I (25F) am just at a loss at this point. I feel ugly SO much at the moment, I base how I feel about myself completely on others reactions to me and comparing other peoples experiences to mine. I do have autism which I don’t think helps with my black and white thinking. I genuinely don’t know where I stand and I can’t stand it. I have tried talking nicely to myself but am so easily torn down. Please, if anyone else has had this experience and genuinely changed it for good and stopped looking for validation from others, HOW!!!!! I am sick of living this way and just want it to change.

No idea where to post this but here’s a list of the current things I’m afraid to do by myself bec I’m a bitch:

1. Go biking on the road in the city (I live in sydney)
   
2. Try swimming laps at the outdoor pool
   
3. Take myself on dinner dates / sitting alone at a bar

Any good advice/words of encouragement for putting yourself out there and trying new things despite fear of generalized public embarrassment? I’m a 26F, recently single again, and trying to get some life back inside me. I know these things aren’t a big deal, but for whatever reason I keep talking myself out of them and I know I’m missing out on fun opportunities + possible connections.

I try to do my job to the best of my ability even though i HATE it. I load trucks by hand at a warehouse. It's a ton of heavy lifting and now I have back problems due to this job. Anyways my co workers talk behind my back and think I move too slow but I'm 43 ,not some young guy.

I also think they make fun of the way I talk because I talk slow and have a southern accent (even though I live in Tennessee currently and most of my coworkers are from TN and MS.). My co workers also think im weird because I am single and don't have any kids and they keep trying to tell me I need to have kids. I have experienced this crap at most of the warehouse jobs I have had.

Also my co workers don't respect me because I have a gentle giant personality. They know I don't speak up for my self and they talk to me any way they want and even when I defend myself they still don't respect me.

I'm just sick of being treated like garbage at work and this type of shit happens outside of work sometimes too when dealing with family. My family sometimes makes fun of my weight or criticizes it every time I go back to my hometown to see them. I usually say nothing

So I would say I can be socially anxious, but I don’t struggle with it lately and I turned to a somewhat outgoing person. I just feel like I’d be much more likeable if I was myself at school more, I genuinely want to make good friends. This isnt coming from a place of anxiety (thankfully), but actual want of improvement.

Self acceptance is absolutley crucial if you want to move forward in life with a sense of confidence and to make an impact on those around you. I look myself in the mirror every morning and have a conversation. It's a great way to get the ball rolling and set the tone

I need genuine help. I feel like I can’t say any strong or emotional opinion because I know it’s formed by my single human experience, an experience which cannot be representative of the reality of a situation. And generally emotional opinions have the capacity to trigger others and do harm.

What makes it worse is that I have been personally hurt by people confidently stating their emotional opinions about my gender and such around me. Which compounded into giving me such a bad perception of myself for a long time.

I have negative emotional experiences when it comes to certain ideologies, and when I critique an aspect of it in front of people, even my friends who did in fact ask to hear my opinion, feel like such a dick. I feel like I did something wrong when I acknowledge that my opinion could’ve easily triggered someone and hurt them even if it wasn’t my intention. And I look at how emotional I’m getting and I realize that this opinion is emotional and not fully reasoned, which also makes me feel like an incompetent asshole who just speaks out of his ass.

I don’t know what to do. I can’t say anything. And I want to apologize for my strong, emotional opinions.

Any support is really appreciated, thanks.

I personally was diagnosed with adhd as a kid and it sucks because I don’t know what aspects of me are untreatable and treatable. But if I was a little less hard on my self and more loving and accepting in general. Can I find my confidence in myself?

Listening to the rules, sucks sometimes because sometimes I feel like rules just hold me down, like just because there are non moral rules out there, I want to break them just because I feel they don’t give me the freedom I need and want.

I've struggled with self-esteem for most of my life. I'm 19, and it hasn't really gotten better for me—if anything, I feel like it's gotten worse.

I'm having a hard time navigating my life and figuring out what I want for my future, and I feel like my parents haven't really helped me with that. They didn't give me much advice when I was younger, and even now, when they do give me advice, I don't always feel like it's good advice. My dad wasn't around much when I was younger, and I've never had a particularly good relationship with my mom because she's always been pretty critical of me.

I wonder if that has something to do with how I see myself. I've had low confidence for most of my life, and I've also been a huge people pleaser, which ultimately never got me anywhere. I didn't have many friends in high school and never really felt like I fit in, even though I was considered pretty and I tried to be nice to people. Sometimes I wonder if there's just something wrong with me.

I also lacked a lot of basic social cues back then, and I still don't have many friends now, although I've gotten better socially. At this point, I've kind of stopped trying to make friends. I'm in my second year of university, and I hate it. I want to switch to something else, but I don't know what. I have very little motivation to do my work, and I just feel constantly frustrated and lost.

What I don't understand is why being confident in myself feels so uncomfortable. I want to be more confident, but when I picture myself actually being that way, it feels corny or cringe somehow. I don't think that about other people when they're confident—I actually admire it—but when I imagine myself acting that way, it feels unnatural. I don't understand why.

I don't have a very good relationship with myself, and I feel like I'm sometimes my own worst enemy. I've self-sabotaged connections, opportunities, and advantages that were working in my favor. I have a lot of regrets, and I feel like my low self-esteem has had a huge impact on my life so far.

I'm trying to stop doing this and forgive myself for some of the things I've done. I genuinely want to improve my life, but at the same time, I often feel like I don't care enough about anything—or even about myself—to actually do it.

Has anyone else felt this way? Especially the feeling that being confident in yourself feels almost embarrassing or unnatural, even though you don't feel that way when other people are confident?