Today I'd like to tell you more about self-efficacy by looking at the profile of someone who is highly efficacious.

Perhaps you've heard me say that self-efficacy is our appraisal of our own ability to do something. Self-efficacy varies from task to task, and situation to situation. For example, I may feel very efficacious about my ability to teach people how to set goals and achieve them, but I may not feel efficacious at all about my ability to operate a computer.

Did you know that in any given situation, people with high self-efficacy tend to perform better than others? That's because they don't let the outside environment dictate their inner feelings, and they place a high value on themselves because they believe they are worth it. People with high self-efficacy also have a high need for achievement.

They enjoy learning and growing and doing well. They also believe that they have a high degree of control over what happens to them. In other words, they don't feel like helpless victims, even when things happen to them that they can't control, because they know that they can still control their response.

They don't give up easily, either. In fact, they see all setbacks as temporary and they never think of themselves as failures. Instead of dwelling on their mistakes, they use them as teachers.

How about you? You know, you can learn to have high self-efficacy, too. You have the potential waiting inside you. All you have to do is use it!