CONFIDENCE - THE KEY TO EVERYTHING

So, Ive been getting this question from people who knew me like 2 years ago, "Where is the Ken that we used to know? The one who used to hide under the shed when it comes to interacting with people? The one who used to be shy all the time?"
I remember my friend we went to a sister school which was just near our high school, (yeah in Kenya we are separated when it comes to studying high school), my friend made a lot of jokes to me, he was so confident in everything that he was doing. I used to just walk to a girl and act confident but in the real sense i wasn't. The only problem was it used to work for them, not me.

According to google, confidence is: the feeling or belief that one can have faith in or rely on someone or something

You know people just throw this word around like its just a simple thing. Its something that you just have to develop over a period of time.

I can divide really this stages into 3:

1.Dont force confidence -
what i learnt from my ordeal, confidence is something that comes from within, you cant force it. When you are approaching a lady, its like she can smell that you are not confident and stumble all over you. This does not apply to ladies only, even when you are out there trying to strike deals, its impossible do this with faked confidence.
Always just relax and be you

2.Always maintain eye contact
I remember approaching a lady and feeling the tension building up inside of me. Just imagine yourself feeling like something is boiling up inside you, i was maintaining eye contact all along and she was also doing so i Almost felt like bursting. When i finally reached her position, boom i had nothing to say.
what i learnt is just maintain eye contact and the other person will think that your vey confident, kinda like playing mind trick on them

3.open up
another thing is to just be open about who you are, be vulnerable enough to admit that you are not confident and you will laugh at it first but then that will increase you confidence