This article looks into ways to help people break free from shyness. The advice is based from personal experience and I hope it will provide inspiration to many people.

As a child and well into my teenage years, I was a person who was often referred to as being very shy. Even though this description was true, I always longed to be as confident and outgoing as everybody else. The problem was that I did not know how to gain this self-esteem and found socialising very difficult.

There were many reasons as to why I was a shy person. My family by nature for whatever reason are seemingly always worrying about something or other. We all spiral in and out of depression and basically have a negative outlook on life.

I also grew up having to cope with a stuttering problem which as you can imagine did not help my own confidence levels and only added to what was already the difficult task of mixing with other people. I did eventually manage to achieve fluency but only after suffering with the speech impediment for eighteen years.

I have to say that I always preferred to be by myself and was what many people saw as a loner. When I am on my own nobody can hurt me and I was also in no danger of stuttering. The weird aspect was that inside I was a very confident person who was desperate to show the world, the real Steve Hill.

Being shy made it difficult for me to form relationships with women and made my work life also more of a choir.

At the age of around twenty-one I decided to attempt to overcome my shyness once and for all. I had to understand the real reasons behind why I was shy and to deal with each one in turn. I asked myself many questions such as:

Why are you scared of people? This was because I had a fear of not being accepted or liked. They may hurt me by being aggressive towards me or by taunting me about my speech etc. This was me being paranoid, so I decided that if I don’t try, I won’t know.

Why are you afraid of socialising? This was because I did not feel that I had a lot to say and believed people would think I was boring. I decided just to try my best and to see what happens.

Why won’t you approach a member of the opposite sex? This was because I thought that they would only tell me to go away and that they would not be interested in me. Yet again, if I do not try, how will I know.

These are just three of many questions I asked myself and you can probably see a pattern forming. I was just somebody who was scared to try, a fear of failure in a way. It was also a fear of being rejected and disliked.

I have now come to realise that out of ten people I meet, three of four of them might not like me, but that means there are six who will. Life is to short to be constantly paranoid and stressed. I have to battle against my shyness and break free of it once and for all.

I now have more confidence than I ever have had. I still have periods where I become shy but these are becoming less and less as time goes by.

In conclusion, if you are not happy being shy, work hard to deal with and to understand what is making you this way. I am sure that you can live a much more relaxed life in the same way that I have done.