I have always had a lot of confidence, I am very articulate, and I think very quickly.
TThat said, that facility was a bit like having a garden hose with too much pressure - i could quirt my verbosity this way and that, but had very little control over it.
I have found with each year that passes, my comfort at who and what i am grows, and with it an inbuilt self-confidence which I know radiates from me, and allows me to control almost all social interaction.
With age comes the wisdom to know that being able to control a conversation does not mean it is always polite, appropriate, or even desireable so to do, and that is a vitally important difference in me at fifty-three, compared with me at seventeen.