I'm currently 19 years old. I know, I'm young as hell and shouldn't be stressing over shit like this. But for my whole life, until I was 17, I was obese. My chin and neck were one continuous blob, I was 70 pounds heavier than I am now, and I hadn't ever even seen the inside of the gym. I was fat, and I also didn't groom/dress well, and I never socialized.

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Now I am physically fit, and well kept and well dressed, and I am great with people. But my mentality is still as if I'm what I was 2+ years ago. My friends will be laughing with me, but I'll still feel like I'm the loser of the group. A girl will hold prolonged eye contact with me at a party, and I'll blow it off and think there's no way she can be into me. Looking back, so many gorgeous girls have shown me IOI's that TRP describes (eye contact, "accidental" contact, standing near me alone for long periods of time, dancing/showing off their bodies to me), and I just blow it off not thinking she's ACTUALLY into me. Either that, or I pretend as though I'm not interested so I can validate not approaching her.

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How do I change my mindset so I realize that I'm not what I used to be? I need to be convinced that I'm actually of value now, and that both guys and women will see that way too.

(Also adding: I saw one of the girls (the one really eyeing me up at the very beginning) sitting alone and on her phone, so I walked up and sat near her. She didn’t look up when I sat, so I just said hi and waved kindly. She looked up, gave me a huge smile, said “Hi”, then held the smile and eye contact for a few seconds, before looking back down at her phone. I feared rejection too much, didn’t say anything, and now I’m beating myself up from regret.)