Just G
Well-known member
Well folks, it’s 3: 44 AM in the morning where I’m at, and I’m sitting in front of my laptop with a big grin spread across my face as I begin typing this.
2010 has ended and 2011 has begun.
I spent New Year’s – like I did Thanksgiving and Christmas - alone.
But, you’re probably wondering why I’m grinning then.
Well, to be honest, last evening I became a bit bummed out after receiving word that the party I was attending was going to be canceled.
When I came to the realization that I was once again going to be alone on yet another holiday, it hit me like a bag full of bricks. No mother or father, no siblings, no friends, no significant other, no dog or cat, no one else was available to share the New Year with me.
It sucked royally to say the least.
However, instead of moping around my room and feeling sorry for myself, I decided to channel my energy into doing something more positive.
So I worked out.
Then I cleaned up.
And when I was finished, I sat on my bed for a while.
As I was sitting, I began thinking about how far I have come over the years with my personal development.
When I was in high school, my social anxiety was at an all-time high. Despite being one of the more popular kids at my school, I still mightily struggled communicating with anyone outside my social circle. Public speaking, eye contact, and hell, even ordering from the dollar menu at McDonald’s, were all tremendous, mental obstacles to overcome in my daily life.
I was fat, weighing in at a whopping 240 pounds. Needless to say, all that fat especially didn’t look good on a 5’6 frame. Also, it didn’t help matters that
I dressed poorly and rocked the dreaded porn ‘stache.
My first day at college, I almost fainted upon seeing such a large concentration of people in one area. I remember it being too much stimuli to take in at once.
As I walked from class to class, I would hang my head down low as to make sure no one would see my face.
In class, I either sat in the middle rows or way in the back where no one could see me. I never talked to anyone, nor did I ever raise my hand to speak out in class.
If I saw anyone I was familiar with, I would turn the other way as to avoid a social situation. I had a tendency of doing this wherever I was, and it manifested in different scenarios as well. For example, I would often avoid going on elevators just as others were stepping on. Another example is if a lot of people occupied a particular aisle in the grocery store, I would wait until everyone left before going in and getting what I needed.
My Social Anxiety coerced me into a heavily routinized, daily regimen. My days consisted of waking up, going to school, coming home, eating, going to bed, and doing the same thing over for the next day.
I commuted on the same roads, did the same ****, ate the same food, and just basically lived my life in this ultra-conservative, safe pattern.
Since those days, I have improved on a lot of aspects in my life. As I mentioned before in my introduction piece to the site, I lost the weight in six months time. Two years afterward into the present day, I’ve managed to maintain a healthy lifestyle. I dress better and I maintain myself better.
While I’m still not the greatest at public speaking and while I still get nervous, I’ve vastly improved my performance and have become better at controlling my nerves.
Whenever I speak to someone I’m able to easily lock my eyes onto theirs now, but I still have a hard time making eye contact when passing certain people (mostly notably women) on the street. However, I’ve noticed that every time I mustered up the courage to do it, it has resulted in a positive outcome. I’ve gotten some looks from some very, very cute girls, and when I sent back the favor, I was always greeted with warm, inviting smiles followed by nice, little waves. Hell, they might as well had signs above their heads that said “Approach Me,” because it was so painfully obvious. But, I wasn’t ready for that type of exposure yet, so I never followed through with an approach.
My conversation skills have become much better too, so much in fact, that I made “temporary” friends in a select few classes. And I say temporary, because it was my fault that I became out of touch with them after the semester ended.
I’ve learned to listen and react. I’ve learned the little nuances that make a conversation work, such as asking open ended questions, asking follow up questions, maintaining eye contact, smiling and the proper etiquette for adding humor, touching, etc. Mostly importantly, I’ve learned that people value you when you take a genuine interest in them.
When I go out there, my head is held high, I walk slowly, and I take the time
to survey all my surroundings.
And instead of doing the same thing every day, I now try to go into different venues and try the different things that peak my interest (yoga classes, coffee shops, gyms, etc.).
Again, I’m still working on all of this, and it will take time before I master it all, but the initiative has been made and that’s all that matters.
And now my progress begins coming full circle into the present day.
A couple of months ago, a random girl friend requested me on Facebook. Initially, I was taken back upon not recognizing the name, but when I saw the thumbnail picture of her, I liked her looks enough to press the “Accept” button. After evaluating her pictures, it turns out that she is very cute. She’s also near where I live, attends the same college, and knows some of my friends.
So out of curiosity, I send her a message asking her if we knew each other by any chance. She responds, saying “no, I just thought you were cute.” I send her a reply back basically flirting around; we do this back and forth a bit. I say I want to get to know her better; she flat out gives me her number. I respond saying I don’t text, but I do talk (bold move on my part, I think). I don’t tell her when I’ll call, but I say I will.
A couple of days later, on one particular evening, I follow through with my promise. The phone conversation starts out awkward, with the two of us being nervous. After we get into the conversation, things settle down a bit and it manages to become fun. After 30 minutes, I make the crucial mistake of not hanging up first. It didn’t seem to matter though, as she seemed to really like me. So well in fact, that she sent me a text right afterward saying how much she enjoyed the conversation and that if I ever got bored that I could call and text her any time I wanted.
The next day, she sends me a text first. We text back and forth for the next couple of days, but I play it cool between each text, making sure to vary the times in which I respond back.
Well after a while, I finally let my balls drop, and I arrange a weekend date. I set up the time and everything, but she has objections at eating at the particular restaurant I have chosen. She says she’s not down for eating out (she’s a home body like me) and is not feeling Italian. If you know anything about where we live, there’s not a place anywhere that’s decent except the place I’ve chosen, and trust me when I say that it is a nice, little place. I told her it was more about the meeting than anything else, not about stuffing our faces. We didn’t have to eat at all, we could have had coffee or not had anything at all and just talked, but again, she wasn’t feeling it.
I suggested taking her to the city, but she didn’t seem too keen on that idea either.
I finally suggested that we just meet up at her place to hang out, and she Ok’ed that idea.
The day finally comes. It’s early in the afternoon, and I receive a text that she’s not feeling well. I ask her if she’s ok, and she tells me her kidney stones are acting up. Instantly, I thought she was trying to make an excuse to get out of the date. However, as we correspond back and forth, she gives me a detailed overview with her history having them, and I was like, “this is far too elaborate to make up.” I kept my wits and composure about me and expressed concern and understanding of her situation. Apparently, she wanted to hear from me because she kept lighting up my phone trying to text me. I text back, expressing my well wishes, while also negging and joking around with her every chance I got. She expresses her appreciation, and in the middle of our conversation, she asks for a picture of me. I’m like, oooooooooooooook, but I do it anyway. I grab a white piece of paper, write “Get Well Soon” on it, and take a picture with my adorable face next to it. I send it to her, and she’s like “You’re so cute.” I do the same thing again, except this time I write “I know” and send it to her. She loves it, and after a while, it all ends.
Over the next couple of weeks, our messages become few and far between. I miss one of her calls, and she misses one of mine. We eventually stop our communication, and I just move on.
That is, until one day I’m at the movies with my friends. As we’re watching the trailers, her number flashes on my phone; I can’t answer it because we’re in the theater. Anyway, to shorten this up a bit, I start receiving these text messages where’s it apparent that’s she drunk. They weren’t annoying messages. If anything, they were actually quite funny. So moving on, we didn’t get out of the theater until about 3 in the morning (it was a late showing of TRON Legacy).
Since it was pretty early in the morning and since I was under the impression that she was pretty drunk, I decide to message her on Facebook again a couple of days later. I make light of the whole situation, and she responds back apologizing. Then as I’m responding back to her message, I decide to arrange another date with her again. Keep in mind, Christmas and New Years were around the corner, so I suggest that we should just go out for coffee when everything calms down and when our schedules open up. She responds saying she’s down for it and would love to have coffee. I begin scouting the various coffee shops in the city near me. I find this really great spot in the downtown area that’s really hip and trendy. It’s quiet and spacious; it essentially had everything that would make for a great atmosphere for a first date. As I was doing this, my anxiety spiked a bit, with feelings of doubt and regret beginning to pervade my consciousness. However, I reassured myself that what I was feeling was ok, just as long as I gave myself the benefit of going through with the date.
So I had everything planned out. I was going to take her on Sunday (after New Years day) early in the afternoon and we were going to have nice, calm afternoon together.
That was finished, and now, came the doozy: the call.
I was really nervous about this, despite already having a successful phone conversation with her under my belt. Later that Thursday evening, I manned up and made the call. I call, she answers, and I say with my sweetest voice, “Hey [insert name here].” She responds with a simple “hey” in return, and I ask “what are you up to?” She says something that I could hardly make out, so I ask her to repeat what she said. She repeats it, but the low tone in her voice and the default audio levels on my phone made it hard make hear what she was saying. I go ahead and say, “That’s cool,” even though I’m still oblivious to what she actually said. I go on to ask, “How was your Christmas?” She says it was good. Before I get the chance to unload follow up questions from our previous conversations, she cuts me off and says she has to go and tells me that she’ll call me later that night. I calmly say something along the lines of, “no big deal, go do your thing.”
My plan was to ask three questions, ask for the date (which I would phrase as “hanging out”), give the specifics, and hang up.
I had another shot to do so…or so I thought.
15 minutes passed. 30 minutes passed. An hour passed. Two hours passed.
Before you know it, the night was over. She wasn’t calling my ass back.
I’ll be honest, at first I was hovering over my phone, waiting anxiously for her to call me back.
Then something incredible happened.
I stopped caring.
Was it me or was it her?
Was I boring or was she too insecure?
Was I not confident enough?
Was she really a flake? (I saw some signs of this)
I realized that speculation didn't serve me in one way, other than contributing more to my anxiety.
Sure, I was a bit peeved that she didn’t have the common courtesy to return a call when she said she would, but it didn’t matter.
All that mattered was that I was making progress as a man. I didn’t allow fear to get in the way of what I wanted to do. I didn’t become clingy or whiney over her. I didn’t snap by sending a barrage of mean spirited messages to her inbox. I took it in stride and used it as an opportunity to grow and mature as a man.
I won because I was learning to accept my anxiety instead of trying to get rid of it. I am building a skill.
Everything I do is an indicator that I am pushing myself. It’s a catalyst for me to confront my inner demons and destroy them as I become a man.
That’s what living is.
Living from moment to moment is part of the beautiful struggle of life.
Risk, reward, and bliss go hand in hand.
I’m proud to say that I’m slowly becoming the man I always wanted to be.
A new man for a new year.
2010 has ended and 2011 has begun.
I spent New Year’s – like I did Thanksgiving and Christmas - alone.
But, you’re probably wondering why I’m grinning then.
Well, to be honest, last evening I became a bit bummed out after receiving word that the party I was attending was going to be canceled.
When I came to the realization that I was once again going to be alone on yet another holiday, it hit me like a bag full of bricks. No mother or father, no siblings, no friends, no significant other, no dog or cat, no one else was available to share the New Year with me.
It sucked royally to say the least.
However, instead of moping around my room and feeling sorry for myself, I decided to channel my energy into doing something more positive.
So I worked out.
Then I cleaned up.
And when I was finished, I sat on my bed for a while.
As I was sitting, I began thinking about how far I have come over the years with my personal development.
When I was in high school, my social anxiety was at an all-time high. Despite being one of the more popular kids at my school, I still mightily struggled communicating with anyone outside my social circle. Public speaking, eye contact, and hell, even ordering from the dollar menu at McDonald’s, were all tremendous, mental obstacles to overcome in my daily life.
I was fat, weighing in at a whopping 240 pounds. Needless to say, all that fat especially didn’t look good on a 5’6 frame. Also, it didn’t help matters that
I dressed poorly and rocked the dreaded porn ‘stache.
My first day at college, I almost fainted upon seeing such a large concentration of people in one area. I remember it being too much stimuli to take in at once.
As I walked from class to class, I would hang my head down low as to make sure no one would see my face.
In class, I either sat in the middle rows or way in the back where no one could see me. I never talked to anyone, nor did I ever raise my hand to speak out in class.
If I saw anyone I was familiar with, I would turn the other way as to avoid a social situation. I had a tendency of doing this wherever I was, and it manifested in different scenarios as well. For example, I would often avoid going on elevators just as others were stepping on. Another example is if a lot of people occupied a particular aisle in the grocery store, I would wait until everyone left before going in and getting what I needed.
My Social Anxiety coerced me into a heavily routinized, daily regimen. My days consisted of waking up, going to school, coming home, eating, going to bed, and doing the same thing over for the next day.
I commuted on the same roads, did the same ****, ate the same food, and just basically lived my life in this ultra-conservative, safe pattern.
Since those days, I have improved on a lot of aspects in my life. As I mentioned before in my introduction piece to the site, I lost the weight in six months time. Two years afterward into the present day, I’ve managed to maintain a healthy lifestyle. I dress better and I maintain myself better.
While I’m still not the greatest at public speaking and while I still get nervous, I’ve vastly improved my performance and have become better at controlling my nerves.
Whenever I speak to someone I’m able to easily lock my eyes onto theirs now, but I still have a hard time making eye contact when passing certain people (mostly notably women) on the street. However, I’ve noticed that every time I mustered up the courage to do it, it has resulted in a positive outcome. I’ve gotten some looks from some very, very cute girls, and when I sent back the favor, I was always greeted with warm, inviting smiles followed by nice, little waves. Hell, they might as well had signs above their heads that said “Approach Me,” because it was so painfully obvious. But, I wasn’t ready for that type of exposure yet, so I never followed through with an approach.
My conversation skills have become much better too, so much in fact, that I made “temporary” friends in a select few classes. And I say temporary, because it was my fault that I became out of touch with them after the semester ended.
I’ve learned to listen and react. I’ve learned the little nuances that make a conversation work, such as asking open ended questions, asking follow up questions, maintaining eye contact, smiling and the proper etiquette for adding humor, touching, etc. Mostly importantly, I’ve learned that people value you when you take a genuine interest in them.
When I go out there, my head is held high, I walk slowly, and I take the time
to survey all my surroundings.
And instead of doing the same thing every day, I now try to go into different venues and try the different things that peak my interest (yoga classes, coffee shops, gyms, etc.).
Again, I’m still working on all of this, and it will take time before I master it all, but the initiative has been made and that’s all that matters.
And now my progress begins coming full circle into the present day.
A couple of months ago, a random girl friend requested me on Facebook. Initially, I was taken back upon not recognizing the name, but when I saw the thumbnail picture of her, I liked her looks enough to press the “Accept” button. After evaluating her pictures, it turns out that she is very cute. She’s also near where I live, attends the same college, and knows some of my friends.
So out of curiosity, I send her a message asking her if we knew each other by any chance. She responds, saying “no, I just thought you were cute.” I send her a reply back basically flirting around; we do this back and forth a bit. I say I want to get to know her better; she flat out gives me her number. I respond saying I don’t text, but I do talk (bold move on my part, I think). I don’t tell her when I’ll call, but I say I will.
A couple of days later, on one particular evening, I follow through with my promise. The phone conversation starts out awkward, with the two of us being nervous. After we get into the conversation, things settle down a bit and it manages to become fun. After 30 minutes, I make the crucial mistake of not hanging up first. It didn’t seem to matter though, as she seemed to really like me. So well in fact, that she sent me a text right afterward saying how much she enjoyed the conversation and that if I ever got bored that I could call and text her any time I wanted.
The next day, she sends me a text first. We text back and forth for the next couple of days, but I play it cool between each text, making sure to vary the times in which I respond back.
Well after a while, I finally let my balls drop, and I arrange a weekend date. I set up the time and everything, but she has objections at eating at the particular restaurant I have chosen. She says she’s not down for eating out (she’s a home body like me) and is not feeling Italian. If you know anything about where we live, there’s not a place anywhere that’s decent except the place I’ve chosen, and trust me when I say that it is a nice, little place. I told her it was more about the meeting than anything else, not about stuffing our faces. We didn’t have to eat at all, we could have had coffee or not had anything at all and just talked, but again, she wasn’t feeling it.
I suggested taking her to the city, but she didn’t seem too keen on that idea either.
I finally suggested that we just meet up at her place to hang out, and she Ok’ed that idea.
The day finally comes. It’s early in the afternoon, and I receive a text that she’s not feeling well. I ask her if she’s ok, and she tells me her kidney stones are acting up. Instantly, I thought she was trying to make an excuse to get out of the date. However, as we correspond back and forth, she gives me a detailed overview with her history having them, and I was like, “this is far too elaborate to make up.” I kept my wits and composure about me and expressed concern and understanding of her situation. Apparently, she wanted to hear from me because she kept lighting up my phone trying to text me. I text back, expressing my well wishes, while also negging and joking around with her every chance I got. She expresses her appreciation, and in the middle of our conversation, she asks for a picture of me. I’m like, oooooooooooooook, but I do it anyway. I grab a white piece of paper, write “Get Well Soon” on it, and take a picture with my adorable face next to it. I send it to her, and she’s like “You’re so cute.” I do the same thing again, except this time I write “I know” and send it to her. She loves it, and after a while, it all ends.
Over the next couple of weeks, our messages become few and far between. I miss one of her calls, and she misses one of mine. We eventually stop our communication, and I just move on.
That is, until one day I’m at the movies with my friends. As we’re watching the trailers, her number flashes on my phone; I can’t answer it because we’re in the theater. Anyway, to shorten this up a bit, I start receiving these text messages where’s it apparent that’s she drunk. They weren’t annoying messages. If anything, they were actually quite funny. So moving on, we didn’t get out of the theater until about 3 in the morning (it was a late showing of TRON Legacy).
Since it was pretty early in the morning and since I was under the impression that she was pretty drunk, I decide to message her on Facebook again a couple of days later. I make light of the whole situation, and she responds back apologizing. Then as I’m responding back to her message, I decide to arrange another date with her again. Keep in mind, Christmas and New Years were around the corner, so I suggest that we should just go out for coffee when everything calms down and when our schedules open up. She responds saying she’s down for it and would love to have coffee. I begin scouting the various coffee shops in the city near me. I find this really great spot in the downtown area that’s really hip and trendy. It’s quiet and spacious; it essentially had everything that would make for a great atmosphere for a first date. As I was doing this, my anxiety spiked a bit, with feelings of doubt and regret beginning to pervade my consciousness. However, I reassured myself that what I was feeling was ok, just as long as I gave myself the benefit of going through with the date.
So I had everything planned out. I was going to take her on Sunday (after New Years day) early in the afternoon and we were going to have nice, calm afternoon together.
That was finished, and now, came the doozy: the call.
I was really nervous about this, despite already having a successful phone conversation with her under my belt. Later that Thursday evening, I manned up and made the call. I call, she answers, and I say with my sweetest voice, “Hey [insert name here].” She responds with a simple “hey” in return, and I ask “what are you up to?” She says something that I could hardly make out, so I ask her to repeat what she said. She repeats it, but the low tone in her voice and the default audio levels on my phone made it hard make hear what she was saying. I go ahead and say, “That’s cool,” even though I’m still oblivious to what she actually said. I go on to ask, “How was your Christmas?” She says it was good. Before I get the chance to unload follow up questions from our previous conversations, she cuts me off and says she has to go and tells me that she’ll call me later that night. I calmly say something along the lines of, “no big deal, go do your thing.”
My plan was to ask three questions, ask for the date (which I would phrase as “hanging out”), give the specifics, and hang up.
I had another shot to do so…or so I thought.
15 minutes passed. 30 minutes passed. An hour passed. Two hours passed.
Before you know it, the night was over. She wasn’t calling my ass back.
I’ll be honest, at first I was hovering over my phone, waiting anxiously for her to call me back.
Then something incredible happened.
I stopped caring.
Was it me or was it her?
Was I boring or was she too insecure?
Was I not confident enough?
Was she really a flake? (I saw some signs of this)
I realized that speculation didn't serve me in one way, other than contributing more to my anxiety.
Sure, I was a bit peeved that she didn’t have the common courtesy to return a call when she said she would, but it didn’t matter.
All that mattered was that I was making progress as a man. I didn’t allow fear to get in the way of what I wanted to do. I didn’t become clingy or whiney over her. I didn’t snap by sending a barrage of mean spirited messages to her inbox. I took it in stride and used it as an opportunity to grow and mature as a man.
I won because I was learning to accept my anxiety instead of trying to get rid of it. I am building a skill.
Everything I do is an indicator that I am pushing myself. It’s a catalyst for me to confront my inner demons and destroy them as I become a man.
That’s what living is.
Living from moment to moment is part of the beautiful struggle of life.
Risk, reward, and bliss go hand in hand.
I’m proud to say that I’m slowly becoming the man I always wanted to be.
A new man for a new year.
Best wishes for 2011.
