Self-Conscious

I have often felt very self-conscious; anxious about how I come across or how I might’ve come across. We all feel self-conscious sometimes but it’s when you feel it all the time that it takes over and stops you living your life properly. Being so self-conscious meant that I was worried about many things such as what to say or if I was even saying enough and how I might look. I often felt like I had made too many mistakes so I became more and more self-conscious.

As a quiet person I tended to worry about not asking enough questions or giving enough input. During staff meetings I have often felt self-conscious because I would feel like I was the quietest there. If I did speak I would feel very nervous doing so and I was not sure why as I knew these people and had been working there for a while. I wanted to make sure that I at least said something.

At school I was made fun of because apparently I “ate funny ” and the way I drank a bottle of Diet coke was “weird ” and this stuck with me for a while. The low self esteem person in me listened and I soon became more and more self-conscious.

I have attended gatherings where I was very much aware of myself and felt like I did not fit in. I was desperately trying to relax and not worry but this did not help. I had already had this nervous feeling inside me and was already feeling negative. The trick was to not think about it so much which, of course, is easier said than done. When I was younger I would continuously play over in my head about what I was like when I was with certain groups of friends. I always felt like the odd one out because they seemed really chatty yet I felt I was nothing like them. It became pretty tiresome worrying all the time about the way I was. Being self-conscious with almost all social situations meant that instead of feeling happy about meeting up with people I just felt anxious. I would’ve been more happy not to meet up. It was because I was worrying about how to be social and talkative. I was so concerned with this that I became stuck in this vicious cycle. Everytime I met with these friends I ended up feeling bad afterwards. Being younger I wanted to fit in and to impress people. I knew I had issues with self esteem and as I got older and I worked on my confidence I became less self-conscious with a lot of aspects in my life. Whatever people think it usually isn’t that bad and most of the time people are not even aware

Being less self-conscious to me meant caring less about what others thought of me. No one can not be self conscious from time to time but when it becomes too much then it is an anxiety issue. There have been so many situations where I thought if I spoke out and answered a question that people would think I’m stupid or that no one would hear me apart from one person so I would be embarssed. We often play over what we think might happen and then we miss opportunities for growth and insight. How can we learn new things without speaking out, asking questions and providing input?

There is more value in being yourself than in constantly being self-conscious. If we’re too busy stuck in our own minds then we are missing out.