Hi
@gapplegal and
@iminacolt , how are you doing, I hope you are well, because I'm feeling great :D. I'll take my time to reply since I find this a bit philosophical and psychological, which are 2 subjects I liked since I left High School. Sorry if my reply is a little long, but this topic interests me. It's a common "problem" I've seen among many people around me. This reply is mostly directed to Gapplegal.
Let me start to ask if you've read "12 rules for life" by Jordan B Peterson? You are the ideal candidate to read that book of his. Anyways let me reassure you for a moment. I'm sure you can sit back and relax, there's no reason to be anxious about these things, because I can tell from reading your posts, that you are a person who's conscious about your past, which is a really good thing. You are lucky to be who you are. You seek to improve - some people don't care and just move on, (Warning, extreme analogy: Imagine if we just forget what Hitler did during WW2. It'd mean we'd repeat the same mistakes). I assume this process will require some of you though - which you have already realized since you reflect about your past. Most importantly, you need to believe in yourself and believe in that you can improve - and trust me it's easy, you can easily do that, these are minor problems compared to the problems other people have. How old are you now (if I may ask) ?, Because It's important to look back like you are doing, but it's more important to also reflect about your future and work on it for the better. This is especially essential if you are around 18, 19 or 20 and starting to create your own identity,
(I encourage you to read some sociology of Erving Goffmans theories about identity). I truly believe that the ones who reflect on the future and past and seek improvement will GROW and have a GREAT and SUCCESFUL future compared to other people, trust me. The ones who seek to grow in all the aspects of life will have an easy life in the future. It doesn't matter which elements in the future you'll work on, it could be your studies, your social interaction skills like you are referring to, trying to find a partner and establish a family early on, go travel and discover who you truly are as a person, and the list goes on... Some of these skills, like how to interact with others and send off "images" of who you truly are, is a life long skill that takes long to master..., but I'm 100% positive that if you believe in yourself, open up to people and SHOW INTEREST in their life stories and what they have to offer, you'll make at least a few friends instantly. I don't know you well though. You surely do other stuff than being a moderator on here, but you could meet people by doing some of your hobbies, if you have a work, if you study something at uni, anything literally. The reason being that the mentioned skill isn't easy to fully master quickly is that in order to interact with others you have to "brand" yourself and send off "images" of WHO YOU ARE. After that it's up to them if they are interested in you or not. But one could ask him/herself the question who even am I, what's my identity like? For that reason, it's just AS IMPORTANT to first learn who you are, what are your beliefs what do you accept, what do you dislike, what do you like, your strong parts and weaknesses etc. While you learn more and more about yourself, you can at the same time "improve" yourself and look to address your "problem". Btw: Nice to hear your anxiety is less nowadays. You've already improved, which is awesome for you. Congratulations, and make sure to keep going.
The next summer I'll maybe be moving to a whole new town to study at uni for 6 years 100km away from my family and childhood friends, and I'll be on my own (although there's only 1 good friend that will start there aswell), but I thought to myself that there's no reason to worry about it, since I'm conscious about myself and day by day learning who I truly am as a person, like you are doing. I believe in myself, and I'm optimistic. This allows me to make my future great and be 100% successful and make new life long friends once I move. I will always seek to improve whatever it might be, the ones who don't will lose to life and feel lost. In conclusion, this process and struggle is a part of growing as a person to become an adult, either man or female (especially if you are 19 or 20 like me). Believe me, it's fully normal. There's no need to be anxious or anything, try to help yourself fully off your anxiety my friend and you'll be on the right path :).
As you can see these questions related to identity and existentialism really intrigues me, and I therefore hope you can use my advice atleast a little bit, haha. I'll see you around.
Sincerely doutdes
