Right now I see how so very lacking in confidence and self love i am.
I often feel shy of my own husband.
I feel too shy to befriend people here on 43things.
I sometimes feel unaccepted by my own 1 year old son.
I feel too shy to post long entries on here because i feel like i’m taking up too much space, or something.
I sometimes want to play music and i feel too shy, like the neighbours or someone outside might hear it, and i dont want that.

It feels good to be able to admit that the root of any sadness in my life comes from shyness and a want to be accepted, the fear others will reject me or think badly of me, that need to be loved.
It feels good to know that I can start taking real steps towards my own self happiness because i’ve finally realised what’s stopping me from having it.

I know that I have so much good in me, so much to give and that nothing but these feelings are stopping me. So today I promise myself to start working on these feelings of unworthiness, unacceptance, desire to be loved etc etc.
Today i promise myself not to shy away from playing music from fear of others hearing and thinking badly of me. (Within reason, obviously i dont actually want to cause disruption to neighbours or anything like that). Today i promise myself to not shy away from interacting with people on 43t. Today i promise myself to not feel unacceptance or shyness from my own son and husband. Today I promise to do anything i can and seek any help i need to feel and know that i deserve to be confident because i deserve nothing but love and acceptance. I wont always get love and acceptance, but i do deserve that. 3 months ago

For me that would be feeling like not being a good enough mom. I spent the whole day with my daughter today and was very tolerant of her behavioral quirks. At the end of the day she asked ME instead of her dad to give her a bath, read to her and put her to bed! 3 months ago

Wow, nearly 7 months ago I posted an entry on this goal saying that I was going to try really hard to build more confidence and be more sociable etc. 7 months later here I am still with zero confidence and zero social skills.
Hmph.
Since writing that entry my lack of confidence and social skills has begun to bother me even more.
Working on my confidence and social life really is a huge priority for me right now, I am trying to be more confident but it’s a really big challenge. How am i doing it? By just pushing myself to do it, whenever i feel scared to do something because of my lack of confidence, im telling myself to just do it. Feel the fear and do it anyway. That’s the only way to do it. I still have a long way to go. 7 months ago

I’ve been thinking a lot recently…I’ve been feeling strange recently…I’ve realised things about myself and my life recently…recently I’ve been feeling like i’m ready to start a new chapter in my life.

Recently upon talking to my mother about things that are bothering me in my life, she pointed out to me that if i was more confident and was more able to “put myself forward” then these things would change. I realised she was right.
Furthermore, yesterday on Facebook I stumbled upon pages of some people who went to the same school/college as me. It was really interesting to see the things that they’ve done with their life…some of them have done/are doing really great things. It got me thinking about school and college and how lacking in confidence I was. It got me thinking about how I never had many friends, I always doubted my intellectual ability (and as a result i believe my grades really suffered), I missed out on great opportunities such as doing charity work abroad with classmates. I just never had any confidence. As I was looking through the pages of those who were brimming with confidence at school/college and looked at what they’re doing with their lives, the friends they’ve made, the great experiences they’ve had I felt full of regret. I’ve never had the confidence to do great things with my life, to make great friends, to have greatr experiences etc etc. I was thinking about the so called “popular” boys and girls at my school/college and thought to myself actually, they were just the confident people!
I’ve displayed very little confidence throughout my life and i regret it, my lack of confidence has always made me feel bad about myself…and it still does.

Today, I live a simple but pleasant life. I am a wife, a mother and I stay at home and take care of the household affairs. I like it. But even in this simple lifestyle my lack of confidence is causing me great problems and making me feel really bad about in myself.
I live in a nice neighbourhood with lots of lovely neighbours who are always socializing among themselves. I’ve never made much of an effort to befriend them…I dont have the confidence. I want to improve my cooking, try new recipes etc….I dont have the confidence to try. I recently missed out on a great opportunity to work at a school…I didnt’t have the confidence to do it.

What amazes me is that I’ve only just realised how much my lack of confidence has/is affected/ing my life! Now that I have realised it, I feel SO determined to change it. It is NOT going to be easy, but I have to try. Small steps at first, building up to bigger steps. I know building confidence will change my life so much for the better. I just have to keep doing the things that challenge my confidence and step out of my comfort zone, until it becomes habit. 14 months ago