If You Want to Stop Being a Social Outcast, Stop Trying to Be Perfect!

Written By Caroline Smith

Are you tired of being a social outcast? Well the first step to social confidence is to break free from The Curse of Perfectionism!

When your social life is being controlled by the need to be perfect, you’re too afraid to live your life.

You avoid putting yourself out there for dating and relationship-making because you think you should have it all together first.

You’re too afraid to invite people over to hangout because you’re convinced they will be overly judgmental and critical of your place.

You’re too afraid to start a conversation with someone, go to social events, and hang out with people you know, because your social skills aren’t 100% perfect.

This episode is all about how waiting until your social skills and confidence are perfect will keep you friendless, dateless, and lonely. Confidence and improved social skills come with PRACTICE, so it’s time to embrace the mistakes and awkward moments along to road to becoming socially confident.

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Transcript:

Hello to all of you misfits who are tuning into this episode of the introverted misfit podcast.

The Curse of Perfectionism is something I think affects all of us at one point or another in a lot of different areas of life, but in this episode I want to talk about this curse as it pertains to social confidence, shyness, social anxiety, social awkwardness, all of those things.

When your social life is being controlled by The Curse of Perfectionism, you’re too afraid to live your life.

You avoid putting yourself out there for dating and relationship-making because you think you should have it all together first.

You’re too afraid to invite people over to hangout because you’re convinced they will be overly judgmental and critical of your place.

You’re too afraid to start a conversation with someone, go to social events, and hang out with people you know, because your social skills aren’t 100% perfect.

As an introverted woman myself who happens to live with Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) Level 1, I certainly fell into this trap of perfectionism while I was still living with social anxiety.

And I would say that this combination made me a social outcast of sorts, for a large portion of my younger years.

A big part of being in that mental state was about being overly worried about making every social interaction perfect and then consequently freaking out if I thought it wasn’t perfect or good enough.

So overthinking everything I said or did — especially if I noticed the other person’s interaction was not what I thought it would be — and then spending hours (sometimes days) just replaying that conversation in my head and obsessing over it.

And as a result, I would avoid social interactions more and more because the awkward moments and the thought of not being socially perfect were making socializing not a pleasant experience for me.

Now, a mental health professional might call those behaviors something else — something more medical or psychological — but for the purposes of this episode, I’m calling it The Curse of Perfectionism; the idea that everything has to be perfect and you must have all of your ducks in a row, otherwise you’re not good enough.

You aren’t good enough to have friends, to find love, to fit in at work, and have those fulfilling relationships that everyone needs and wants.

It’s not true that you can’t have those things, by the way, but you may have convinced yourself that it is true.

Maybe you think it’s true because of past experiences of rejection and embarrassment.

Maybe because you were that kid that other kids liked to pick on.

Maybe you’re autistic like me or maybe just socially awkward (or dare I say an introverted misfit), and you’ve always felt like you just couldn’t fit in anywhere.

And as a result, you assume that if every social interaction you have moving forward is not 100% perfect, you’re going to get the same results as you’ve gotten in the past; being rejected and feeling too embarrassed to try again.

Well I’ve got some really great news, Misfit: You can stop trying to be perfect.

And you can stop believing that you have to be perfect in order to have a healthy social life.

It’s kind of like that new pair of running shoes that you buy — or if you’re not a runner, walking shoes — when you want to start exercising more and you’re determined to make better lifestyle choices.

Or maybe they’re not athletic shoes; maybe they’re dress shoes.

And you’re waiting for the perfect opportunity or event to which you can where them.

You’re waiting to find the perfect dress, or waiting until you finally decide to train for that 10k you’ve always wanted to run one day.

But, weeks, months, maybe even years go by and you realize you’ve barely even worn the shoes.

They’ve just been sitting on the shelf in the same box for all this time.

And do you know what happens to shoes that haven’t been worn for a while?

They ruin. They crumble.

And you end up wasting about a hundred or so dollars, depending on how expensive they were, all because you were waiting for that perfect time, and it never came.

That’s what your social skills are doing while you’re waiting for the perfect time to use them; while you’re waiting for your conversational skills to be perfect so that you can have the confidence to actually put them to use.

They are wasting away.

Your social skills are wasting away.

Your relational skills are wasting away.

Your confidence and self-worth are wasting away.

And most importantly, your motivation to build relationships and be social is wasting away.

Here is the truth that is going to set you free from this curse of perfectionism as it relates to being a social outcast: People don’t care about your insecurities and imperfections as much as you think they do.

In fact I talked all about this just a few weeks ago in my episode titled Nobody Cares as Much as You Think (And That’s a Good Thing).

As a social outcast, especially one who struggles with shyness and awkwardness, you’ve probably been rejected quite a few times in your life.

And that rejection and those feelings of not being good enough have made you overly obsessed with what other people think of you — even if they aren’t thinking about you at all.

Every where you turn, you’re anticipating rejection and judgement.

It’s like you’re constantly waiting for the ball to drop.

You’re waiting for someone to point out that insecurity you have and laugh at it.

You’re waiting for someone to tell you they don’t like you and don’t want to talk to you anymore.

I know that has to be exhausting and emotionally draining for you to live that way, but the good news is you don’t have to be a social outcast for the rest of your life.

You can find your people, but the first thing you have to do is stop believing you have to be perfect first.

You’re not going to be perfect — especially not at first. You’re going to say some awkward things, ask the wrong question at the wrong time, say something that doesn’t come off how you wanted it to, but that’s all part of the process.

That’s how you get better and build confidence in your social skills — by making mistakes and learning for them.

You know just yesterday, I was playing outside with my almost 3-year-old niece.

She wanted to ride on her tricycle, but she was getting bored of riding up and down the sidewalk like we usually do.

She wanted to try something bigger; something more fun.

She wanted to ride down the hill that’s right in front of my parents’ house.

It’s not a very steep hill, but it is a long, downward slope, so I let her try it out (with some help, of course).

At first we just went halfway up the hill, and the first few times she was perfecting her steering and learning how to control the tricycle when it’s going fast.

And guess what? There were a few falls and scrapes that happened, even with me running along side her.

But, she decided to keep trying, and eventually, we had almost started from the top of that hill and I rarely had to help her! I would just encourage her and help her slow down a little if she was going too fast.

The main thing is that my niece was not afraid to make mistakes and fall off a few times, and even when she did take a tumble, she got back up and kept trying.

And her reward was she had a lot of fun in the end!

But remember, the fun doesn’t happen until you’re willing to fail a few times and yet keep trying.

It’s the same with your social skills and confidence; the more you do it, the more comfortable it gets, the more connections you make, and the more you actually have a good time doing it!

That is, when you’re in the mood to be around people, because we are still introverts, after all.

If you are an introverted misfit and a social outcast of sorts who is looking to become socially confident, you might need some help to get started.

You’re kind of like my niece, not that you’re a child, but you’re trying something that’s very new for you and that may be a little scary right now.

I help make this process of becoming socially confident a little less scary so that you can make some big changes in your life.

If you’d like to talk with me some more about my services and how I can support you, you can book a free Connection Call with me using the link in the description.

Or if you want to read more about my services and offerings, go to theintrovertedmisfit.com/coaching and you can read all about my program, Communicate With Quiet Confidence, and then you can book your Connection Call with me from there.

That’s all for today’s episode.

As always, if you enjoyed this talk, please don’t forget to hit the follow or subscribe button, leave a review and/or comment whether you’re tuning in on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts from, and share this podcast with a friend.

Thanks for listening, and have a great day!

Connect With Caroline:

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Caroline Smith

Caroline is the founder of The Introverted Misfit, a community committed to helping socially inept people become more socially confident in themselves.

https://theintrovertedmisfit.com
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