In the country I live in, today is the teachers day. So me and my classmates decided to buy our class teacher a present like a week ago. The problem was our class teacher wasn’t in the country and we needed to solve that issue. One classmate managed to get his home adress and we decided to send it here. The issue was that I thought they got his hotels adress. When we decided to finally order his present, I said something really freaking dumb. We were chatting on whatsapp (in the class group) and one of my friends was complaining about how she wasn’t able to get his present delivered to teachers home, as the shopping service wasn’t able to deliver to that location. (She was trying to buy it from a local seller)
HERE IS WHERE I COMPLETELY F UP
I told her that in order to deliver something to another country you need to get the thing first, and than deliver it outside the country thorough international delivery companies.
IN THE FREAKING CLASS GROUP. DELIVERING A FLOWER TO ANOTHER COUNTRY. HOW THE HELL DID I THOUGHT OF THAT.
The embarrassment I felt was extremely bad, so bad so that I was hitting myself constantly. I wasn’t calming down no matter what, so I grabbed a razor and did the thing…
I didn’t go to school today because I don’t even know how the hell will I be look her in the face. And the fact that it was in class gc…
I still don’t feel calm, I feel like she thinks I am extremely dumb. I just can’t cope with it.
Normally I am pretty good at making friends and socializing, but I just can’t cope with the feeling of shame. It just causes so much anxiety as it makes me feel like everyone hates me. The thought of being hated is just awful. How the hell do I cope with this?
14 comments
99% chance everyone else already forgot about it.
Relax. This is literally nothing. You will end up doing things 1000000 times worse than this. What you need to understand is that in most cases people will just move on. Only in the moment will they think about it for the most part. They either forget, move on or just simply do not care about it. The shame is something you make up yourself.
In this specific case I would say they either just move on, or perhaps they are simply a little confused on what exactly you meant (I mean, I have no idea what you were even trying to say). Just go to school like any normal day, and it will end up being a normal day. If they ask you about it, or ask what you meant, just say you had some brain lag when writing that message and that will be the end of it.
It’s literally impossible to avoid saying something dumb occasionally. To err is human. Don’t try to be a perfect robot, it’s boring.
Its okay OP, don’t beat yourself up, you were only trying to come up with a solution to a problem, problem solving and sometimes saying the wrong thing is part of being human. I also have a really hard time getting over it whenever I do or say something that I think others perceive as dumb, sometimes it’s totally mortifying, but at the end of the day, you just have to remind yourself, everyone is in their own little world not really paying attention to things like this, everyone is too self involved to care which in itself is a relief because I’ve said a few silly things before and embarrassed myself plenty of times. What matters at the end of the day is your own perception of yourself. Not tying your self worth to the perception of yourself you think others have made up in their mind. I know that I am smart and an amazing person and whenever I feel like this I just remind myself over and over that ultimately my value is tied to how good and loving I am, not about silly things I’ve said in the past. Life is bigger than that. Learning to laugh at yourself and accept that you are only human is huge, still currently learning this. It’s hard when you’re so hyper critical of yourself but it’s an important skill to work on, don’t beat yourself up OP, I hope this helped.
you only remember it because your body had an emotional reaction to the event, everybody else probably already forgot about it or will in a couple days
The world is not against you. They just don’t care. Bro, think about how self obsessed you are being right now. Nothing embarrassing you do is going to have the impact on someone else’s life like you think it will. They are thinking about themselves and not doing embarrassing things themselves. We’re all human. We all deal with this. You are not unique in this.
I had quite the same experience. Though, I’ve forgotten what it was about, I just remembered that I felt SO EMBARRASSED when I sent something on our class gc ONE TIME and no one replied. I completely freaked out, good thing I was already talking to a friend and I told them the absolute state I was in. I was profusely saying sorry cause it was weird and such a non-issue but the feelings I felt were real. They calmed me down but it still felt so embarrassing. Today, I don’t give a damn about it cause everyone else don’t care or didn’t even care. I get the way you feel but I assure you, everything will be alright. If they did mention it, who cares? Laugh it off cause we all goof up sometimes, okay?
just tell it was a joke
I think people are really missing an important point here. OP, you are so worried and anxious that you cut yourself— this part is no “laugh it off” matter.
I agree that you should absolutely not feel so horribly about this one comment you made. It won’t stick around, people are correct that it is ONLY you remembering it. However, if you are feeling this socially anxious that you are physically punishing yourself for very human mistakes, I believe you should be talking to a therapist. Your mental health is important and ruminating on small things like this to the point that you feel the need to hurt yourself is something that a mental health professional can talk you through.
You need to see a good psychiatrist. I did so many dumb shit nobody cares. We are all just a tiny little piece of dust in the cosmos
I’m dumb ass hell and I do stuff like this constantly. I think a good strategy is to try and see the humor in it and laugh it off. Better for your mental health ofc and a bonus is that people find you more chill
You are far too hard on yourself. Trust me when I say the only person that is judging your actions here is you, and it’s unwarranted. Shame can be an awful emotion, but you must meet it and yourself with compassion to break the power it holds over your life.
Give your self a break and be kind to yourself, you’re doing fine.
The ridiculous things children get horribly embarrassed about always makes me laugh. They think their world will fall apart and no one will ever love, respect, or talk to them again. Let me offer a perspective you’ll only gain with age.
I’ve had my pecker shown to the boys in my middle school and people went around saying it was small (if you’re not a guy, you should know that is about the worst thing you could do to any male’s masculinity and self respect), considering I was a teen I can tell you it hurt me a lot more. I’ve been insulted and humiliated in a crowd. I’ve backed down from fights in cowardly ways and it changed the way those around me saw me. I’ve shattered hundreds of dollars of glassware in my old job by accident. I’ve flopped horribly while flirting with girls, even got told “ew, no”. Are you cringing yet?
None of it killed me. None of it even left a permanent scar. I’m not saying any of this to say “don’t be such a wimp, be like me and just stop caring what others think”. I’m saying these things to point out 3 major considerations:
1) You will fuck up, now and in the future, sooo much worse. And that’s perfectly normal. Everyone embarrasses themselves and makes mistakes. To err is to be human. You are tough enough to survive mistakes like these.
2) How often did you mull over the mistakes of others all day long and spend a lifetime hating them over it? Never? Other people work the same way. Most of your class mates probably never read your text, those that did probably thought absolutely nothing about it, and the even smaller amount of people that did probably didn’t think about it for longer than a moment. No one, has thought about it for a fraction of the amount of time you have been thinking about it. No one has strong feelings towards it. Other people are thinking about themselves, and their self-image, not you.
3) You will come to find out even the people who dislike and hate you, don’t matter. Like literally at all. I mean this from the most objective and logical point of view. Other people’s opinions are of absolutely no consequence. I’ve worked with numerous awful people: cheaters, bullies, creeps, and even straight up thiefs. Their actions almost never cost them anything beside some people’s scorn. They might’ve made some enemies, but none of it ever affected their life. And when they moved on to another place, they got a fresh start. And the enemies they left behind forgot about them.
This isn’t a license to be a bad person, I’m pointing out if truly malicious people don’t really pay a price for it, then you making a mistake will probably not haunt you at all. Certainly not as a much as you think it will. It’s okay to be truly yourself. If everyone in the world knew everything about you down to every thought you’ve ever had, chances are there’s a significant number of people who’d hate your guts for any number of reasons. They might hate you because you’re gay, or they find you annoying, or boring, or your sense of humor is distasteful for them, etc. So why bother trying to appease those people and getting them to like you? You’re going to be walking on eggshells for rest of your life like that, never really being free to say what you feel and enjoy yourself.
There’s also a large number of people who, if they knew everything about you, would actually think you’re a pretty cool person. Worry about pleasing those people. The people who would actually enjoy being friends with you. I promise they will have way more influence on your life than haters. Those will be your best friends, ones who are there for you during a crisis. They are where you will probably find a romantic life partner. And they are where you’ll find your niche, and a community where you belong. So be yourself, fuck up, say sorry, then forget about it. Other people probably forgot about it already. Those that didn’t don’t matter. Those that like you anyway do matter.
I don’t even understand how this is a fuck up really. Seems like a valid way to get somebody a gift. Maybe a pressed flower would be better suited for international shipping.
Most importantly though, you can’t just give that much of a shit about the people around you. Most of the misery we experience will be in our own heads. Thinking like that is how you become miserable in your own head.