I am confused about the direction I’m taking myself in regarding the development of my confidence and social skills. Specifically, I’m confused about who I’m “supposed” to be, and who I’m “supposed” to fit in with.

This is going to sound really pathetic, but I need to discuss it because it’s impacting my social life significantly. The problem is this: I find it difficult to be friends with someone if I think they’re not “cool” enough. I’m not exactly sure when I developed this rule or what led to it, but I need to do something about it because it’s practically ruining my life.

For a while I’ve had two goals: 1) to hold my ground and express myself confidently around other confident people; and 2) to have a thriving and active social life with lots of friends. I really wanted to achieve the first goal cos I was sick of feeling awkward and getting picked on for it. And I wanted to achieve the second because I’d also had enough of feeling lonely and frustrated and like I wasn’t in control of my social life. The problem is that my efforts to achieve the first goal have made it much more difficult to do the second. I can now “hold my ground”, so to speak, but it makes connecting with people difficult. In fact it’s actually pushed away a lot of the friends I had previously. I’ve had to put on a sort of “tough guy front” or something like that, and I feel like I have to have it up all the time. I can’t just let my hair down and be my quirky, playful self and connect with people I truly like. I really find it difficult to express the “uncool” parts of my personality and be friends with “uncool” people. That to me feels like I’m opening myself up to get mocked and ridiculed at any moment, and on a broader level it feels like I’ve failed in some way.

Now you might say “well just be yourself”, “own who you are” or something like that. And that certainly sounds like great advice. But it seems to me like the message of the RSD and pick up community is that no, you are supposed to become this “cool” guy that hangs around with “cool” people, is always the leader of his social group and so on, and I really don’t think of myself like that. I’m mildly autistic and an introvert (in the sense that I lose energy to socializing, not the broad stereotype of someone who’s just really quiet), and I have a pretty quirky and goofy personality. So I’m kind of confused about where I’m going and who I’m supposed to become, if I’m supposed to “become” anyone at all; and I feel like I need to resolve this soon because I’m 24 and time is ticking. Any clarity on this problem would be appreciated.