want to learn more. They're willing to watch game film and their sports. They're willing to read books in their studies. They're willing to learn from people who have experienced life before them that know skills. So I want you to choose one person and reach out for encouragement. In fact, I want you to type in the comment right now who is one person that you want

to reach out to right now that you're going to text or call in your life for accountability and just have the accountability this week and just say, hey, can you hold me accountable this week for this one thing? Whether it's giving me feedback, whether it's checking in on me once a day to see if I've taken action on the thing that I want to do, and type that person's name below and then text that person. Again, confident people take consistent action. So if you're just going to consume this, take notes and not do anything, it's a good step that you're learning it and letting it sink in, but confident people say, God, I'm scared to reach out to this person. I'm scared to write this

down. I'm scared to take this action, but I'm going to do it anyways. And you are a confident person for being here because you want to break free from the chains that have held you back. and that's why you're going to leave a comment about the, you just put the first name of the person you're going to reach out to and then you're going to call or text them right now. If you need to pause this video or this episode and text or call them, do it.

And say, hey, I'm listening to this video by Lewis House. He told me to call you because you inspire me as a person in my life. And I would love for you to give me feedback on how I can improve in this area of my life. I would love for you to do that. And also, bonus points, if you leave a comment also in saying what happened after you called or texted that person. Let's see who replies in the comments.

Key takeaway here is that confidence deepens when it's supported. Let your circle help you become unstoppable. Don't do everything on your own. Don't try to live this life on your own all by yourself. That is key. build confidence by having the right circle. Now here's the truth. In just seven days, if you do these seven keys for the next seven days,

science shows your brain begins to rewire and you'll start to feel the shift immediately. You'll start to feel the notice of change in your body, emotionally, mentally, physically. A month later, others will notice. Other people are going to come up to you and say, you've been drinking something different, like you've been eating some different. from food, what are you been doing? Because you're just starting to show up differently. I don't know what it is. There's something about you. What are you been doing? Did you get a makeover? Have you been working out? Like, they're going to think what has this

person been doing because they're showing up ever so subtly or you just look like you're a different person. Again, instead of being, you know, scared emotionally or physically, you just show up in more poise. And then months later, man, the world's going to notice. other people will notice, and your self-confidence will snowball naturally with momentum. A year from now, confidence won't be just something you practice, it will be who you are. But the key is consistency, it's not about perfection. Tell you what, the story of me salsa dancing, those first three months where I was taking action every single day, I was the most imperfect, tall, goofy-looking, you know, white guy trying to saw a salsa dance in a world where I did not fit.

in and belong. I looked awkward. I made mistakes. I was like just, what am I doing sometimes? But the key is consistency, not perfection. Now, I'm telling you what? When you start to build confidence through consistency, not perfection, you will start to have this undeniable confidence in your life. And that is the key. Do it even when you're scared. Do it when it's not perfect and be consistent after that. Don't stop when you make mistakes. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to leave a comment below of your biggest takeaway, like this video right now, click the like button, and subscribe to our channel right here because we have a ton of great content for you. And if you love this video, then I want you to check out this video right here, right now. And it's all about what to do every single morning

for the next seven days to really help you manifest and unlock more in your life. So check that out here. If you're looking to unlock and manifest more in your life, make sure to watch this video right here because I was shocked what happened after I learned these strategies. And I think you're going to be very surprised what you see as well. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode

with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad-free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts as well. Let me know what you enjoyed about this episode in that review.

I really love hearing feedback from you and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward. And I want to remind you if no one has told you lately, that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.