Do you envy other people?

[Snowdrop]

I find that this has become a really bad habit of mine. I always wish I was somebody else, someone more confident and carefree. Especially in college I will see certain people that I admire a lot and wish I could have their charisma. When I look at them, it's like they have a strong personality that radiates off them. When I hear them talking I'll think "how can they talk so naturally?" and every now and then they'll say something that makes me think "I could've said/done that if I wasn't so impaired with SA" It's like I'm so far away from who I want to be, it's out of reach. Compared to them, I feel incredibly small and almost invisible.
But then afterwards I force myself to look ahead and once again I'm dealing with my own problems by myself as best I can.
I know it is useless to think this way but it's sort of become an illness.

 

[Ignace]

Yeah, I wanna be everyone else. Except who I am now, and criminals. The only thing you need in life, are social skills. Guess what, what is the only thing we don't have .. ?

 

[BlueDays]

Y-E-S! I have a frequent problem with doing this too.
It's hard to watch people who socialize so effortlessly, when it causes so much stress and emotional anguish for us to do that same thing.

 

[Phoenixx]

I know exactly what you mean. I envy those who are so outgoing and charismatic. How they socialize and talk so freely without giving a second thought as to what anyone else thinks. It's not so much I want to be them as it is I just want their social skills ::

 

[Snowdrop]

I don't want to be them either, I just want to be myself but with that extra confidence and smile...

 

[Dronee]

Well, you're talented in art... as can be seen from your work on the artist thread... That is a very enviable thing to someone like me... and I'm sure that I'm not the only one.

 

[Untamed88]

I wish I was confident and carefree but I find myself hating those sort of people too because I believe they are superficial and arrogant.

 

[Snowdrop]

Well, you're talented in art... as can be seen from your work on the artist thread... That is a very enviable thing to someone like me... and I'm sure that I'm not the only one.

Thank you Dronee but I would do anything to feel confident again, I just feel like this depression overshadows everything else, I just wish it wouldn't.

I wish I was confident and carefree but I find myself hating those sort of people too because I believe they are superficial and arrogant.

Yes, I get that too, it feels like a mixture of hate and longing...or maybe hate is too strong a word? Either way, one minute I'll find myself really wanting to be like them, and the next hating that they're so happy whereas I'm not, and superficial. Though sometimes I think I only dislike them now because of how I am, like it could just be a defense mechanism lest I hate myself even more. :/

 

[BlackPuma]

I get what you mean. I used to (and still do) envy a lot of people for their (relatively) carefree past. When I was I kid I used to think I was being punished for something I did in a previous life, as the events of my past just seemed too coincidental. As such, I told myself that I must've deserved all of it somehow. But now I realize that negative people and events pull and attract each other like gravity. I was just too inexperienced to see it.

You can still see the effects of it today, though. Due to constantly having accepted all that crap as punishment, I've developed a odd defense mechanism that allows me think straight on a outer-body level, but still confines me with guilt, anger and sadness. I'm constantly battling between strong logic and strong emotions. It causes this dreadful silent distress that nibbles at me constantly.

Now I envy others a lot. Because if I might have led a different past, I might have had more of my human nature left. Now I'm just odd semi-intelligent monkey that doesn't have anything more to add to a conversation then either a philosophical theory- or a simple joke.

Sometimes it just gets to me, as both of those strong aspects don't aid me in any way.

 

[Bustn Justin]

Alot of times I feel that if I was a 'normal' dude I would be more confident and have friends. Since I am diffierent from most other guys i get anxious and not want to talk to others.

 

[bsebring]

I think you're spot on. I feel like I'm inferrer to everyone around me at the university I go to. When I see people bettering themselves it just reminds me of how behind I am.

 

[missjesss]

this kind of attitude is whats ruining you ... stop comparing yourself to others and accept yourself for who you are we have been thru alot more **** then those so called "normal ppl" so you might say we are quite strong ppl to be still standing here with our past

don't put urself down ever again and you will notice a difference in time trust me

 

[Liam17]

Depends some days i'm like oh i wish i was them.

Then other days i'm like i can do better/or be better than me.

Thats what i feel like when i'm writing a song, or playing guitar though.

 

[missjesss]

bsebring

I wish I knew the answer to not feeling so inferior to others some days im ok but others im not its **** hey :-(

 

[JamesSmith]

Once i got into college, and then after college it got really bad with me envying people. I hated that I was like the way i am, and they were lucky to not have SAD like i do. I couldn't stand that 95% of people don't have what I have (SAD) and I'd see them jabbering away w/ all their friends enjoying life. Lately, I've come more to terms with myself. I have a bad genetic social anxiety disorder, and it's going to be tough to conquer. People like us shouldn't expect to have a lot of friends, we should just try to enjoy life as much as we can and learn to be happy with less than what others are happy with. Life is harder for us, we must accept that. It could be worse, we could be blind. While we envy "normal people," there are probably blind people envying us.

 

[los77]

The major thing I envy from what some may call, normal people, is their ability to interact with others... there may be other things I may be forgetting but this is the one that most impacts my life... Other than that though I'm pretty happy with who I am and I'm not really interested by the lifestyles these people may be living.

 

[Kiwong]

I can honestly say I don't envy other people.

I wouldn't want to be anyone else. I am lucky in many ways.

 

[jack23]

First post yay! Ironic that I had a hard time starting to post on here.

Anyway, I was flipping through channels, landed on MTV, and I watched the show where the two kids compete for a date with a girl by spending the day with her parents and what not. So I'm watching this and one challenge the kids did was to pick out an outfit for the girl. The douchey one proceeds to pick out a very ugly outfit. Nothing out of the ordinary.

What makes me envious of this guy was his reaction to the negative reactions of the outfit he picked. He's like "What are you talking about? That outfit is slammin!" It was clearly ugly. Anybody with a brain would have seen that.

All I'm thinkin is the kind of confidence that a person has to have to say to themselves that they can possibly do no wrong. Granted this guy was delusional but if I had even a quarter of that confidence, I'd be years ahead of where I'm at now. SA sucks.

 

[Falkor]

I do. Especially Outgoing people, I wish I could have a more socially life.
I'm like a hermit :/ But I just have to wait till my counselor can get me back to school again :]. and I'm looking at a appartment this thursday, so I will meet new people there.. That's a good step. but still hard. :/ But I think it'll be good for me.. though, to make progress. I hope I can get more social again.
But I just want to be like those people on facebook etc who goes to many parties or have a group of friends, I don't really have them.. Well I did, but I didn't see them in a while. Like 2 years or something. :/ We grew out of eachother, both went to different schools. But I do have friends, But I only see them very often because of my SA. & I never go to parties.. :/ Wish I could.

 

[Dronee]

There's no need to envy other people really... sometimes.. often, what you see is just a mask. There are many occasions where I would seem like an extremely confident person when I'm really, really anxious inside. I'm sure many of you have had this experience as well to some degree.

From talking to my once colleagues, I've learned that underneath the extremely confident and carefree masks, there's just a normal human being down there who's very anxious and covering it up as best as he or she can... This doesn't apply to everyone... but from personal experience, I see it often enough.

I remember there's this extremely, extremely confident man who was my colleague. He had the calmest, most assured voice that you'll ever be likely to hear and an aura about him that commands instant respect. He told me (when I was depressed) that he himself had gone through such a time and actually just cried. People who are assured on the outside... it doesn't necessarily mean that they've never been touched by pain. It could be that they were once like us... but they had persevered. Or it may be that the cocky youth down the road is exactly as insecure as us, but choose to use arrogance as a way to cope until a better tool can be found.