They say that you should judge against yourself, and not against others.

Well I can't stand the fact that whenever I think of a guy friend of mine, they have been hit on by more attractive women than I have. What makes it worse is that some of these guys are socially awkward, dress plain, don't have too good of social skills - not types you would think would get hit on.

I will look in the mirror at my good style and state, but then I will think of how my buddy who was wearing plain jeans and a wrinkly flannel with messy hair got hit on by an attractive girl the previous night - and it will destroy my state.

Also I keep reading about the "horror" stories of RAFC's and Newbies on this site. The thing is that the stories usually involve an attractive girl that is obviously interested in them initially and they screw it up. Well I can with complete honosty that I have never been blatantly approached or hit on by a girl greater than a 6 in all my life, period. And yes, I have a very active social life and have been going out on average of about 2-3 times a week for the past 5 years. I figured out that I have been introduced to probably about 300 attractive girls in the past 5 years (about one a week on average) Is it even possible to not be approached with a number that huge? It is a huge confidence destroyer. I have a very well paying job so I try to look my best.

So either I am,

-Clueless as to the signs of when a women are interested
-Have something physically unnappealing about me that I am ignorant of (due to the PUA philosophy of "looks do not matter" that was pounded into my head for the past 4 years)

Have you by chance heard about the thoughts of your sub-conscience being portrayed through your body language?

ever noticed someone that does not look shy, but you can tell they are not confident about them-self?

Somewhere along the way, you have this belief in your mind, that even tho you are stylish and handsome, your unapproachable. This mind-frame, be it an active thought or an in-active sub-conscious thought, will be portrayed through your body language and be picked up.

for a long time, People would not approach me, someone once mentioned i seemed intimidating to them. Then checking my thoughts, i realized i was acting like a toad, in the sense that when i felt threatened or had competition that i tried to appear larger then what i was and intimidate people. Once i changed the root cause, it stopped, and now people approach me more then i approach them based on non verbal communicators.

need help changing the belief, let me know...

_________________
"The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one."

Yes, I have heard of that theory. However again, I don't believe I have horrid body language.

It would be nice to get a step in the right direction to change this belief though....

when body language is spoken of, its not simply how you stand, walk, or sit. It also includes you mannerisms.

some people dont realize it, but there is something called a micro expression, its an expression that comes from the actual emotion but is masked by a visibly different expression.

say you where asked a childhood question, the memory is a sad one, but you act as if nothing is wrong or even that is was a good one. There would be a micro expression of sadness when your actual expression is of joy.

Women can pick up on these types of things through intuition. They may not be able to tell exactly whats going on, but they can sense something off. That sense alone can stop someone dead in there tracks.

this also comes out in mannerisms, the sub-conscious is a tricky thing, you can tell yourself your confident, but you can never lie to yourself. Ever been around someone that is upbeat and social, but it seems like something is out of place.

this is the exact same thing, that is going on, you have this belief, and tho you may not noticeably see your body language being negative, there is a chance that your mannerisms, a sudden movement, the direction of the eyes something completely subtle that it does not register with your conscience mind are sending off a negative unapproachable vibes. Just the fact that you limit yourself based on the fact you think your not approachable lowers your confidence and those subtle clues will increase to others.

first before, you can fix it, you need to figure out the underlying cause of the belief. Then you have to ask yourself why you put so much validation on this one specific outcome. once this is all done, let me know what you have discovered.

_________________
"The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one."

Do you have a good time when you go out with your friends? You should be happy for your friends, especially when they have the good fortune of being approached by an attractive woman.

What do you do for fun? If you have a well paying job, then that means you probably only have nights and weekends free. You may want to focus on doing the things that you find fun and then you won't worry so much about your friends getting approached.

Also, if you are introduced to at least one attractive new girl a week, maybe some of those girls would have approached you if you hadn't been introduced. Maybe your social circles are too big. (Which is not really a problem at all).

Lastly, you're a dude. You can approach anyone you want. Who cares if your guy friends get appraoched once in a while, you're a PUA, your friends are probably amazed at your ability to approach others with ease.[/quote]

DC,

I actually took some time to sit down and think about my past and how they affect my inner beliefs.

I am talking about almost sub-concious beliefs, my true beliefs beneath any fake facade I give out. This is kind of a bad example, but think of the girl who seems very outgoing and confident. But when she gets really drunk and breaks down at 2am in the morning and cries because she is insecure inside. She may be convincing herself all the time that she is confident and she will put on that facade. She may put on the facade so well and for such a long time that she will have forgotten that she is insecure - I kind of ignorance if that makes any sense. However, the next time something sets her off she breaks down again and her true inner self shows.

Anyways,

Growing up I had severe social anxiety up until the age of about 17, when I made an effort to get rid of it (and mostly did). However, since then I have noticed that I still have some form of "self consciousness" around people. This makes me ALWAYS think about what I am saying, even if I don't have the anxiety. This is going to sound weird, but I can make friends very very easily. However, anyone can make shallow connections with people. I feel like I have trouble making deep connections with people, including women. Thus, I have a ton of friends who are great people, but I feel like I have very few (or none at all) friends who I connect with on a deep level. I blame this on myself. I say to myself "it is your fault that you cannot make any deep friendships, and its because of your self consciousness, and this self-consciousness is not going to go away because you have tried to make it go away for the past 6 years and nothing has worked, it is a part of you". I feel like I am missing some subtle social interaction cue, I merely cannot "connect" with people on a deeper level. I actually think I may have aspergers - I meet a lot of the criteria for this disorder, which includes: odd habits growing up, high intelligence, and most importantly - difficulty reading emotions as well as difficulty forming deep relationships with people.


Anyways, this is one of my main core beliefs. It took a lot of thinking to get this out.

Its an endless circle.

DC,

I actually took some time to sit down and think about my past and how they affect my inner beliefs.

I am talking about almost sub-concious beliefs, my true beliefs beneath any fake facade I give out. This is kind of a bad example, but think of the girl who seems very outgoing and confident. But when she gets really drunk and breaks down at 2am in the morning and cries because she is insecure inside. She may be convincing herself all the time that she is confident and she will put on that facade. She may put on the facade so well and for such a long time that she will have forgotten that she is insecure - I kind of ignorance if that makes any sense. However, the next time something sets her off she breaks down again and her true inner self shows.

Anyways,

Growing up I had severe social anxiety up until the age of about 17, when I made an effort to get rid of it (and mostly did). However, since then I have noticed that I still have some form of "self consciousness" around people. This makes me ALWAYS think about what I am saying, even if I don't have the anxiety. This is going to sound weird, but I can make friends very very easily. However, anyone can make shallow connections with people. I feel like I have trouble making deep connections with people, including women. Thus, I have a ton of friends who are great people, but I feel like I have very few (or none at all) friends who I connect with on a deep level. I blame this on myself. I say to myself "it is your fault that you cannot make any deep friendships, and its because of your self consciousness, and this self-consciousness is not going to go away because you have tried to make it go away for the past 6 years and nothing has worked, it is a part of you". I feel like I am missing some subtle social interaction cue, I merely cannot "connect" with people on a deeper level. I actually think I may have aspergers - I meet a lot of the criteria for this disorder, which includes: odd habits growing up, high intelligence, and most importantly - difficulty reading emotions as well as difficulty forming deep relationships with people.


Anyways, this is one of my main core beliefs. It took a lot of thinking to get this out.

Its an endless circle.

get the bullshit out of you head about you having some sort of debilitating disease. The majority of the illness in the world effect people because they think they are sick. You dwell on it, start to find reasons it fits in your life, and one day it will. Cut the BS out now.

Second it takes strength and courage not only to look at yourself in a different perspective to better yourself, but to also post on a forums for others to view. I admire that in you, it shows you want this issue to be corrected.

Lets get something straight, there are no broken people in life, only misguided ones, so lets see if, together we can put you on a more positive path.

now. Im not going to sit here and assume that i know you because i dont, one thing that comes to my attention is this sense that somewhere in your past there was a traumatic experience dealing with a relationship that hurt you deeply. Be it a death, a divorce, separation or something more devastated. To me you have created barriers, to protect yourself, from harm coming to you emotionally. You can tell your not happy with yourself, which develops the pain even stronger.

So far in your life, you have put too much stock in others opinions of you. I grew up in a household that was very negative, None of my dreams where ever supported, in fact they where usually shot down. My parents tried to live vicariously through me. So i reachs out for acceptance from them. Doing things they liked, or i thought they would approve of. When it was not to thier standards and the negative comments came flying out, such as i was a failure, a fuckup, not worth anything.

It was even as harash as stuff such as saying they wished i was never born, or they went through with the abortion. How they wished for a girl but got me. Mind you it was never because i was a horrible person, i just never met there expectations. In turn me trying to gain there acceptance, i lost myself. My confidence was non existant i began to think that everyone looked at me the way my parents did, my rational thought was, if my parents, the people who are supposed to love me and accept me unconditionally cant, then who ever could.

It took me years of studying psychology both behavioral and social, world theologies, NLP, Confidence techniques, self help books and many other methods to understand, everything i believed about myself was a false sense of who i was. I set out to prove to myself and anyone who dared challenge me, that i would succeed, and only by a miracle have i gotten this far.

Its a fact we create our reality, our beliefs determine how we perceive the world. If you think people are always judging you, you will find signs to validate this belief, no matter how far fetched it is.

On trick to finding the truth that i have found, is the true answer is always the opposite of what you doubt. A persons intuition is an amazing thing, and its right almost every time. As humans we fear the unknown and that fear becomes doubt. When you ask yourself a question, your intuition tells you the truth behind it, but then doubt will set it. When the doubt sets in, whatever you doubt, the answer will be the opposite.

Lets start simple, im going to ask a series of question relating to your situation, Answer them as honestly as you can. Take as much time as you need, all these questions will need you to focus and think into the past. Even if the only answer you can come up with one seems small or insignificant, jot it down.

1. Can you think of a time when have trusted another person?

2. Can you think of a time, when you have had a deep connection or relationship with another person?

3. can you think of a time, when there was a deep connection in a relationship?

4. can you think of a time, when a relationship that had a deep connection was broken off by the other person?

5. Can you think of a time when any relationship was broken off by the other person?

6. Do you honestly believe people can change?

7. Do you honestly want your self consciousness to go away?

The answers can be a simple yes or no, or you can give detail. Realize, only answer these questions if your ready to move past the point of no return. No more blame games, from the moment you answer the questions and let me know the answers, is the moment you take responsibility for your own life, the choices that are made and the reality you create. Good or bad, the choices where yours and yours alone.

there are seven questions to start, we are going to start small and work our way from here, if of course you decide to.

Im going to ask one more question, this one may take some thought. You said you tried to work on yourself for 6 years. Can you honestly say, that for 6 years you put your best foot forward in recreating yourself, that you where consistent with your efforts to understand and overcome the limiting factors in your life. That it was not more of a roller coaster ride, where there was no real consistency. That you went through the motions, but you never really left that comfort zone?

_________________
"The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one."

Yes, I have always been into bettering myself. I have realized that I will continue to feel pain via stress and anxiety if I don't correct my beliefs.


My negative experiences stem from having social anxiety and generally being "different" than most kids my age growing up. I was more into self-reflection and felt the most comfortable thinking to myself or being by myself. Whether this was the result of who I truly was or the result of a traumatic social experience is still a mystery to me. I believe it may be a combination of both, since I felt like socializing with people for a long time "drained" the energy out of me. I still truly feel this way - I just get bored after awhile, especially if it is silly banter and nothing deep/philosophical. However, I am a very ambitious person, and I have come to realize that the greatest thing in life forming deep relationships with people. Also, once my goals changed and I entered into the adult world, I came to the realization that social skills and understanding social dynamics (in any situation, not just with women) WAS vital to reaching my goals (I want to eventually manage people and lead people, both in my career and in my social life).

I firmly believe in the truth of one's intuition as well. I remember countless times when I just knew something was amiss - you actually FEEL it in your gut, without thinking about it. You try to deny and rationalize yourself out of it but deep down inside you know you are right. This scares me. The reason why this scares me is because I have gut feelings about a lot of my friends and how they perceive me. It is not the way I want to be perceived. It is not necessarily negative perceptions, but ways I do not want to be perceived.



Yes, my ex-girlfriend I dated for 4 years. I could never imagine her being unfaithful to me at the time.

No. No I can't. Maybe my best friend back in middle school. But he turned out to be very manipulative. People kept telling me so I kept defending him. I finally ditched him. Not even my Ex-gf I dated for 4 years. Something tells me that it is not normal to feel like you have have never felt a deep connection with someone.....For myself I feel like deep connection cannot happen unless you build enough social comfort.
Yes I know there has to be a time. But writing this I feel stress (physically, my head is hurting) so feel like I cannot think clearly about it. I feel this stress whenever I think about my social life and past relationships. It physically hurts.


I can think of times when relationships were broken off. But never deep ones.

Yes, several times. my ex gf. my friends back in high school, on several occasions. On all the occasions I was brought in the social circle and promptly "kicked" out. on almost all occasions I was the only one ejected. It has gotten a lot better in college. This has barely happened in college and when it does I just move on. I have been very fortunate to be hanging out with a great group of people for the past 2 years.

I believe people can change, but usually only temporarily. The ability to maintain change also depends on the person too. Depending on the person, he/she may be able to maintain the change. It is hard to generalize. I however, do believe that people have a certain "equilibrium" state. People will have have the urge to drift back to your equilibrium state, even after you attempt to fix it. Its like the guy who has severe anger issues growing up - he finally decides to get it fixed and he ends up not throwing an aggressive tantrum for a couple years. however, he still has tendencies to drift back to be easily angered. 10 years down the road he may revert back to his old habits. I am not sure if this makes much sense but this is what I believe.


Yes. I do. This is the one thing that has to be fixed in order for me to progress. I believe that having social consciousness is similar to having"writers block", you think too much about doing something. It hampers social creativity and picking up on subtle social cues. I remember reading a study where the brain actually becomes less socially creative when you have self consciousness and anxiety. In times where I am not self-conscious and am in "Ease" and relaxed/confident in a social situation, my social skills come out very naturally and unenforced.


I have left that comfort zone many times. Part of my therapy in high school for social anxiety was to continually go outside my comfort zone in social situations, and I have progressed a LONG way since then. However, for the past 6 years I Cannot seem to get rid of the self consciousness and I forgot to mention - the feeling like I have nothing really much to say in a conversation. In natural conversation i feel like things just naturally pop up in your head. I don't get this. I believe a lot of my friendships have turned stale or ended because I cannot enter this "natural conversation flow" state.




FYI - I tried to be as "intuitive" and unfiltered as I could in the above questions. Everything I said above is unfiltered and truly how I feel.

What i first will touch on is your response to me asking if people can change. Change is a constant state, it never stops, it never can. your either moving in a positive or negative directional change. Your statement that change is temporary is correct, when you reach a certain level of change, you determine if you will continue to move forward or backwards, so in that sense, yes it is temporary, but a positive change forward can grow into an even more positive change and continually grow, as well with the reversal.

Your change will start when you stop worrying about the beliefs of other people, when you walk through life and not try to rationalize everything. just let it be.

you speak of being different growing up, im curious is which ways you felt you where different and how severe these feelings of difference were. Not wanting to play sports is one thing, but creating a negative reality because you viewed or where told to view no wanting to play sports as wrong, is something totally different.

overcoming your self consciousness when your constantly affected by how you feel people perceive you is nearly impossible. You said your intuition scared you because if shows you how friends perceive you, yet im still wondering why you allow their perceptions to become your reality. Its nice to take notice how the perceptions of other, only to determine if you wish to change that certain persons perception, however if you constantly change how certain people perceive you, it will make another group of people then change their perception of you, it will be a constant circle in which affects your own perception of yourself. Never can you appeal to everyone, but you can always appeal to yourself.

as for the questions, each one pertained to limiting beliefs you had about yourself from what you had previously told me. What i see about you is simply this:

You have the capacity to trust people which is a doorway to deep connection, yet you choose not to make a deep connections in relationships for various reason of your own imagining. one being you are more comfortable alone then in social situations, and the belief that you have to have social comfort to create a deep connection blocks you from the goal. how can you obtain social comfort if you are not comfortable in social situations. Another is this fear of becoming the outcast, its happened so many times, you dont take the chance for the scenario to play out again. Which if you dont take the chance, you can never gain the benefits.

Do you see any issues here? or perhaps a way you can change your beliefs to go past the ability to simply trust?

You have all these reasons, excuses and rationalizations to you use everyday to limit your exposure to social situations. Like an automatic response that women use when men approach in the same fashion over and over. When you get into a social situation that feels similar to ones in the past that have been negative, your own automatic responses initiate. such as the conversation being becoming boring, yet you have the power to make that conversation more exciting. Im sure if you think about it, you can find many more of your own automatic responses that are nothing more then excuses to no pursue the relationship further.

Now dont worry about the natural conversations right now, people get tongue tied easily when they are uneasy or nervous, in time, natural conversations will come, and you will develop what i call filler words, that you can say in any situation when you cant think of something more to say.

Lets forget about the past, and pay more attention to the present, to do this here are a few simple tools.

First, the word "want" is not longer used, when you say you "want" something it does nothing but give you the experiance of continually wanting that something. Instead we use the present tense, such as will, or am.

Next, lets do some goal writing. to do so an outline of some simple rules for more effect goal writing will be set. They are the same guidlines i learned awhile ago that have made a profound effect for myself. When i was writing in out, i did not expect at the time to do more then read it for myself. When i wanted to change myself, i wrote out a 6 page single spaced detailed image of who i wanted to be, just to give you an example when you see the section on detailed writing.

Goal writing…
Goals create a roadmap to your success, for this reason I am going to write my goals down, in detail, so I may start my success from this day forward on the right foot. Just the act of writing goals down can set the process in motion, I feel that goals need to be reviewed periodically, to see if they still fit my life and rewrite any as needed, It seems the more focused on a goal a person is the more likely that goal will be accomplished. I have heard there are 4 strict rules to follow when writing goals so they may be more effective. Goals are serious business; they define the imprints and the base the mind to work with to achieve success. Weak goals = weak images which means your results will be weak.
1. Write the goal in the positive,
a. Goals are meant to help propel you forward, not backwards; a good reason to write the goals down is to set a direction and to create a set of instructions for our subconscious to follow. Its only function is to carry out those instructions, the more positive the instructions the more positive results you will get.
2. Write the goals in complete detail.
a. This helps the subconscious mind produce the results we are looking for, the more detailed the easier it is for the mind to give you the exact results you are looking for. With more information that is given, the outcome becomes that much more clearly. The more detail the more of the chance the subconscious will get and understand your goals.
3. Write your goals down in the present tense.
a. The goals should be wrote down in present tense and in first person as if they are currently true
4. Rewrite your goals.
a. Never be content with the first draft, when they are rewritten they develop maximum impact to the subconscious. This is very important, sometimes you may want to change them, rephrase them or add more, this is extremely encouraged.

Next i want you to become aware of the situations your in every time you notice a negative thought, be it a statement, excuse, affirmation or whatever, change it. Its best to change it right when you realize them, but sometimes you have to wait till you have more time to evaluate the situation. For me i use the "why not, why" approach.

Example: in your mind the converstaion is getting boring
you think to yourself: i dont want to continue this conversation
why not?
because its boring.
why?
because its uninteresting
why?

and so forth, doing so can find self realizations as to how to improve any interaction you may be involved in. When you ask yourself the questions and you answer them, you find the truths out for yourself. which could help you realize that the conversation is not interesting because you have not made it interesting, then you can find out the reason why you have not attempted to make it more interesting and so forth, many times used correctly you can find the root to the issues at hand.

Another thing to try, when being aware of the situation, is notice the emotions you feel, the emotions you can control and the thoughts behind them. Simply welcome them, do not try to make excuses for them, or act like they are not there, welcome them and accept them as ok, the emotions will then be let go in a positive manner.

I dont mean this to be taken the wrong way, you seem to me to be someone that is well spoken, at least if you speak as well as you type. You come across as a person that already knows most of this and sometimes when i read your responses the feeling that all this is simply a test comes to mind.

_________________
"The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one."

Well, I did not consider myself different because I played sports. I considered myself different because was more into doing things by myself than playing with other kids, although I did enjoy that. I would always bring up pretty deep topics, but I feel like everyone else just wanted to have fun and be silly.

Now that I really think about it, I feel as if my negative relationship experiences growing up had a profound impact on my beliefs today as well as my "frame" as you guys call it. My parents always had good intentions, but they were strict and always had to be in control - their opinion was always right. I am just talking about my mother here. It was beaten into my head that I was to always respect people. I would never make fun of people, there was none of that in my family - not even playful teasing. There was also the friend that was very manipulative.

I literally realized when I was in middle school - "oh wait, you CAN make lighthearted fun of someone and they can laugh about it? because its just a joke?" - if that makes any sense.

Regarding your last comment..

Deep down inside, I know that I am a very good conversationalist in terms of content. Anxiety and over analyzing things is what I believe eventually kills any good social connection I make with someone. The funny thing is that the most comfortable part of a relationship for me is when I first meet the person - I have no problem introducing myself and coming across as socially confident and outgoing. I feel like once the relationship progresses is when the natural social flow starts breaking down - there are more "Awkward silences" and a general sense of uncomfortableness. I theorize that this is may be the fact that I am so concious of the progression of the relationship, due to the negative nature of my past relationships - I don't want it to fail.

Also, sometimes I want to give up on the whole "social thing". I mean to come across as cocky, but I have pretty much excelled at most things I put my mind too (my hobbies, my career etc). So if I excel at all these other things, why has it been so incredibly difficult to acheive this one thing, and to achieve it at a level that I feel like 90% of people have, most without even trying?

Regarding goals, it is actually something I have been working on for a while. I seperate my goals into five catagories: relationships, career, hobbies, body, and mind. I keep making progress towards career, hobbies, and body. But mind (self-confidence, state etc) and relationships (friends, family, sig. others) I feel never progress the way I want them too.

I was simply using the sports as an example.

When i speak of goal writing, i want you to take a different approach to it, not simply write what you want to achieve as a goal but who you want to become. Imagine your a writer, and have to give a detailed description of your character, do the same about imagining the man you want to be, down to the last detail, but do it in the I AM format.

IE i am successful with women no matter the circumstance, i always know what to say and my timing is impeccable.

DO this and follow the goal outline i gave in a previous post, and remember, your creating the self you want to be, so it does not have to pertain to women, it can be you in general. I had mentioned i had 6 pages all single spaced, one large block when i did this. One of the rules is to rewrite it were you feel needed. read it over and over, add in and change things. Do it untill you feel that confidence inside shine through as to that being the exact person you wish to be.

I think you have this perception that a deep connection involved a deep conversation. You have constantly spoken about how you cant have certain types of conversations with people about intellectual or deep things without it getting boring. Perhaps this is a place where you are over analyzing, to much inportance on whats being said, and less importance on the process of conversation. Some of the deep connected relationships ive had started with silly banter. Its always about the situation, in this case the actual conversation, not getting to certain topics. Try to rework this area, dont use the topics you deem as deep connection topics as a measuring tool for the depth of the relationship.


Im sure you realize that a connection also does not need to be made with conversation, most of what i do when i meet people is non verbal, the conversation plays little importance. The way you grew up and the rationalizations and beliefs you have on conversations alone is a major sticking point. That fear that comes around subconsciously when a conversation is going on makes you analyze the situation.

When you grow up never being silly with conversations, and now the idea that you want to be silly with conversations comes to play, it creates a conflict of emotions, this conflict when you put too much thought into it creates an environment where your unsure what to do, and it will fluctuate, at times you feel its ok to be silly, but then your beliefs growing up will kick in and it will feel awkward, which brings those silences.

I think your major roadblock right now, is recreating those beliefs about conversation. Once you can achieve that, you will be one step further, to be honest, after you get ride of those limiting factors of your youth concerning the way conversations should be, i dont see you having much more of a problem, this my friend is a good focus point to start with.

It excites me, just with this simple dialog that you are seeing new things in yourself, that you discover on your own. This process of self discover is much more powerful and gives you even more strength to change what you find for the better.

_________________
"The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one."

Here's my 2 cents. You've obviously learned enough techniques to last you a lifetime, but you are too cerebral. I understand the whole "I might have asbegers", "I am different from everyone else", "I am the only one like me" mentality. I really do.

I was, and on some levels are, just like you. I was always looking for something or someone to blame my failures on. I wished I had something like asbergers, social anxiety disorder, manic depression, adhd, or anything that would explain why I couldn't connect to people so easily. But the answer was that it was just me. I was the reason why I could connect to people, I was the reason why women weren't attracted to me, I was doing it. Then I realized the power in admitting my shortcomings, because now I had the power to fix them.

On some level I didn't like myself. So I made a "fake me" that I thought everyone else would like. I pretend to be how everyone thought I should be, and I was damn convincing. The only problem is that I lived in constant fear that if anyone got too close they would see the real me and reject me. So I kept everyone at a distance, and never let anyone get too close. I avoid meeting new people too, because I never knew whether or not I could trust them. The result was that I became isolated, even if I was surrounded by people, because I wasn't really there, the "fake me" was.

So basically, you are alone because you are afraid of rejection. You keep people at arms reach as a defense mechanism. The only really solution is to get in touch with who you really are underneath all the social bullshit, and learn to be okay with that version of you. Then you should practice opening up to some of you more trusted friends, so that you realize that people won't reject the real you once they see it.

P.S. Don't watch the show Dexter, you'll start thinking you're a killer on the inside (You'll understand if you see the first episode).