The confidence trick: How to build up your self esteem

Elizabeth O’Neill learned the hard way that competence and confidence are

It’s not just hayfever that makes my skin itch at this time of year, it’s also the ghostly residue of exams and exam results. Exams are terrible and while I always had my head buried in a book, I was never good a holding my nerve.

Half way through a final-year philosophy exam, on who knows what, my world suddenly tilted on its axis. Seemingly out of nowhere time slowed and space elongated and I felt the ground was no longer solid. It was a bit like vertigo.