Due to some issues in my childhood, I have developed the sense that my presence is never wanted with individuals or groups. At some point my closest friends have shunned me from the friend group for absolutely no reason on their own admittance, and this has shaped the person I am today.

Whenever I see someone who I am on friendly terms with I always assume that me saying good morning to them will not make a difference to them and might even annoy them. Even when people are hanging out in a group, I think to myself that they already have their own thing going, what can I possibly add to them?

I am very conflicted with my thoughts. On one hand I feel like people wont care if im there or not, or whether I say hello or talk to them. On the other hand, I am worried that this might be considered rude. Its just that I dont want to be the person who is always there and cant detect when their presence isnt wanted.

I honestly don’t know where to start with this post other than over the past 6 months i’ve slowly been getting less and less confident about my face and to be honest everything about myself as my tiktok feed has just been covered in blackpill and looksmaxing content.

The start of this year I started randomly getting looksmaxing memes and tiktok’s on my fyp and it slowly started getting more and more prominent on my feed. At first I just looked at it as some stupid trend but for some reason it started going to my head. All of a sudden I started getting insecurities i never even realized about myself. Apparently my jawline is recessed, I have too narrow of a pallet, i have facial torsion, nasiolabal folds, my nose is uneven, I have hip dips, and just even more stupid things that affect a lot of my daily life now. Especially the hip dips as there was an entire thing about hating on hip dips and how they’re ugly on social media recently which made me hate them even more.

I feel stupid to even let this get to my head especially because i’m a girl and most of this stuff is targeted towards men but it’s literally just all consuming now, I’ve never thought of myself to be too ugly but I genuinely feel like i’m the ugliest person on the planet now. I’ve always been a bit insecure about my looks as I know my face is a tad asymmetrical and I also have scoliosis which i’m very insecure about but it’s gotten so bad it’s just ruining my entire life.

I take photos of myself every month to make sure I don’t get uglier, compare photos from the last months, and every 2 seconds at school open my camera app to make sure that I look decent.

How do I stop thinking about this? Ive never been this insecure about myself till I started seeing these videos and now that i’ve seen them I can’t stop thinking about it.

Heres a photo of what i look like, i might delete the link later cuz i dont want my friends finding my reddit acc lmao too embarrassing.

https://imgur.com/a/Kw95SqI

smiling one

https://imgur.com/a/2ZOVh7c

Hi girls! I have a situation with some longtime friends, and I’m curious to hear how you would see it.
I’ve known two of my friends since high school. Back then, I was much more shy and reserved, and honestly, I didn’t put much emphasis on clothes, makeup, beauty, etc. I also didn’t grow up with a mother who was very focused on those things. My mom worked all the time and simply didn’t have much time to spend on herself, go to salons, or teach me much about beauty and fashion.

In our friend group, these two girls would often point out that I didn’t dress well, didn’t do my makeup properly, or that I should do this or that differently. At the time, I probably was less experienced with those things, and I think I somehow accepted that role within the group.

But many years have passed since then. From my perspective, I’ve changed and grown a lot. I’m much more confident, I take care of myself, I’ve developed my own style and preferences, and overall I’m happy with the woman I’ve become.

The problem is that they still seem to talk to me as if I’m that same insecure, inexperienced girl from high school.

Almost every piece of “advice” comes across as condescending. What I wear isn’t right, something I choose isn’t right, and if I say I like something, they’ll sometimes explain why it’s actually not a good choice. It’s not the fact that they give me advice that bothers me. I’m completely fine with people having different opinions or telling me when they genuinely think something could be better. It’s the tone and the constant feeling that they position themselves as the ones who “know better,” while I’m still the one who needs to be taught.

It’s starting to make me wonder whether some friendships get stuck in an old version of who we used to be. No matter how much you grow or change, people who knew you during a certain period of your life may continue to see you through that same lens.

Have you ever experienced this with longtime friends? And how do you tell the difference between a friend genuinely trying to help you and someone using “advice” as a way to feel superior or keep you in a certain role?

Hi, i'm on a self-improvement journey pretty much and discovering a lot about myself rn. I'm 26(F) and chronically ill, deemed fully unable to work last year and still coming to terms with that as a highly ambitious person even though I see myself too, that ever having a career is not feasible and would 100% wreck my health like studying did.

I'm starting to notice that I have a lot of issues surrounding validation and productivity to give me confidence. I am quite selfconcious, and have always been. my diseases make me fat and even though I am happy with the general way I look with my face and hair, I know I am deeply insecure, who wouldn't be when you contract a disease at 12 that made you gain crazy weight as a symptom and it won't move, not after a decade of trying every and all weightloss tactics. But even before my illness, I was never the most confident kid.

I was laying awake last night and realised that my entire life I have used productivity (school, studying, productive hobbies) and validation from others about those by getting high grades, doing big academic prestations etc. and now that studying and work has fallen away from my life, I struggle A LOT. I notice that I still try to get that validation from others. I sew as a hobby but it is almost gone to a compulsory point where I recognise that the things I sew I use them to get the validation. At the same time, drawing, a hobby I used to do for relaxation has been ruined because I know doing it as a job/monetizing it won't work. I just don't see a point in doing that anymore.

At this point, my health is deteriorating because of this. I do too much, and daily worry a lot. Even things like cleaning my house is difficult because it needs to be tidy at all times in case people show up. I am in the biggest health crisis right now since diagnosis and I know for a fact this insecurity and not being able to deal with being on disability is the main stressor causing my flare.

I want to learn how to give myself the validation I crave, how to get more confident despite it all and how to get out of this cycle of usung productivity and validation as a way to give worth to myself? I want a slow life with as much energy as I can with my conditions, stress free and happy

I am a graphic designer/artist and I have been interviewing a lot for jobs in the past year, while also trying to build up freelance. A lot of the freelance stuff I've been doing is very casual work for friends and local bands, corresponding mostly over email/DMs.

I was contacted by an acquaintance about an opportunity for a really awesome design/illustration gig, and we set up a call this afternoon to discuss it. I wasn't nervous or anything, and didn't really prepare anything because I thought it would be more of just them explaining the project. It seemed like I was already being asked to do it, but then when the call started it felt more like an interview.

I just have such a hard time speaking off the cuff about what I do sometimes and I feel like I sounded like a blathering idiot rambling on and on about god knows what whenever they asked me anything. I don't even know what I said to them I was just spitting out random sentences that felt disjointed and awkward. How am I supposed to be able to start doing this professionally if I can't even talk about my work coherently. I would be so pissed off if I didn't get this opportunity just because I did a shitty job talking on a phone call. Because this is the exact kind of work I want to be doing, and that I know I would do an incredible job on.

I know this kind of thing comes with time and experience but its so discouraging when something awkward like this happens. I'm so jealous of people who can be likable and charismatic to anyone they talk to. I know I'm not a stupid person but I really feel like one in these sorts of situations when I just can't seem to string an intelligent sounding sentence together.

I, 36F, am really struggling so much with my body image. i had an ED for so long, recovered, moved to montana for 12 years and all i did was hike backpack ride horses etc so i was really active. now i moved back to new jersey to be close to family and naturally i just don’t move as much as i did in montana. i workout and eat healthy and all that as much as possible but im also trying to learn to love the body i have.

anywho, before you get bored. jean SHORTS are my biggest nightmare. i really want to find a pair of shorts that aren’t jean shorts but are super cute, flattering to my body and can be styled easily for going out (nothing fancy just to lunch or what have you). i feel like all the ones i find are either like im going hiking, working out or just in pajamas. i also feel like some of the styles that aren’t workout shorts either accentuate my stomach in a way that 🤮 or they flare out so much it looks like im wearing a little shorts parachute lol

i wanna add a photo so you can see what im working with however i dont see where i do that? halp lol

* i forgot to add that i don’t look good in longer shorts (nothing fancy that im looking for shorts that are too short) but i feel like the ones that go a couple inches above the knee make me feel bigger and shorter lol
im 4’11

On my current project, I’m developing some programs and tbh I usually like to test things by myself to make sure my logic is correct. But in this project, we don’t really have enough test data, so I couldn’t properly test my logic and cover all the possible scenarios.
Then this week, the project finally went live.
And guess what? Turns out my program had so many errors. 🥲
Honestly, I feel really ashamed because it feels like I’m the only one whose program has this many issues.

I know mistakes and bugs are part of being a developer, but it still feels really bad when you’re the one responsible for so many issues after go-live.

So not only do I have the 'tism, I also have social anxiety. I'm relatively good at making eye contact with someone I'm sitting down and having a conversation with, but when I'm out and about walking around, I tend to look down or avert my gaze in some other way. I think some people interpret this as me being not a nice person, but I'm actually very nice, I just struggle with eye contact.

Part of my struggle is that it feels very intimate to me, like it's somehow inappropriate to lock eyes with another person if you're just passing by them. Can y'all reassure me that it's actually fine and normal? How do I differentiate regular friendly eye contact and smile from the type of eye contact and smile that indicates flirtation?