Converting from Shy to Outgoing and fun

"It was not easy and took A LOT of effort and awkward situations, but I did it!"

How I did it:

Last January I decided it was time to make a life change. One of my New Year's resolutions was to shake my shyness off completely. I had gone 18 years of my life being shy and I was sick of it! I hated being silent and awkward all the time. I hated to hide my true self and smile and blush. I hated people thinking that I was weird and socially awkward. I needed to change.

The first step of my process was to take a class that would force me to break out of my shell a little bit. So I enrolled in Acting for the next semester. I was scared at first but relieved to know that I was taking a step for the best.

I knew that it would take more than an acting class to cure my shyness so the next step was to look inward and find the cause of it. I interviewed several former shy people to see how they did it. They gave me simple steps to start out with and offered guidance to help me find the cause. After a month of searching, I finally found the cause. The cause was that I cared too much about what people thought about me and I had some confidence issues.

One of the things I started to do was to say "Hi" and "How are you?" to random strangers. I started out with just one person a day. While on my runs I would say hi to people that I passed. It soon progressed to greeting people on the bus and carrying on conversations while I rode to school.

The acting class was great and I learned some great things but I was still not quite out of my shell. In May I got a girlfriend and I met some of her friends and they didn't think I was too shy. A week later I had an opportunity to go to Idaho with her for two and a half weeks, meet all her friends and her mom.

I was nervous but decided to go anyway. While in Idaho I met her friends and they were very cool and outgoing. I was probably at the halfway point of shy and outgoing. People still saw me as quiet.

I returned home in Utah and decided that there was no going back to my shyness. It was time to change all the way. I went on a series of trips this summer that demanded continual conversation and outgoing behavior. I went on a retreat that lasted one week, there were 42 people and no one knew each other (which was a big relief). And there were continual deep discussions about racism and inequality. It was extremely emotional and it was almost like they forced you to be social. It was Inclusion Summit, I highly recommend it. By the end of the week, everyone was so close and it was so sad to leave. Since then I have still kept in touch with many of the people I met there.

After this trip I found a new love for dancing and I continue to dance. I also talked to more outgoing people to see how they transitioned to outgoing. I found that if I acted like someone was my best friend than it would be easier to talk to them.

I now feel like I am no longer shy and I can walk up to anyone and start a conversation (even girls of interest). I feel that the real problem was that I was afraid to show my true self and now that has changed. Never give up on your quest to become outgoing, it is so worth it in the end.

"A stranger is just a person you haven't met yet."

Lessons & tips:

• Start Small. Make a goal to talk to one stranger a day, even if you only say hi.
• Put yourself out there. When there is an opportunity to have fun with a group of people, take advantage of it.
• Pretend like you are talking to your best friend when you approach a stranger. It will give you lots of things to talk about.
• People love to talk about themselves. Ask them questions that will allow them to talk about themselves.
• Find common ground. Ask what their interests are and find out about them.
• Don't be afraid to speak your mind.

Shiny Toy Guns Concert

Yesterday was not just a normal Tuesday. For one, it was the last day of school before the Christmas break, and second, it was the first ever x96 night before x-mas concert featuring Shiny Toy Guns. This is how the day went.

I woke up to the sound of my alarm at 6.25am I a stood up and walked over to my alarm and reset it like I usually do, to 6.40am. Then I walked to my bed and slept for 15 minutes. Once again, the alarm went off at 6.40am so I knew I had to wake up. I got ready for the day, took my medication (for the adida virus that I acquired from my little brother), and walked up the stairs. Feeling the hunger pain in my stomach, I made some cereal (fruity pebbles), sat down, and began to eat. After satisfying my needs I walked into the bathroom and washed my hair. We have a small bathroom and my dad is always in front of the mirror shaving, so it is kind of awkward being bent over the tub washing my hair while my dad is standing up shaving right behind me. After washing my hair, I dry it with a towel until it is only slightly damp, then I put a beanie on because I have long hair and if I don’t put the beanie on, my hair gets puffy.

Now you at least have a background on how my day starts. Well I usually leave for the bus at 7.14am but today I left at 7.16am, two minutes late. My bus stop is about three blocks away. Well I thought that I would be able to make it on time if I walked a little bit faster but of course it didn’t work out. I got about halfway there when I looked behind me and saw the bus coming up the hill. I said, "oh sh*t" and began to booke it as fast as I could up the steep hill. My legs were wobbly and the cold air penetrated the back of my throat. I finally got to the bus stop and luckily the bus driver saw me and was kind enough to wait.

I stepped on the bus and sat down breathing heavily in pain. We got to school at about 7.29am and I walked in and walked up the stairs to the junior rotunda where my friends were waiting. I conversed with them until the bell rang and I went to my first class, English 1010. Then I went to my second class, adv weight lifting, then I went to the Christmas assembly, then I went to math 1010. Then I decided to go home because my next two classes were seminary and critical workplace skills. I got home and sat around until 6.00pm. I was scheduled to work but i decided to do a risky no call no show because I really wanted to see the Shiny Toy Guns.

My neighbor/best friend called and told me to come over because we were leaving to go to the shiny toy guns concert in 30 minutes. I arrived at her house with my ticket in hand and chatted with her for a while. Her friends Vella and Brittany were coming with us. Brittany was the driver. At 6.45am we were on our way. Brittany's truck was only a 3 seater. So we had to make some awkward seating arrangements. Amber was pretty much groping Brittany the whole way while being violated by the joystick. I sat next to amber and I had to put my arm around her. Vella was seated comfortably by the passenger door next to me.

We were about a quarter of the way to the great Saltair when we noticed that Brittany forgot to turn on her headlights. She quickly turned them on and looked around for any cops. This is when we found out that Brittany didn’t have her license yet. We continued on our way. We clumsily missed two exits and we had to turn around and get on the right exit. Then we got on the exit to the Saltair. There was a line of about 500 cars waiting to get to the parking lot. We waited for about 20 minutes and finally we were in. Brittany parked the car and we walked to the Saltair doors.

There was a man at the doors that told me to take everything out of my pockets. I did so and I tried to hide the muscle relaxer under a ten-dollar bill. Luckily, he didn’t see the pill and told me I could go in. I walked in and went into the bathroom where about 20 gay men were fixing their hair in the mirrors. I did my business and walked out. I met back up with my friends and we walked toward the stage. We had already missed the first band, Victim Effect. The second band called I Hate Kate was playing. I knew a couple of their songs so I sang along. We all wanted to get closer to the stage so I lead the way up through the tightly packed crowd towards the stage. At one point I was some how separated from them and I never did find them again until the end of the concert.

I just thought to myself, "oh well". And I kept dancing. Soon the third band came on called "DataRock", I hadn’t heard them before and I thought it was going to be some awesome hardcore techno, but it wasn’t. It was more like soft gay techno. I can’t explain it, but they weren’t that great. On a couple of their songs, me and three other guys would push open a big gap in the crowd and started a mosh pit. Mosh pits are the greatest things in the world. They are so fun, I'll admit that they do kind of look scary when you are watching, but once you are in them, you don’t get hurt. No one punches you in the face, you just get pushed around. One thing about mosh pits is that you get super exhausted really fast, but you keep on going. After about 15 minutes of pure moshing I could barely stand up. I decided it was time to stop. (I think the best form of weight loss would be to go in a mosh pit everyday, so the next time you are at a concert, push a fat person into a mosh pit)

As most of you know, it gets really hot at a concert, and I have a major sweating problem because I used to be overweight. So you can imagine how much I was sweating then. Sweat soaked my shirt and it looked like I just dunked my head in a bucket of grease. It was nasty. But I didn’t really care because it was a concert. Soon after that, DataRock was done. So I decided to go looking around for my friends that I lost. I squirmed my way out of the crowd and walked around the Saltair searching for my friends. After 10 minutes, I gave up; they were nowhere to be seen. I went back into the crowd and aggressively pushed my way until I was in the ideal spot, front and center. Well, more like middle and center.

I waited for 10 minutes and finally Shiny Toy Guns came on! It was the moment we had all been waiting for. They came out of the fog and started to play. I felt a rush of adrenaline and I fought my way into a mosh pit. I was pushed around and someone pushed me so hard that I got whiplash. I decided to leave the mosh pit and I continued to dance and watch Shiny Toy Guns play. They played all of their really good songs that I like and they even did an encore.

At the end of the night I was completely beat. That concert kicked the shit out of me. I was sore everywhere. I made my way out of the building and waited by a tree. Soon Vella and her friend Jordan found me. We waited until Amber and Brittany came out, then we headed to the truck. We all talked about how awesome the concert was. When we got seated in the truck, I just fell right to sleep. We stopped at a gas station on the way back and I was so thirsty that I bought a 1 liter bottle of grapefruit juice and two 6-packs of water bottles. When we got back into the truck I consumed the muscle relaxer and went to sleep again.

I was awakened by Brittany when we arrived at my house. I stepped out and thanked them for a great time. I walked up the driveway and into the house. I was too exhausted to even take a shower so I went and crashed on my bed. It was a great night to start off the Christmas break.