is it possible....

Post Reply New Topic

...to exude confidence and feel good and not be awkward?

To have enough charisma to do almost whatever you want in a public setting within reason.

is it possible to be confident? to truly be ones own character and not be tied back by shyness.

I have a vision of how I want to be, its a dream, and maybe its unrealistic and really far-fetched, but is anything really possible? If you strive hard enough can you really be who you want to be? Or will how you have acted the previous years of your life and the cringing experiences and traumas always be holding you back? Or the AS or dissociative/depression/ or whatever is ingrained into you always hold you back?

Im so far from the image of me exuding confidence but I feel like no matter what I do Im afraid I stand out. It could be because of my awkward posture or movements or maybe because people find me attractive on an outward level, or maybe I look like a weirdo. Im afraid nomatter what I do Im going to stand out and there is no pretending to be normal so I can blend in. That doesnt work, and im afraid makes me stand out more in a negative way when I try to control myself too much instead of just flowing.

I think If I could really do a complete 360 on my personality I could be the person I want to be and not feel like I have to hold back anything.

I think my most of my life has been me holding myself back and trying to be normal. But its obvious that I was never meant to be. The question is if I can improve myself to be truly confident in who I am and realize my dream potential.

is anything really possible? Im getting pretty fed up with the way I am and my situation in life. If I dont strive to make a 360 then whats the point of life? Why bother to barely make the grade being avoidant and never having the balls to take risks. Whats the point of life to just scrape by?

my response might be a bit depressing, so you may want to not read further....






only temporarily. ive found that i have been able to do a 360 on my life and somehow life pushed me all the way back in what can only be described as a series of unfortunate events. i will admit that i enjoyed the time i had though. hapiness is only temporary, dont fool yourself

Iv felt like for a short period of time I made a 360 earlier in the year.....but I wasn't strong enough to hold on to it...obviously. It was so great I felt like I was a bit free and outgoing and not bound into being avoidant and "safe"

and then all of the sudden crap happens and I fall back into the same old me. But really whats the point of life? If not having that dream and making at least part of it happen and having the goals of keeping on improving.

Because right now it feels impossible for me to ever have self-confidence. It feels like never.

But I have a dream, and it starts now.

the point Im making is that ill never be some regular guy. I think I will always stand out and I need to change so its in a good way. Why not be able to just be able to randomly talk to any person? Any girl? within reason or cheer up a room when you enter it? to be a truly confident person and then bam life is wayyyy f******* enjoyable........thats my dream. I am a guy and I dont think I am too old to drastically change but its going to take quite some work.

.....instead of being a miserable introvert who never had the courage and never goes anywhere in life. never has fun

Is it wrong to have that dream? Or is 22 years of bad experiences based on my hardwiring and that itself will always hold me back?

i mean whats life if I cant dream and my dream and slowly start getting there?

thats what I'm saying is "anything is possible if you put your mind to it" real? Can that really happen?

I really want to believe that its possible, because my life needs to change right now. whats life if im not confident? and right now it feels impossible that I will ever feel confident in who I am. It feels like never............

I mean its not possible to be inhuman and there are always going to be sad and miserable times and times when you feel low. But on whole that shouldnt be all the f*****g time.....

OP, I feel the same way, actually.

I've still never figured out how to learn to be genuinely confident and all that, and I don't know if it's something I can achieve, but I've learned how to fake it rather well. I had an ex-boyfriend who was very charismatic and confident, and I learned to pretend to be him when talking to people. "What would luke do?" and I do/say that. It's hard to maintain for more than, say, 3 hours, but it's better than nothing...

Easy:
1. Acquire lots of money
2. Make sure everybody knows you're loaded
3. Sit back and watch them fall over themselves trying to be lovely to you

Seriously, I don't think self-confidence is a thing that anybody has 100% of the time. It depends on the situation and on your previous experiences of similar situations. Even the most successful people probably have doubts about themselves. And there is such a thing as overconfidence which can set you up for a fall, or just piss everybody off if it spills over into arrogance. You can't be entirely realistic and entirely confident at the same time, because there's always some chance you'll screw up, because you're human.

Some people know how to exude confidence pretty much all the time they're being watched, but what's going on inside them is anybody's guess. A good finishing school could teach you the tricks. It's one of those things that can become true if you fake it well enough to begin with, because people will begin to revere you and the positive feedback will make you feel more sure of yourself.

Of course, if you have really good friends, you'll be able to tell them when your confidence is at a low and they'll help you to work it out. Not everybody will shun a person just because they aren't currently looking much like Superman. You are allowed to have weaknesses.

If you make it your life's work to master the art, and diligently work on your act, then there's no reason why you shouldn't succeed, though there will probably always be times when you fail. Especially if your upbringing taught you to undervalue yourself, or if you had very bad social experiences as a young adult. If that was bad enough, you'll probably always be prone to regression, though if you play your cards carefully then you might go for decades without a serious relapse.

For example, I had largely pulled out of my severe social ineptitude by the time I was 26, and became confident enough with women to keep myself in girlfriends until I was in my 40s. I really thought I'd got the whole problem solved and that I had acquired all the necessary skills. But like a fool I went to a party where I knew nobody, and inside me I was instantly dragged back to those horrible times of my youth when I couldn't find anybody to talk to. And a few years later I went to visit a lady with whom I hoped to begin a relationship....I don't know what it was, but when I arrived my confidence collapsed and I was once again dragged back to my old wimpish state. I clumsily bluffed my way through and eventually we did have a relationship, but I never forgot the shock of discovering that all the old anxieties and ineptitudes were still alive and well inside me, waiting to scupper me.

So it's never going to be perfect. If I stick to small numbers of carefully-selected people (reasonably non-judgemental, friendly and familiar ones who have some kind of common purpose with me), then generally I'll do quite well and you'd probably never know I was an Aspie. Take me beyond that safe little pond, or immerse me in it for too long, and you might see a very different creature. I have to know my limits and stay within them, with only the most carefully-controlled excursions onto "higher" levels. And if I lose my current batch of friends, as well I might, judging by the track record of my lousy retention rate, I'll have to take another sizeable dose of fear and of feeling like a complete idiot before I manage to get used to another load of chums. I know I've got all the skills to do it over, but at the time I'll feel so strongly that I've "lost it," that it will seem true. Luckily the essential ingredient to get through that - courage - is not a thing that Aspies are any worse at than anybody else. It's completely illogical but I feel I have no choice but to believe that there is always hope.

maybe you should do a 360 on thinking about yourself

I don't intend to be rude by saying this

I spent most of my life trying to do what you seem to wanna do
it just doesn't work, you would need to spend so much energy on weak points that you would lose the strength you have, discover your strength

If you're an aspie and you're acting confidently as though the world were supporting your goals and everyone was moved by the force into alignment with you, then you're deluded and heading for a fall. The thing that's missing for us is being on the bus with the rest of them, feeling the tide rise just before they do, knowing what they want for breakfast.

Actually doing a 360 is possible, and it's so easy. The hard thing is to be remain on there. Things may change fastly again and you may turn to to the position where you started simontaneously. That can probably make you depressed and worse than the position where you started.

In order not to feel that way, and completing your 360 succesfully also reaining on there till the end of your life, go through step by step (degree by degree).
360 may not be the one that you are really expecting, so you may like and be happy 90, or maybe 180. So stop there and not continue to do a 360.

The only way to do this is trying to do the things that you can't. Start from the most basic things thatyou can't do. When you accomplish those skills, increase complexity.

DO NOT START FROM THE MOST COMPLEX ONE:!:

Hey,what is confidence, more then the abillity to go with your own ideas for an extended piriod of time.
Why don't you just rush up and say hi without thinking about it?

notice I stop to think befor i do something so i show very little confidence.

Acting confident is just that.. and act.. it's fake. If you want to actually be confident then you have to be happy with who you are. The whole "you can be anything you dream of" is bull.. I can dream of being a professional basketball player or a bird.. but it's not going to happen. We all have different strengths and weaknesses, it makes no sense to play up the weaknesses in order to achieve some image or act.

is it? Thats what I want to know? If I keep beleiving and working toward making myself a fun confident person who isnt held back by avoidant/depressed/anxious feelings and I keep trying can it be done. I think yes and not because I buy into silly catchphrases, but because if not, then there is no point of living if I cant have a dream.

Of course you cant be a bird, and its very slim that you could be a professional NBAer, but would you want to be any one of those things after the age of say 9?

Im not thinking in terms of a career. To me things like a job/career girlfriend and other such things are a waste of time thinking about When there is a giant gaping hole that completely hinders the way you function like how Im feeling right now.

If I could change the way I think about myself and my personality improves and iv seen it happen for short periods of time.

yes of course I need to play on my talents

No, I agree - dreams are good, I have plenty of them myself usually. I don't know what you mean by making yourself into a fun, confident person. Do you mean acting? Because acting is not real, and eventually you'll burn out.. I've tried on dozens of personalities in my life of people who I thought were successful and ended up failing and making myself look like an idiot in the process. Sure I felt more confident at the time because I thought I was doing things "right" but it's tiring and eventually people see through it. However, I think that just being happy and in a good place makes you more confident, and certainly there are small actions you can take to make yourself look more confident.. I don't think that you can change your entire personality though.. nor do I think that anyone should be expected to make such a drastic change of themselves.

of course it's possible. you can't change yourself, but you can accept yourself 100% (easier said than done, of course). my brother had a friend once who has this ridiculous off-rhythm random twitching jerking dancing style. everyone laughed at him. and no one could come anywhere near him on the dance floor, or risk getting knocked out by a stray limb. it looked like he was having a seizure.

but it didn't stop him from dancing. he was totally, completely comfortable with it.

"Is it wrong to have that dream? "

Me, I am not a dreamer. But I am marruied to one, and have a strong sense of it:

If that is you, dreamer, then it is not wrong. Likely uncomfortable. Possibly frustrating - but NOT NECESSARILY FRUITLESS. And if you are inborn dreamer, then you are going to dream and right or wrong does not come into it. The trer does not stop photosynthesising.