Videos of You: how to overcome shyness (low-esteem)? Afraid of real life people finding out?

[Lin]

If you are making video that has your appearance (comedy/talk/tutorial whatever), are you afraid that people will find out? I feel like I have a low esteem or just really shy. I would love to be able to make videos like others where they can talk so proudly and confidently in front of a camera and not afraid of anyone's judgment or something like that.

I have thought about just doing videos that do not require my appearance, but then, I am also curious in trying XD

I tried to search the forum but didn't find anything related to this topic. If I have missed any thread, please let me know >.< I am still new and learning

 

[Michael]

I have been and still am the same way when making videos to some extent. I think most of us will go through it regardless of how we look or perceive ourselves and its only normal. I think my main issue was that I was not used to seeing myself on camera and playing it back for the time first time I felt somewhat shocked, I think it was the shock of not seeing myself as how others see me. You just have to not worry as much and get on with it, I mean whats better, never doing it and no one seeing your videos or trying and people most likely enjoying your videos and not even caring about how you look or whether youre shy or not. I think the whole side of YouTube, the troll side and hater side is why many people think this way and are so worried about it, I always thought to myself, I know I will get trolled or name called and I havent been name called once, well I have slightly but I am not sure whether the person was serious or not because it seemed like he was messing around and so unrealistic what they said.

I am not too bothered about people seeing my videos but I dont lead a highly social social life so I could be in those circumstances. You just have to get on with it and try it because otherwise you will never know. To improve your confidence I would try just doing them offline for a bit, no one else would see them and that way you can get used to seeing yourself, I also read somewhere once that acting as if you love the person behind the camera helps with keeping eye contact and not looking away when youre shy. Apparently telling yourself in the mirror that you love yourself and saying the good things about yourself and not even thinking about any negatives can help build your confidence. If the videos you want to do would be best done with yourself in them then I would do it and practice, the more you do something the more confident you become and the more natural it is to you.

All in all I would go for it if its something you see yourself doing or want to do, follow it if its niggling in the back of your head that you want to do it. I am sure everyone here will be supportive too

 

[WhereMyLaLasAt]

Hey, I too suffer from low self-esteem, but I do vlogs.At first I was really apprehensive about starting, I mean I was actually scared, if you watch my first video you'll know I'm completely out of my comfort zone but I felt like I had to do it. Making vlogs is something I've mused with for a while but I finally decided to bite the bullet and do it.

It was hard to post the links to my facebook, I didn't really want people to find out but everyones been really supportive, they probably have a giggle to themselves when they're watching it but I usually get positive comments and that's great, it's a real mood changer. It's helped me realise it's not important what people think as long as you love what your doing, and I do it love it.

I'm still not there 100% with my videos but I've improved so much and I know that I will continue to improve, it's important not to let things like self-esteem hinder you doing things you want to do. Just take a deep brathe and do it. You'll feel 100% after you've done it.

 

[Symph]

I act really confident in my videos and probably give off the illusion I don't care what people think. But some of the comments will bug me for long periods of time. 3 people have said my voice was creepy, and I still think about it sometimes watching myself going "what's creepy about my voice????" I think alot of people who seem like they don't care what people think really do, and if the negative comments outweighed the positive ones I probably wouldn't be doing what I do on youtube. Don't be fooled, very few people just don't care what people think, some of us just do what we do anyway or let the positive motivate us to push through the negative.