Room for Improvement

I have some issues and I have been working on them. The biggest issue I am dealing with is low self esteem and lack of self confidence. On a day to day basis I deal with it okay. But there are times that I feel like a fish out of water and I just worry about everything I say and do. It happens a lot when I am with groups of people. I second guess everything I say and do and when I leave the group I worry about what they thought about everything I said and did. I am also a perfectionist. Whenever I do something I over think it and I always find fault with it - without exception. It seems that I don't want to find the good in things. But it isn't a conscious effort - the negative just overrides the positive.

A good example of this is a recent note I received related to a hobby I am involved in. The hobby is letterboxing and the note was about one of my letterboxes I have placed. The note pretty much stated that the clues I wrote for the box were worthless and because of that the person looking for the box ended up having a very bad day. Well, I took it personally (and it was - it was specific to me and my actions with this box). And it made me feel horrible. I immediately started thinking about all the negative notes I have received and they pushed anything positive about the hobby out of mind. Now this isn't the only negative note I have received but it is the proverbial straw and I have decided to back away from the hobby. Why do I want to put all this effort into creating and placing a box (this is not a simple task for me - one box usually takes me about three weeks to complete from beginning to end - from research and planning to executiona and placing). I put a lot of myself into it so that the person that goes to find it has a good experience. Well from the negative comments it appears that they aren't getting a good experience. So I don't want to deal with this so I end up removing myself from the activity. Now I am not stupid and I realize this doesn't actually solve the problem but it is the coping mechanism that I have developed. This is what I am trying to change. The last two weeks have seen me take an enormous step backwards in my work. But I am not giving up and I am hoping that I can come up with a better way to deal with this and look at the negative as a learning experience and reflect on the positive aspects and know that I am doing something right.