Once a loser, always a loser?

[stopit]

From your experience, do people who are socially awkward in high school get "better" in college? Particularly in the dating arena?

 

Any input would be much appreciated!

[Kevin T]

Depends on the person.

 

Some get better, some get worse.

 

I think I honestly got WORSE.

[robowarrior]

If you invest energy and become more extrovert, then you definitly can become better, if you dive into shyness, thats socially not the best place to be. To be honest , over the years most people get bad experiences which tend to shut them down in terms of relationships. Everyone expects the other partner to bring happyness into their lives, while in reality they are just together only to forfill their own selfish needs. Which leads to a lot of struggle and discomfort to say the least.

[pinkelephant]

I just went back to my old highschool (I switched school - I'm not that old ) and found a lot of people (who I never knew existed back then) who are very fun to be around. A lot of people grew into themselves and the social akwardness is gone.

 

Some people grew to be worse because of their inferiority complex. The endless of cycle of fear of rejection -> bad behavior causing actual rejection. Kids at my old school are really mean though, so there were a lot of people who grew to be worse than the other way around.

 

For my cousin, he got a lot more social once he hit college. He says the maturity level is much higher there and was be able to be more at ease (thereforeeee, no inferiority complex). I guess it really depends on the person.

[Kevin T]

If you invest energy and become more extrovert, then you definitly can become better, if you dive into shyness, thats socially not the best place to be. To be honest , over the years most people get bad experiences which tend to shut them down in terms of relationships. Everyone expects the other partner to bring happyness into their lives, while in reality they are just together only to forfill their own selfish needs. Which leads to a lot of struggle and discomfort to say the least.

 

WELL SAID!

 

Wow.

[equinox]

I had no real friends in school and I was convinced that things would change when I got to college. Well the certainly didn't. I went into my first year in college with high hopes but they were dashed very quickley. I was so upset that I left that course and started a new one this year. Now I went into this new one with no hopes and I was right as nothing changed.

 

As someone allready said, it could depend on the person. I honestly think that it's too late for me to make friends as I'm bitter over how I was treated by people in the past so that's a huge barrier to me making friends.

[Reluctant Rebuilder]

I did.

 

 

Seriously I did.

[stopit]

I was hoping that the individuality vs. conformity issue would make things easier in college. I've always been painfully shy, I'll admit, but I've never really found anyone with the same interests as me. I imagine (hope?) that it'll be easier to find people with like backgrounds and passions in college, especially if I join clubs and by take specialized electives, and so forth. Realistically, I don't expect my shyness to go away, and I don't expect the transition to be easy in the short run. But I do hope that after a few months into the school year, I'll find my niche and not be outcast for a change.

[puff.tm.dragon]

For girls? ABSOLUTELY! For guys, the shy ones don't get much better if they don't have the motivation to change.

[Allie.]

YESSSSSSSSSSS! hahaha, an example right here. i was the scrawny ugly duckling in highschool and now as a sophomore in college...i get more positive feedback!

[Boughs]

No change here. Same in HS as it is in College.

 

Biggest change, is that the people I meet are from DRASTICALLY different backgrounds. In college I've had to date more to find someone similar enough that I'd like to be around.

[yeawutever]

Depends on how you are portraiting yourself as. People will sense if you're an insecure individual with low self-esteem v.s. a confident person.

[Markers]

From your experience, do people who are socially awkward in high school get "better" in college? Particularly in the dating arena?

 

Any input would be much appreciated!

 

I got better, a lot better. And I'm still getting.

[shy2cool]

YESSSSSSSSSSS! hahaha, an example right here. i was the scrawny ugly duckling in highschool and now as a sophomore in college...i get more positive feedback!

 

Off topic, but you are one attractive young woman.

[Kevin T]

For girls? ABSOLUTELY! For guys, the shy ones don't get much better if they don't have the motivation to change.

 

Truly, you are the embodiment of wisdom itself.

[scotty77]

I have come a long way in regards to conversing with people in a general sense.I never did quite get over my social ineptness when attempting to display my romantic interest in a given women.Perhaps I just go to the wrong places to meet women,i.e. the bar scene.Initiating a conversation with a perfect stranger has never been an easy thing for me to do,I hope I can find the courage to start.

[wlfpack81]

Deleted by user

[stopit]

To those of you who said things were exactly the same, what would you identify as the cause of that? And to those who changed, why were things different?

 

And what about the conformity/individuality issue?

[Gunner6543]

No change for me from school, to College, to UNI.

 

I would be fine around people I know and be outgoing and happy, but be too shy to approach people I didn't know.

 

However, having for the last couple of months, since coming to this site. Made an effort to change, I would say I've improved socially. Only by around 25% or so, but i can see myself making progress and I know i'll get there in the end if i keep doing what I'm doing.

[Batya33]

From your experience, do people who are socially awkward in high school get "better" in college? Particularly in the dating arena?

 

Any input would be much appreciated!

 

I was socially awkward until I met my high school sweetheart in sophomore year of high school - he taught me how to dance, he was very outgoing, social and kind and brought me out of my shell. When I really grew in social skills is when I stopped caring about being "popular" and liked myself reasonably well - I've never really stopped improving my social skills but i noticed a huge improvement over the last 10 years as far as being comfortable in my own skin and widening my circle of friends who truly respect, appreciate and like me - and who think I'm fun to be with! (I did a thread about this some months ago - you can search for it).

[pianoguy]

Hi Stopit,

 

I think most people usually get better in college- it depends on the person, but I think generally it's a better atmosphere.

 

First of all, colleges are usually a lot bigger than high schools and you will have a lot more people to make friends with. And a lot of different kinds of people- if you have a really unique personality you're more likely to find people like you than in high school.

 

College students are vastly more mature than high schoolers, a lot happens in those few years (and upperclassmen are more mature than underclassmen usually). Best of all, you don't have to deal with those obnoxious jocks and cheerleaders like you did in high school- they are off working at McDonald's or living on some part of the campus that you never have to go to if you don't want.

 

At college you aren't as bound by your past. When you're in high school there are people who know everything about you going back to kindergarten, rarely the case in college. Some people actually use the opportunity to completely recreate themselves, making up an alternate past about themselves. You don't have to do this, but you don't have to feel as worried about things that happened long ago. Your parents aren't around, so you don't have to worry about them either. Well, not too much, most parents are omniscient to some extent.

 

Oh, and I should mention that you will be a lot hotter when you get out of college than when you went in.

 

College isn't perfect. Freshman year can be kind of stressful, you won't have any friends at first and might feel lonely and homesick. Typically in your junior year you will be so absurdly busy that you'll feel like there's no way you can possibly do all the things you are supposed to do (and you'll probably be right). By your senior year you will like college so much that you will become terrified of the outside world and the prospect of looking for a job or trying to get into grad school. You'll be poor all the time and will learn to subsist entirely on cereal, Ramen, and frozen burritos, which you may or may not cook before you eat them.

 

More seriously, one problem that students can experience is being lost in the crowd- especially at a very large school. If you are far away from your family for the first time ever this can be kind of sad too, but you can adapt.

 

I think college can be quite a blast, many people look back on it as one of the best times in their lives.

[New_Horizons]

No, no, no, no no. I can't emphasize that enough.

 

Edit: What I mean is, in my case, I never changed one bit. So no, not all people change in college. Some like me remain losers.

[yeawutever]

No, no, no, no no. I can't emphasize that enough.

 

Edit: What I mean is, in my case, I never changed one bit. So no, not all people change in college. Some like me remain losers.

 

Ever heard of the self-fulling prophecy?? If you go in life doing nothing and simply keep believing that you're a loser, then people can detect it fast and they'll walk away from you. So it's not them running away from you but it's you causing them to run away.

 

 

[bulletproof]

There is always a chance that things will change, if you are proactive about it. College in and of itself won't change things, although I do agree with another poster who said that the opportunities for change are much more readily available in college as opposed to high school. I didn't change too much socially from high school to college, but that's probably because I attended school close to home and kept a lot of the same friends. I didn't challenge myself enough. Maybe if I had gone out of state to school and was forced to address my somewhat shaky social skills, I would be as outgoing as I am now.

 

What has helped me a lot is having jobs that force me to talk in front of people. Waitressing/bartending has been great for that. I have also taken courses in public speaking. Just try to approach college as a new beginning, and take advantage of all the opportunities.

[PBcrawler]

I recently saw a psycological sort-of documentary which made alot of sense to me. Basically it had to do with positive thinking and the law of attraction. The message was that if you focus mostly on the bad things in your life ie. depression loneliness discomfort etc, then you will attract those things into your life until you stop. Think only of positive outcomes, and happy endings and those things will attract to you like a magnet, and manifest themselves in your life.