Shyness

“ When Miggy was leaving, she paused on the threshold with her first hint of shyness, a hint which I welcomed. I think that every one to whom I am permanently drawn must have in his nature a phase of shyness, even of unconquerable timidity. ”

“ The moment that a shy person sees before him a perfectly unsympathetic person, one who is neither thinking nor caring for him, his shyness begins to flee; the moment that he recognizes a fellow-sufferer he begins to feel a reinforcement of energy. If he be a lover, especially, the almost certain embarrassment of the lady inspires him with hope and with renewed courage. ”

“ Shyness is certainly very pretty—when it is not very ugly; but shyness may often darken the bloom of genuine modesty, and a certain frankness and confidence may often incline it toward the light. Let us assume, then, that all the young ladies whom you may meet here are of the highest modern type. ”

“ Still, it is hard to see the ubiquity of some sort of tribute to shame, however perverted—as where female modesty consists in covering the face alone, or immodesty in appearing before strangers unpainted—and to believe it to have no impulsive root whatever. Now, what may the impulsive root be? I believe that, for one thing, it is shyness, the feeling of dread that unfamiliar persons, as explained above, may inspire us withal. Such persons are the original stimuli to our modesty. [392] But the actions of modesty are quite different from the actions of shyness. ”

“ He called it shyness or coyness or maidenly timidity, according to the circumstance that called it forth; but whatever it was, this apathy to his passionate dumb-show piqued him to a frenzy infused with an element of homage. Any other girl in her situation would have come half-way at least toward a man in his. ”

“ Shyness seems to depend on sensitiveness to the opinion, whether good or bad, of others, more especially with respect to external appearance. Strangers neither know nor care anything about our conduct or character, but they may, and often do, criticise our appearance.... The consciousness of anything peculiar, or even new, in the dress, or any slight blemish on the person, and more especially on the face—points which are likely to attract the attention of strangers—makes the shy intolerably shy. ”

“ May I say a plain word or two about the shyness and self-consciousness in society which so torment young girls? The first thing I would say is that they will almost certainly pass away before long, and that therefore they need not be bothered about. Lots of the most effective and socially successful men and women in the world went through a painful period of shyness in early youth, and now only smile at the memory of those days. ”

“ It is often very difficult to distinguish between shyness and reserve, for one can be reserved without being shy, and one can be shy and in an excess of shyness frightfully unreserved. Though the English are rightly credited with having brought reserve and self-control—those characteristics of the highest civilization as well as the lowest—to the greatest mastery, yet some of their amazing silence and immobility I believe to be shyness. It is a comfort to think so because, when one's vivacious disposition occasionally hurls one against an icy obstacle, it pains. ”

“ He leaned toward her eagerly, all of the uncertainty gone from his gaze. "I sure behaved goofy," he said. "But I'm a shy sort of guy. I try my best to hide it but maybe it would be wiser to just accept it, go along with it. I've been told I'm giving it an importance it doesn't deserve."
"Of course you are," she said. "Some women like shy men. Perhaps sixty percent of them do, when the shyness has something very genuine behind it. Shyness has nothing to do with courage—or lack of it. It's often a blending of humility and strength. And humility is a very fine quality." ”

“ You understand, doubtless, the wide distinction that exists between modesty and shyness. Modesty is always self-possessed, and therefore clear-sighted and cool-headed. Shyness, on the contrary, is too confused either to see or hear things as they really are, and as often assumes the appearance of forwardness as any other disguise. Depriving its victims of the power of being themselves, it leaves them little freedom of choice, as to the sort of imitations the freaks of their animal nature may lead them to attempt. ”

“ She is, therefore, privileged one moment to contradict the inevitable consequences of the assertions made the moment before.
You cannot avoid such criticisms; brave them nobly. The more you disregard them, the more true will you be to yourself, the more free will you be from that shyness which, though partly the result of keen and acute perceptions and refined sensibilities, has besides a large share of over-anxious vanity and deeply-rooted pride.
Do not believe those who tell you that shyness will decrease of itself, as you advance in age, and mix more in the world. ”

“ Thus shyness sends much happiness to Limbo. But actual shyness is not the worst. Some persons, sometimes of the very finest kind, endowed for loving-kindness, passion, highest devotion, nay requiring it as much as air or warmth, have received, from some baleful fairy, a sterilising gift of fear. ”

“ Shyness.—This odd state of mind, often called shamefacedness, or false shame, or mauvaise honte, appears to be one of the most efficient of all the causes of blushing. Shyness is, indeed, chiefly recognized by the face reddening, by the eyes being averted or cast down, and by awkward, nervous movements of the body. Many a woman blushes from this cause, a hundred, perhaps a thousand times, to once that she blushes from having done anything deserving blame, and of which she is truly ashamed. ”

“ I have no doubt that shyness is one of the old, primitive, aboriginal qualities that lurk in human nature—one of the crude elements that ought to have been uprooted by civilisation, and security, and progress, and enlightened ideals, but which have not been uprooted, and are only being slowly eliminated. ”

“ Be it ever so cold, so wanting in the shyness that belongs to conscious tenderness, it is still the very first caress she has ever given him of her own accord. A little thrill runs through him, and a mad longing to catch her in his arms, as he feels the sweet, cool touch ”

“ There are many otherwise sensible people who seek to cure a young person of that very common complaint—shyness—by exhorting him not to be shy, telling him what an awkward appearance it has, and that it prevents his doing himself justice, all of which is manifestly pouring oil on the fire to quench it; for the very cause of shyness is an over-anxiety as to what people are thinking of you, a morbid attention to your own appearance. ”

“ She had the genius of friendship, a native sincerity, a certain reality of nature--those fine qualities which so often accompany the shy that we almost, as we read biography and history, begin to think that shyness is but a veil for all the virtues. ”

“ I have a breezy, boisterous, cheerful friend, of transparent simplicity and goodness, who has never known the least touch of shyness from his cradle, who always says, if the subject is introduced, that shyness is all mere self-consciousness, and that it comes from thinking about oneself. ”

“ And she could put this question in spite of so feeling her host a shy personage; since such shyness as his—the shyness of ticklish nerves and fine perceptions—was perfectly consistent with the best breeding. Indeed it was almost a proof of standards and touchstones other than the vulgar: he must be so sure the vulgar would be first on the ground. He wasn’t a man of easy assurance, who chatted and gossiped with the fluency of a superficial nature ”

“ Shyness appears to me to be a quality utterly unknown to either man, woman, or child in America. The girls, from the reasons above stated, and the boys, from being absolutely thrown into the world, and made men of business before they are sixteen, are alike deficient in any thing like diffidence; and I really have been all but disconcerted at the perfect assurance with which I have been addressed, upon any and every subject, by little men and women just half way through their teens. ”

“ "Shyness is only the effect of a sense of inferiority in some way or other. If I could persuade myself that my manners were perfectly easy and graceful, I should not be shy." ”

“ Why, shyness is Egotism multiplied by itself. Your shy person is a person so sublimely (or infernally) conscious of his own existence and his own importance, so penetrated by the conviction that he is the centre of the Universe and that all eyes are fixed upon him, and therewith so concerned about the effect he may produce, the figure he may cut, that he dare not move lest he shouldn't produce an heroic effect or cut an Olympian figure. ”

“ In later life, the shyness, due to a sensitive nature, was mistaken, as is so often the case, for supercilious pride, and the unwillingness to wear his heart on his sleeve for coldness and want of sympathy. ”

“ The shyness, miscalled retiring modesty, with which one young lady shrinks from the notice of a gentleman as though there were danger in his approach, and the conscious coquettish air, miscalled ease, with which another invites his notice, are alike removed from the reality of either modesty or ease. ”

“ Whether from shyness or surliness, he had held consistently aloof from such frivolous pastimes. If a girl ever cast a saucy look his way the brooding blue eyes never seemed aware of it. In speech with womenkind he was always slow and half-reluctant. ”

“ Over supper I began at last to lose my shyness, for I had been very nervous, you know. As one only too rarely is.... She had the quality of making one talk, of making one feel that one was on the top of one's form. ”

“ Losing an umbrella, falling in love, toothache, black eyes, and having your hat sat upon may be mentioned as a few examples, but the chief of them all is shyness. The shy man is regarded as an animate joke. ”

“ Many a voluble, glib boy, who has been appointed the orator of the occasion, fails utterly, disappoints public expectation, and sits down with an uncomfortable mantle of failure upon his shoulders. Therefore, the ways of shyness are inscrutable. Many a woman who has never known what it was to be bashful or shy has, when called upon to read a copy of verses, even to a circle of intimate friends, lost her voice, and has utterly broken down, to her own and her friends' great astonishment. ”

“ Some persons, however, are so sensitive that the mere act of speaking to almost any one is sufficient to rouse their self-consciousness, and a slight blush is the result. Disapprobation ... causes shyness and blushing much more readily than does approbation.... Persons who are exceedingly shy are rarely shy in the presence of those with whom they are quite familiar, and of whose good opinion and sympathy they are quite assured; for instance, a girl in presence of her mother.... Shyness ... is closely related to fear; yet it is distinct from fear in the ordinary sense. ”

“ SHALL WOMEN PROPOSE? The shyness of man—meaning the "other sex" referred to in the woman's journals—has often been noticed in novels, and sometimes in real life. This shyness is, however, so exceptional as to be suspicious. The shy young man may provoke curiosity, but he does not always inspire respect. Roughly estimated, shyness is not considered a manly quality, while it is one of the most pleasing and attractive of the feminine traits, and there is something pathetic in the expression "He is as shy as a girl;" it may appeal for sympathy and the exercise of the protective instinct in women. ”

“ They are shy of words, as of all manifestations; and this very shyness, if it proves that there is at bottom a vital instinct concerned, also proves that it is not intrinsically more erotic than social, nor more social than intellectual. ”

“ Gauche, awkward, ill-mannered boys and girls call these delinquencies shyness. Being shy, however, is no extenuation of being discourteous. It is merely selfish self-conceit allowed to run rampant instead of being checked. How much easier it is to form a bad impression than to destroy one. ”

“ Any little shyness that change of circumstance may have made, and indeed must have made at first, is quite over, and we are as comfortable as ever, which is satisfactory, considering that I love nothing in the world so well as her—tho’ I should be sorry that she should say the same of me now. ”

“ Shyness, a disposition to regard the other suspiciously as opponent, together with the instinct to please and win admiration, and the desire to strike on points of sympathy—all this helps to bring about, and is reflected in the peculiar wrigglings in which the mirthful spirit expresses itself on such an occasion. ”

“ Have you not, perhaps, felt how intensely you could love that creature, and doubted if that creature could possibly love you? Now I think that shyness and that disbelief are common with either man or woman, if, however conscious of superiority in the prose of life, he or she recognizes inferiority in the poetry of it. ”

“ On the other hand shyness is either assumed to be a form, or an excess, of modesty, which is a virtue, or it is assumed to be congenital, and therefore a defect to be excused rather than a fault to be censured. So shy people as a rule rather ’fancy themselves’; for though they urge their peculiarity as an excuse for social defects, there lies behind a secret conviction that they at least have escaped the vice of forwardness, or of that coarseness of mental fibre which is implied in forwardness. ”