Are you shy?
Are you uncomfortable surrounded by people?
Would you want to overcome your shyness?
First things first: There is nothing wrong with being shy as much as there is nothing wrong with being outgoing, either. Shyness is just a plain emotion, not a permanent personality trait. Anyone who is shy has the complete power to change it.
The following are some simple suggestions that can help you overcome your feeling of shyness. It is a feeling. And feelings can be replaced.
Building self-confidence
Self confidence is knowing you are special. Everyone is special, including your favorite celebrity. Being special is having some trait to offer to the world. Your favorite celebrity might be a good singer. Your friend is kind and thoughtful.
How about you? There is always something in you that make you special. Look inside you and find out. Think about it, instead of fixating how you look or sound or dress up. Your being special is the one you should polish and work on.
And whatever your problems with yourself are should not make shy. Everyone has problems too. And they are not shy.
Smiling and getting comfortable
In everything you do, look and act friendly. A smile can work wonders into yourself and that friendly attitude will translate itself into your body language. Your friends will become closer to you and will help you in your work to overcome your shyness.
Smiling is simply a friendly acknowledgment of other people, whether they are friends or complete strangers. It definitely will brighten the day of the person you smiled at. And surprisingly, it will brighten yours, too. Try it.
Visualization
Athletes have a visualization technique. It is simple but very effective. While training months and days before their big events, the first thing they do every morning is sit and relax for about 15 minutes. And they do only one thing: picturing themselves winning their race.
You can do the same. Close your eyes and imagine a situation where you are normally shy. Now, you simply replace that with images where you are confidently dealing with the situation. You can even see the techniques on how you did them in your imagined scenario. Now, do this every day. You will surprise yourself later.
Good posture
Sometimes, it could be our body posture that makes us shy without our knowing it. Good posture and speaking clearly perks up something in us. Standing straight and looking the other person in the eyes sparks a confident note inside us.
We feel secure in what we are talking about and without any prodding, we tend to speak out very clearly because we know that the other person is listening well to us.
No one is watching you
Being self-conscious is the pre-occupation of shy people.
Do you think people are looking at you when you cross the street? Are they pre-occupied with your hair or with the color of your lipstick?
Why not check out if people are looking at others? No one is really watching anyone that intently. That includes you.
Overcoming your shyness takes work, and only you can work it out. Getting a professional help might be good, but in the end, it is you who will do the smiling, the figuring, and the confident walking.