Am I Stuck With My Personality?

And now it's time to Ask the Shrink. Hey, welcome to another bonus episode of Ask the Shrink. This is where I answer all your questions, things that come up as you're taking action, taking risks, learning how to be more bold, more confident, more free. And I want to be here to support you. So send your questions go to shrinkforthshy guy.com shrink for, for the shy guy.com even if you're a gal, we have a lot of women that actually listen to this show. I sometimes wonder about titling it Guy in the show, but there you go. That's what I did. That's how it went. That's how it is. So go to shrinkforthshyguy.com, send me a message. I will read it and we will see how many of these we can get to that we get a lot. So I don't know if I can answer all of them in a timely manner, but I certainly would love to. And you know, the, you can give some backstory, but if, if it's like, you know, a five page essay is less likely to get a response and an answer because, you know, digging through all that, man, I have to have some help me manage all the emails at this point. So, you know, distilled like an arrow short, some context. But then you know the core of your question is going to make it more likely to get answered and you can do that at the site there. So let's dive in. Today's question is from Brandon. Brandon says, just want to start out by thanking you for all the great work that you do. Awesome. You're welcome, Brandon. Thank you for thanking me. My question today is a bit scrambled, but I'll try my best to make it sound coherent. I'm wondering if you know much about the fundamentals of personality traits from early childhood. Sounds intense. Let's go. The reason I'm asking this is because I've always had an outgoing and funny personality since my childhood. However, after various experiences, I am now the antithesis of this. I would do anything to have the personality I had back in those days. Is there any scientific evidence that says you always maintain your personality traits? As weird as this sounds, just seeing some type of evidence would help me as it would provide me with the confirmation that I have the ability to be outgoing, funny. I've learned a bit about this in my psychology courses, but given the fact that you're an expert, you probably know a lot more about it. I know that doesn't make too much sense, so feel free to ask for clarification Great, thanks. Good question, Brandon. It makes plenty of sense to me. You are. You are a lot more coherent than you think. So perhaps there is a belief there to let go of or a way to see yourself more clearly as a. I mean, for those of you listening right now, that was pretty clear, wasn't it? Pretty articulate. So let me, let me dive in here. Probably you're saying it doesn't feel clear, is not about how you communicate it. It's probably you don't feel clear about this issue. You're confused, you're not sure. So let's see if we can help you get a little bit of clarity here. Okay? So a confession. Confession time. You know, man, I read a ton of research and shit when I was in my graduate training program, but that stuff bores the hell out of me. I always hated it and I had to do a dissertation. I hated that too. I am a huge fan. I have a banner at my live events that we have up now that says whatever it takes and whatever works. So I'm much more interested in what I've seen to be true in my own experience than that of my clients, than what research somewhere says. So there's probably someone that can answer this who's like, really more academic. By the book. Clinical psychologist. I'm not that guy. But I have a ton of stuff to say about it. So here's the thing. Yes, you can be outgoing and funny. And I would say that that's true even if you didn't start that way. Even if your whole life, you know, you're 38 years old listening to this, and you're like, fuck. I was never outgoing. Funny guy. I've always been shy back to. Remember when I was five years old, I remember I was scared and shy. And then it got even worse when I was in middle school and it got worse when I went to college and shit. Even you, I know you can be outgoing and funny right now. Like you can learn that, you can activate that in yourself and it might take some time. And when I say right now, I don't mean like, boom, haha, right now, genie. But I mean like you can activate that now. And now in your life, you can start building that and you can become that person and you are that person underneath. Because here's the thing, we are all outgoing and funny. And by outgoing I don't mean necessarily an extrovert. Maybe you do, Brandon. But what I mean by that is we can. We can put ourselves out there, we can say what we think we're free. And we're all that way, every single one of us in our core. You know how I know that? Because I have kids and I've seen babies and toddlers and little young people that are. I don't know what's the next stage after toddler, Little. Little boy, little human, little girl. But they're. They're so free. And, man, they'll just tell story after story. They assume that what they're saying is the most. Of course. You want to hear this. I'm just thinking of my son Zaim, telling stories when he's sitting on the toilet. Like, and then this happened. And then that. Oh, and then that. Yeah, and then. Remember that, dad? Remember that? How would he say it? He's like between two and a half and three right now. He'd be like, sit on the toilet and like, one time. One time. Smashed the bug in the bathroom. I'll say. One time I smashed a bug in the bathroom. Yeah. Mosquito. Mosquito. It was a mosquito. Yeah, yeah. Threw it in the toilet and flushed it down, down, down, down. You know, he's like telling me it's adorable. And he's. He's outgoing, he's funny. He's sharing now. Sure. Someone comes over to the house and he doesn't know him, he might feel a little shy, he might pull back. He might be a little hesitant at first, but there's no sense of, I'm a bad person in that I'm a failure and I'm a loser. He's just not quite sure yet. And then when he gets a little. Warms up a little bit, boom, wants to go, goes over to that person and shows them his whatever, you know, his drawing. So we all have that in us. You have that in you. And the fact that you have a history built up of experiencing that. I don't know what age it shifted, but every year that you were that other way, I mean, that just makes it even easier to get back to. You have more muscle memory, more conditioning in your mind of what that feels like on the inside out. So. Absolutely, yes. So my. A couple of ways to get back there. One is to. I'm not sure what happened, but we all might. You might have had some painful experiences. People sometimes have experiences where they're bullied heavily for a year or less or more, and then it fucks with their self esteem and their confidence that that can happen in school, that can even happen in the workplace. That can happen in your family, which is very unfortunate when that's the case. Maybe this is A big one. People have a relationship, it ends and they're heartbroken and they lose all confidence. Maybe one of those things happen, maybe someone has a parent die. And that might not seem like something that directly shatters your confidence, but it fucks with you and it fucks with your. You know, we get scared of deeply connecting with people because we feel so much pain about the loss of that person in our lives. And that fucks with us and that causes us to start to develop social anxiety. So I don't. These are just some common examples. I don't know what it is for you, but finding what some of those instances are. And there might be some stuff to let go of, stuff to heal, and that's a much bigger topic and might actually, you might actually benefit from coaching. And at this point I'm. The best way to do that would be to work with a coach on my team. I'm building a coaching team. We have some, two dear friends of mine who've worked through their own social anxiety, been with me for years. Started out as clients, both of them, and now they've done tons of training with me, been to tons of my live events, done all my programs. They've immersed themselves and they are powerhouses and they both have clients right now they're helping people. And that's a very accessible way to do coaching because working with me at this point is quite a bit and I don't have much time for one on one coaching. But something that can help you and it could be counseling too. I don't know, whatever's gonna work for you. But you're gonna need to process the emotion of these past events and let it go. And then you're also gonna need to look at the meaning and the stories that emerge from these events and let that go. And that isn't like, that's not like five years of therapy. Like I did a session in one of my groups recently, A guy had a traumatic experience and he released it in one session. So this is not like, you know, necessarily a multi year event. So that's how. So working on that stuff. And then also you gotta, I mean there's probably something happening where you're risk averse now, you're scared to do it, you're overthinking things, you're. You're judging the hell out of yourself. You probably need to get your inner critic in check. You can check out my book, the Solution to Social Anxiety. There's a whole chapter in there called Accepting Yourself all of Yourself. So getting that inner Critic or listening to some other episodes of this podcast, getting your inner critic in check. It's going to be super important. And then taking bold action. Bold action. And the best way to do it would be to think back, to have a little wwbd. I know. Wwybd. What would young Brandon do? I love that. What would young Brandon do? And just ask yourself that question. Just start fucking doing what young Brandon would do. He blurts something out here, we'll blurt it out. Oh, but I'm so scared they're not gonna like me. Do it. Make it a habit. Make it a practice. Keep doing it again and again and again. Work through the fear. Deal with your critic afterwards, and keep going. Do not stop. And being funny and outgoing is a habit. It's a pattern. Your personality is a pattern. And all patterns can be changed. All patterns can be changed. And first of all, being free and able to express yourself is not a personality trait. Every human has that ability, right? So that's just something that's stamped out of us, and we all need to reclaim it. So you can do it, man. Follow those steps and you will get there. And you are awesome. And if you want to know more about how to get in touch with us about coaching, go to SocialConfidenceCenter.com and click on the coaching tab. And I don't know if that's right for you, but it is an option, and people are really benefiting from doing that with us. But there's many ways to get there, and I know you can get there. You're on the path. You're going to get there, man. You're awesome. And so are you for listening right now, whoever you are. And think about how this applies in your life. By the way, what have you told yourself? I lost and can never get back. Where are you? You know, what are you going to do? Having heard this, what are you going to apply in your life to become the person that you want to be? Whether it's funny, outgoing, charming, relaxed, comfortable, confident, direct, assertive, honest, whatever it is. However, you want to be bold, perhaps, and start claiming that. Start practicing that now. Until we speak again. May you have the courage to be who you are, who you want to be, and reclaim that and know that you're awesome. Talk to you soon.