I would agree with the self-reliant part, but I would not say that she’s all that confident, or believes in herself. She searching for an identity, and freely admits she doesn’t understand what’s happening to her. Her running off to save Kylo from Snoke is as brash and reckless as Luke’s attempt to save his friends from Vader’s clutches in TESB, only somehow Luke ends up hanging upside down below a city in the clouds minus one limb praying to be saved, while Rey conveniently escapes in Snoke’s shuttle, and arrives in time to save her friends with an awesome display of the Force.
This is one of my biggest problems with the sequel trilogy. It’s not necessarily Rey’s quick grasp of Jedi techniques or that she’s overpowered. It’s that she (the main protagonist of the movies) is never, ever, ever in trouble. She’s never in a situation in which she needs the help of her friends.
Never, ever, ever in trouble? 😉
For TFA, until she ‘let in the Force’ during the saber battle with Kylo it looked like she was lost… Nor did it look great during the interrogation scene with Kylo before that (as well as being somewhat easily captured by him in the forest - being frozen mid-air).
The Throne Room with Snoke in TLJ - completely out of her depth and about to be easily killed until Kylo turns against his master, and seemed to me she was in trouble vs the many Guards until she teamed up with Kylo against them. She required Luke’s help to teach her what the Force was actually about, prior to this.
It’s interesting how similar TFA and TLJ are in this regard. Both times, Rey is captured and interrogated in a FO installation while Finn with the help of friends successfully infiltrates said installation, though never discovers precisely where she’s being held and ends up not having needed to bother since Rey rescues herself anyway. Then in the final battle of each movie Finn is over-matched and about to be killed when Rey swoops in and saves the day, first using skills honed on Jakku then by tapping into the Force.
Let’s see if JJ goes three for three.