Building confidence

[Tunafish81]

Ok well my confidence and self esteem have been damaged when I was younger.

I got MS unfortunately in 2017, relearned how to walk and am running now 6 years later and started a cement finishing small business. MS I hardly think about anymore. 
 

as a childhood traumas really did damage to my confidence but I’m trying to build it up. I’m not that unconfident but I have tell tale sign like body language sometimes and I get nervous talking it shows. 
 

im going on dates for practice and exposure to get this area of my life sorted out better 

 

any tips or pointer? I’m 6’5” and workout stay in shape so I don’t know where my unconfident self comes out I feel pretty assured with myself got sober and pretty positive guy.

im just a little uncomfortable in social settings I don’t know why and sick of it. 

[glows]

You have to watch any negative self-talk as it’s a constant negative loop. How you view yourself affects the way others perceive you so you may be experiencing others draw back if you’re hesitant or don’t feel as confident. 

Go for quality over quantity. Avoid people with huge messes in their lives or aren’t prepared to date.

What is it that bothers you? Is it going through MS? There may be support in your area where you can link up with others who’ve been through the same. 

You’re not defined by one thing only. Change your thoughts about yourself and find some joy and contentment in your life independent of relationships or people around you. 

[Tunafish81]

21 minutes ago, glows said:

You have to watch any negative self-talk as it’s a constant negative loop. How you view yourself affects the way others perceive you so you may be experiencing others draw back if you’re hesitant or don’t feel as confident. 

Go for quality over quantity. Avoid people with huge messes in their lives or aren’t prepared to date.

What is it that bothers you? Is it going through MS? There may be support in your area where you can link up with others who’ve been through the same. 

You’re not defined by one thing only. Change your thoughts about yourself and find some joy and contentment in your life independent of relationships or people around you. 

MS hardly affects me or my life, I hardly think about it anymore.

I have been puttting work in the last 3 years to address my issues.

I replace negative talk with positive attitude and give myself credit for coming as far as I have. I am ok alone and enjoy my own company but I just can’t get that strong confidence from early childhood traumas. I just feel nervous and uneasy talking to women and sometimes it shows. I want to be more confident and strong socially just never learned any of it it my younger years. 
so now I meet as many dates as possible and until I start getting comfortable talking and working on my social skills 

[smackie9]

Working on your social skills will take time. There is no magic pill or words to make it happen any faster. What you are doing is pretty much what others would have recommended. Keep doing what you are doing. 

Edited January 16, 2023 by smackie9

[Tunafish81]

21 minutes ago, smackie9 said:

Working on your social skills will take time. There is no magic pill or words to make it happen any faster. What you are doing is pretty much what others would have recommended. Keep doing what you are doing. 

I figured it’s a exercise in patience, doing things that make me nervous until I’m getting pretty comfortable in my skin, kinda like exposure to lots of dates will improve my whole demeanour wen I’m relaxed the whole time.

also depends on the date cause if there’s no vibe then no banter and it just gets awkward for me. I need to keep putting myself out there until I’m very comfortable and relaxed and my confidence is there but hiding I’m hoping to bring it out with constant exposures with dates and approaches. 

[Ami1uwant]

6 hours ago, Tunafish81 said:

I figured it’s a exercise in patience, doing things that make me nervous until I’m getting pretty comfortable in my skin, kinda like exposure to lots of dates will improve my whole demeanour wen I’m relaxed the whole time.

also depends on the date cause if there’s no vibe then no banter and it just gets awkward for me. I need to keep putting myself out there until I’m very comfortable and relaxed and my confidence is there but hiding I’m hoping to bring it out with constant exposures with dates and approaches. 

Remove the dating/ relationship stuff

 

how are you in general with talking to others?

[Tunafish81]

32 minutes ago, Ami1uwant said:

Remove the dating/ relationship stuff

 

how are you in general with talking to others?

Good question, I’m approachable and friendly. I can hold a decent conversation but I can have tendencies that can hurt me like body language, tone working on eye contact. Yea I’m no excellent conversationalist, I miss cues and signs I’m just trying to learn cause it’s hurting me in areas of my life. 
 

Appreciate the helping hand  

[Ami1uwant]

33 minutes ago, Tunafish81 said:

Good question, I’m approachable and friendly. I can hold a decent conversation but I can have tendencies that can hurt me like body language, tone working on eye contact. Yea I’m no excellent conversationalist, I miss cues and signs I’m just trying to learn cause it’s hurting me in areas of my life. 
 

Appreciate the helping hand  

You likely have a form of aspergers/ autism

[Tunafish81]

11 minutes ago, Ami1uwant said:

You likely have a form of aspergers/ autism

No I assure you I don’t, I have multiple sclerosis.ADHD and anxiety. 
 

im can learn to improve always and stay positive 

 

[Acacia98]

Something you can do to help build your confidence is regularly do stuff that you enjoy and are good at. If you feel more comfortable socializing in a particular context or with a particular type of person, that can help you get practice with reduced anxiety.

Also, I don't know if this is relevant to you, but I think it's important to be kind to yourself and forgive yourself for your limitations. Sometimes it's easier to address our limitations once we accept them and are not hard on ourselves for making this, that or the other mistake.

[Tunafish81]

15 minutes ago, Acacia98 said:

Something you can do to help build your confidence is regularly do stuff that you enjoy and are good at. If you feel more comfortable socializing in a particular context or with a particular type of person, that can help you get practice with reduced anxiety.

Also, I don't know if this is relevant to you, but I think it's important to be kind to yourself and forgive yourself for your limitations. Sometimes it's easier to address our limitations once we accept them and are not hard on ourselves for making this, that or the other mistake.

Yes you are right I’m a little hard on myself sometimes. I do ok just need to keep improving. 

[Ami1uwant]

8 hours ago, Tunafish81 said:

No I assure you I don’t, I have multiple sclerosis.ADHD and anxiety. 
 

im can learn to improve always and stay positive 

 

An Autism spectrum condition is one in which you experirnce

 

social anxiety/awkwardness and shyness. Not good in social interactions

hard to make friends. Don’t have many of them

poor non verbal communication/eye contact

 

 

[glows]

18 hours ago, Tunafish81 said:

I figured it’s a exercise in patience, doing things that make me nervous until I’m getting pretty comfortable in my skin, kinda like exposure to lots of dates will improve my whole demeanour wen I’m relaxed the whole time.

also depends on the date cause if there’s no vibe then no banter and it just gets awkward for me. I need to keep putting myself out there until I’m very comfortable and relaxed and my confidence is there but hiding I’m hoping to bring it out with constant exposures with dates and approaches. 

Are you going on back to back dates as in multiple in one week and then feeling discouraged because none of them lead to anything meaningful? Slow it down if that’s the case. You may be burnt out. 

Stay focused on your other goals. Meeting someone special is only icing on maybe 1/10th of the cake on one corner if anything. I wouldn’t view it as anything more special or important. Screen better and don’t put yourself out there if you’re using a dating app and someone’s profile is bald or lacking details for instance. In the first few minutes suss out what drives them or motivates them in their lives. You’ll find out quickly whether you’re a match without meeting that person and keep any first meet ups short, not more than an hour. 

Try not to let dating consume your life. It’s one thing but not everything.

[Lotsgoingon]

Go to therapy on this. You get very specific encouragement and you can deconstruct that missing esteem. BTW: people can read missing esteem a thousand miles away. So you can't really fake this. And people with low esteem also are too nice to other people, too begging, too desperate, and that desperation can undermine a good relationship.

Since you have a condition, you really want to work to feel good about yourself, because the condition may become more frustrating with time. You want to be able to like yourself and love yourself even as the condition continues. That's why I highly recommend therapy and maybe therapy with someone who has worked with people with MS. 

[flaxcapacitor]

On 1/16/2023 at 7:44 PM, Tunafish81 said:

MS hardly affects me or my life, I hardly think about it anymore.

I have been puttting work in the last 3 years to address my issues.

I replace negative talk with positive attitude and give myself credit for coming as far as I have. I am ok alone and enjoy my own company but I just can’t get that strong confidence from early childhood traumas. I just feel nervous and uneasy talking to women and sometimes it shows. I want to be more confident and strong socially just never learned any of it it my younger years. 
so now I meet as many dates as possible and until I start getting comfortable talking and working on my social skills 

Is the relevance of the MS that you were bullied, that it was a struggle right at that age where you should be developing social skills?

I ask because kids can be cruel and if something about you led to being an outcast among your peers, or the butt of all their jokes then you can get to adulthood having never had normal social relationships and even if you have gotten past the reason why they bullied you it is difficult to fit in because you're like 10/15 years behind other adults in terms of social development and now the problem isn't that you have this condition which people will use to bully you but that you seem immature to them.

[ZA Dater]

On 1/17/2023 at 6:14 AM, Tunafish81 said:

Good question, I’m approachable and friendly. I can hold a decent conversation but I can have tendencies that can hurt me like body language, tone working on eye contact. Yea I’m no excellent conversationalist, I miss cues and signs I’m just trying to learn cause it’s hurting me in areas of my life. 
 

Appreciate the helping hand  

I can relate to a lot of what you have posted in this thread and I have similar issues with confidence and what I noted was the bold.

What I found helps me is to know I have worth as person, I have knowledge and I am good at some things, maybe I am wrong but a lot of confidence starts with feeling good about oneself. Like you I find dating near impossible and when things get awkward my confidence drops hugely, it difficult pick oneself up from that but again self positive affirmation can help but in my experience dating especially OLD can destroy self confidence. 

One of the best ways to gain confidence is to be good at something and accomplish things, even small things are can make one feel good. 

Something I learnt and still struggle with the damage to self confidence from thinking about hurtful things in life, try avoid this, I know its difficult but at some point you need to try and not let the past influence the future too much.