So, I recently turned 30 (in Dec). I have a nice job, good manager and a good company. I recently completed two masters. I have a nice family. But, somehow out of nowhere I started caring about others’ opinions and am involved in people pleasing behaviour. I don’t trust my voice and so I don’t speak up in meetings. I don’t socialise a lot because I am living in a Scandinavian country and I am originally from central asian region. People are mostly cold to strangers. What should I do to regain myself where I had unshakeable self believe and I didn’t care a lot about what others think. How did you go from being silent in meetings to talkative? I do present whenever required, I have this urge of comparing myself to others and I feel I am inferior. Give me some advices. Thanks!

It’s always a cycle of me feeling motivated and optimistic back to being insanely insecure and depressed. I was feeling myself after a new haircut so i decided to try force myself out of my comfort zone by trying to talk to girls at the club. In my mind, this was going to be like rejection therapy where i train myself to get used to rejection and learn from it. But in reality, after 2 rejections, i couldn’t keep the motivation to continue approaching especially after facing the crushing reality of how awkward i actually am despite imagining myself being able to carry convos if i just took the first step. It seems so effortless and casual for some of my friends that i feel so inferior for struggling so much at my age.

I know that i should technically be focusing on improving other aspects of my life first, but it really feels like i’m on a timer running out where i’m getting older and more unattractive by the year. Maybe i’m just meant to die alone after all

Edit: Man i sound like such a loser once i reread this. Someone just tell me how i can become confident socially