Are you a shy person? If so, you’re not alone. According to Psych Central, more than 40 percent of people deal with a certain level of shyness. The level of their shyness varies from a slight lack of public comfortability to full-blown introversion and social anxiety. Fortunately, you can learn how to become a bold person using a few strategies.
Why You Might Be Shy
A wise author named Mokokoma Mokhonoana said that shyness is a symptom of low self-esteem. There are more than a handful of factors that contribute to an overwhelming sense of shyness. One factor is an ingrained sense of not being good enough.
That shyness issue may come from a childhood experience with your parents, or it could be something that occurred later in life. These experiences may cause you to fear rejection or fear being judged by other human beings. Alternatively, you could be highly self-conscious about an aspect of yourself that someone else made fun of earlier in life.
Shyness can come from an upbringing that’s not necessarily bad as well. You could have lived a sheltered life that caused you to have limited interactions with other people. That might make you feel uncomfortable doing it as an adult.
You might also be predisposed to being shy because of your genetic makeup. Healthline states that 15 percent of infants are born with a shyness trait. There isn’t much you can do to change your genetic makeup, but you can develop strategies to overcome its limitations.
The Limitations of Shyness
The problem with shyness is that it can sometimes hinder your success in life. It can cause you to miss opportunities to meet great people, and it can stunt your growth in the workplace. Learning how to be bold at work is an excellent mission for you to accomplish to improve your life quality.
How to Overcome Your Shyness
Overcoming your shyness is the first step to becoming bold. These are a few strategies you can use to lessen the amount of nervousness you feel when you’re around others:
1. Go Places You’ve Never Been
The best way for you to combat shyness is to meet it head-on. Challenge yourself to go places you’ve never been before and meet new people. You might want to try visiting a new place just once.
Knowing that you’ll never see those people again might take some of the edge off of your shyness. Try smiling at a stranger and opening yourself up for small talk. Your brief acquaintance session may eventually turn into you making a brand new friend.
2. Try Something New Each Day
Trying something new every day can break you out of shyness and make you more bold as well. For example, you may want to sing at a karaoke bar if it’s something you’ve never done. It might be one of the most effective strategies for working the shyness out of yourself.
It might seem challenging on the first try, but eventually, you’ll warm up to the activity. You don’t necessarily have to do karaoke. You can visit a bowling alley, library, or any other public place that puts you on the frontline to interact with other people.
3. Give Yourself a Pep Talk
Using self-affirmations and pep talks is another way to tone down your shyness. Imagine yourself achieving what you set out to do and then do it. For example, tell yourself that you are going to ask the person you have a crush on to go out with you.
Repeat that you will ask this person to go out with you, and then tell yourself that you will succeed in reaching your objectives.
4. Diffuse Negative Thoughts
Part of the reason you are shy is that your self-esteem has taken a hit. You can combat that by telling yourself things that go against the negative thoughts in your head. Tell yourself you’re beautiful if you believe you’re unattractive.
Remind yourself of how many good grades you’ve gotten if you hold a false believe that you aren’t intelligent. The more you hear positive words, the more you will take on those beliefs in your mind. Carnagie Mellon performed a study that shows that self-affirmations work for reducing stress and combating negative thoughts.
5. Breathe or Meditate When You Feel Overwhelmed
Breathing and meditation exercises are amazing tools for shyness. Take deep breaths before you engage in anything you feel shy about, and you will feel the nervousness leave you.
How to Become a Bold Person
If you want to become a bold person, you have to get yourself in the mindset of boldness. Bold people don’t worry about what other people think, and they don’t expect failure. They do everything with the confidence that they will achieve whatever it is.
These are some tips for stepping up your boldness game:
1. Pretend You’re Someone Else
You may have to start your journey by pretending to be an entirely different person. Think of the boldest and most courageous person you know and then imagine you are that person when it comes time to ask for something or speak up for yourself. It’s a strategy known as faking it until you make it, and it’s quite effective.
2. Ask Without Analyzing
Learning how to become a bold person includes asking for things you desire without thinking about a bad outcome. Put your best foot forward and ask without thinking for one minute that you won’t receive it. Believe that you can achieve anything, and you will.
3. Don’t Be Afraid to Take Risks
You’ll receive no gain if you sit on the sidelines and allow life to take you down. Therefore, you must implement a sense of faith into your movements. Set your mind on success, and it will be yours.
4. Just Do It
Remember Nike’s “Just Do It” concept? It was a concept created for people with a winning mindset. Jump into your dreams head-first and they will work out exactly the way you want them to.
5. Keeping Going if You Miss Out
Another way to become a bolder person is to keep going even if you fail. Many people experience rejection before they succeed.
Most famous bookwriters received rejection letters from numerous publishers before someone finally gave them a chance. They would not have succeeded if they’d let a few rejections get them down. Take a few pages out of their book and motivate yourself to push forward.
How to Be Bold at Work
The workplace is another environment that demands boldness if you intend to succeed. You must navigate your worklife like a champion to become a champion. These are some concepts that will help you learn how to be bold at work:
1. Be Straightforward About Promotions
Being bold at work includes being upfront with your supervisors about your desire to move up in the company. Don’t ever be afraid to let them know that you want to achieve much more.
Your superiors can start you on the right path for success if you let them know you want it. They will not invest their time in you if they have no idea that you desire to advance.
2. Imagine Your Bosses as Children
Your lack of boldness at work could be because you hold your bosses on pedestals. In other words, you hold them as much higher than yourself in your head.
You can make yourself bolder by thinking of those individuals as harmless little children. It’s a psychological strategy that could offer you many benefits.
3. Boost Your Own Self-Esteem at Work
Giving yourself a pep talk at work can give you the strength and confidence you need during every shift. You can sneak away to the ladies’ or men’s room to tell yourself how much of an amazing worker you are, or you could do so silently while you work.
Read More: How to Deal With Lack of Confidence at Work – 14 Strategies
4. Bring Your Best Self Every Day
Work hard every day of your life and do the best job you can do. Take every opportunity possible to innovate if you get the opportunity. Furthermore, don’t ever let shyness stop you from making suggestions that can improve the work dynamics or processes.
The worst your bosses can do is refuse to take your advice. On the other hand you could have an idea that makes you and the company you work for highly successful. You’ll never know if you don’t try, though.
5. Don’t Dwell in Perfectionalism
Remember that no one is perfect. A famous person named Salvadore Dali said that you should never fear perfection because you’ll never achieve it. Therefore, it’s better to strive for constant improvement instead of perfection, as quoted by Kim Collins.
Be Bold and Conquer the World
Now you know some valid reasons why your shyness may be hindering your growth. You also have in front of you many strategies you can use to become a bold person in your personal life and work life. Use some of the methods mentioned above if you want to be a bold person who grabs life by the horns and succeeds every time.
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