Last year, I was unaware of how incredibly awkward and shy I was. I came to the sudden realization the day we went back to school in person for the first time after covid. I saw everyone around me talking to each other and bunching up in groups. I was one of a few outliers. I went home that day, crying to my parents. I’ve come a long way since then. The rest of that school year I remained the same. That was until the beginning of this school year when things started to look up. I met someone who became my best friend in only a few months. He introduced me to new people and helped me motivate myself to attend social events. He changed my life. I’ve always had bad social anxiety but for the first time ever I can say I’ve fixed it. This has been the greatest school year of my life and I’m so grateful. However, as of these past couple weeks, I’ve been noticing some of my anxiety is coming back. It’s because I’ve reached the point where I’ve gotten rid of my awkwardness and shyness and I have so many friends I can’t count anymore, but I still have some of my introverted traits. I hang around some people I find hilarious but I don’t know if they reciprocate that about me. I have to really try to get a laugh out of them and it works a lot but it’s exhausting and they appear to do it naturally, with ease. I want to be fun to be around and I get upset when I feel like I’m not meeting my goal. When I’m comfortable, I do meet that goal without an issue. I find it hard to stay comfortable because I’m overthinking what people think about me. I need advice on how to stop overthinking so much. I’m in 8th grade, so it’s obviously not uncommon for kids my age to be socially unsure, but I just don’t want to go back to what I used to be. Thank you for listening.
5 comments
Cocaine helps
https://youtu.be/kbb_0qNdjjo maybe this could help
introverted traits are not inherently bad. about half the worlds population are introverted. Its okay to be shy.
sometimes its useful to know how to not be shy though but don’t make it the most important thing in your life. dont worry about what people think of you because no one thinks of you. people are too concerned with thinking about their own lives.
also its just a fact that most people are more easy going around their friends. but you seem to be trying to be more easy going in general and the more you talk to people and try this the more comfortable you will be.
After going back to classes at Uni I felt the same way. I have heard from a lot of peers that they felt the same way too so you’re not alone.
As for feeling like it’s creepying back, for me social anxiety isn’t something that goes away but is something that I got better at dealing with. So don’t feel like you’re losing progress because every day is different and sometimes you might feel super confident and other days not so much but thats okay because we’re human. I think beating yourself up about it isn’t the way to go. Try just noticing how you feel and instead of associating that with being a bad thing think “thats how I feel today and thats okay”. I hope you have a good day 😀
You need to learn to not give a f and that it doesn’t matter if people like you or not. I was shy and scared of others almost my whole childhood and teen years and in my last year of school when i was 16 i finally realized that most of these poeple i won‘t ever see again anyways and if they hate me for the way i am it doesn’t matter because i wasn’t going to be friends with them anyways then. Having haters means you have more success than others or they wouldn’t even talk about you