Can someone please help me, I’m so tired of being like this. It’s every social interaction. How do I be normal?

[Howdy13]

I feel like I overthink everything. Last night I felt so awkward like i couldn’t talk at all. And everyone treated like that too. Why am I so afraid of what others think? Why can’t I carry a conversation, why do I have 0 confidence, like I just feel like a joke around everyone. Every girl I talked to could tell I’m afraid to talk to girls and I can tell they were making fun of me and non genuinly wanted to talk. I can’t approach them everything sounds so corny and unnatural coming out of me and it gets me laughed at. Why am I so awkward at 27 I’m so sick of this, I’m too fucking old to be like this still but yet can’t break out of it, it just makes look like a clown. I’m so sick of being made fun of. I’m so sick of no confidence. I just look like a freaking loser ever night I go out. What’s fucking wrong with me why can’t I just be normal. Why am I so fucking awkward. I fucking hate it

[SueShe]

There is no such thing as overthinking but only thorough analysis of an event or situation.

Try to join a club or take up a hobby. If you are good at one specific occupation, then see if you can find a club or place where others meet that share that passion. The rest will just fall automatically into place. Sharing the same interests with a person is always a good start to get to know that person better because you have common grounds.

But you have to work on yourself first. That would include shyness and social anxiety if those are part of your problem.

You can train your approach, your attitude and expression in front of a mirror for example. Think of what message you want to bring across and rehearse it until you are satisfied. The next step is the most difficult one and that is the one where you have to put in practice what you learned and rehearsed.

But without you wanting and acting upon it, nothing will ever happen. You have to get out of your comfort zone for it to happen. The most important is not to be afraid to fail. If you are rejected, get back onto your feet and try again.

[Howdy13]

I have hobbies, but it doesn’t really help, and majority of the time when I tell my hobbies to people they don’t believe me or treat it like a joke. So I rather not talk to people about it. I tried to do more “social” hobbies but I just get left out and embarrassed everytime.

I want to keep trying but I’m sick of being the awkward guy and every night I go out it just gets worse, I just look more and more like a joke. You have no idea what it feels like where every conversation you have you can tell everyone is completely disinterested and only talking out of pity. This is how it feel every single night I go out, every time I try to talk any girl regardless of the reason why I went up to talk to them. Just wish I was normal enough that it wouldn’t be this way for me

[Anonymous]

Take a communications class. Join Toastmasters. Talk to a counselor. Ask your friends or co-workers or people you went to school with to help. Join a church, there are a million different kinds. Sign up for a Meet-Up group about something you're interested in, dinosaurs, literature, space, the oceans, mountain climbing, whatever, they have something for everyone. Get a job where you're dealing with a lot of people every day, serving coffee, handing out brochures, giving tours, anything that puts you with people. Read books and watch videos about how to make friends, how to talk to people, how to build confidence, every topic you raised has all kinds of good material available for free.

I know you won't do any of these things, because no one I've ever given this advice to has ever done anything with it. Everything you are saying you want is somewhere in the answers I gave, and there's a hundred more things beyond that you could find out about and try.

There's a free pdf of a book you can start with at the bottom of this post.

Please pick something from this list or someone else's advice and do it. It works for everyone who actually does it. Nothing works if you do nothing.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/BddvcGLVnR8

https://www.rfpmm.org/pdf/how-to-win-friends-and-influence-people.pdf

[Anonymous]

Honestly, stop giving 💩. Let your freak flag fly. Because reality is most people don't give a 💩 about you and will never give a 💩 about you regardless of what you do or don't do. This is good news though. Because this realization gives you license to completely be yourself. And don't take it personal, because it isn't. Because this is the nature of humans in general. They generally think only about themselves. All of the interacting you see humans do. It's just their way of adding more role players to the movie that stars them called "my life".

[zagor]

Sounds like me in my 20's. I just drank my self to confidence; I wouldn't recommend it.

[Screenwriter]

I'd suggest you find a good counseling center and start to work on this lack of self-esteem one step at a time. You are in a panic. Conversation takes practice. If you haven't been doing it with no goal in mind since you were a kid, doing it as an adult WITH a goal in mind, /dating/relationships, would be daunting.

A compassionate therapist can start you on feeling and doing better. You might need an antidepressant for a short time also. Be kind to yourself. None of this will be resolved quickly. But step my step. Bit by bit. Good luck. Ask your primary care doc for suggestions and see several different people until you feel comfortable with one.

[PeachyPie93]

I started taking 20mgs of Excitalopram two years ago and it shut off all my overthinking.. it like turns off your useless emotions and you can just be comfortable as yourself. Now I can talk to anyone and not give a shit what they think or how the interaction went after the fact. Tho I would also recommend counselling to build up yourself esteem and get used to talking to randos..

[Nikki1989]

The fact that you are 27 and are still fighting this means you are incredibly resilient. You've just been using the wrong strategy (self-criticism). The “loser” label is just a lie your anxiety tells you.