Part 3

THE CURE OF NATURAL BASHFULNESS

Consists:--1. In cultivating SELF-ESTEEM,--in exalting your own opinion of yourself. BEING PROUD.

2. Going into company;--associating with miscellaneous people.

1. Who ever knew a really proud person to be bashful and diffident? What is pride? Is it not self-esteem; self-appreciation and valuation; self-respect and reliance; nobleness, independence and dignity?

A proud-spirited person excites in us something of that feeling of respect and admiration we have for a spirited, mettlesome horse.

But to possess true spirit and personal pride, we must possess points of real or imagined merit; of education, accomplishments, personal beauty, or mental, or physical superiority. How can a person of scanty information--ignorant of the world and its doings, carry a proud bearing with a high and noble spirit?

"How proud and stuck up them Brown girls are since they got home from Boston," whispers Mrs. Smith to a neighbor, as the "Brown girls" sail into church, dressed in city style, and with something of "city airs." They have brought home with them the same warm, generous hearts--but they are proud. Have they not some reason for being so? For two years they have been in Madame C.'s fashionable city boarding-school, and in this time they have learned several things outside their school books. Their rustic ways quickly disappeared, and they soon acquired quiet dignity of manners, and that perfect self-control we all admire. It was taught them also that the face is not the proper place for exhibiting our emotions and feelings, so often to our disadvantage; and also that the "sweet, low voice" that men love so well, is much more effective than the loud, harsh tones of so many rustic maidens.

They were also trained to receive introductions from gentlemen without simpering and blushing, and also that it was possible for a gentleman to call upon them several times, and even invite them to a concert, and still have no intentions of "proposing."

And so the Brown girls go home with their varied accomplishments, and are "proud." But it is a personal pride to be approved of, and which all who are bashful and backward should strive to acquire.

Are you ambitious? Do you aspire to better things? If you consider yourself a nobody, do you care to be somebody? Do you care to be considered an intelligent, interesting capable person? Then analyze yourself; take yourself to pieces, and see what there is really of you. We take it for granted, of course, that you are a person of ordinary common sense. Has your school education been neglected? then you must rectify this by a selected course of reading; for the first and most important step towards removing a feeling of bashfulness and inferiority, is to become well informed on general topics. We maintain that it is absurd for any intelligent person to feel awkward and bashful who is well-informed and neatly dressed.

To make up for deficiencies of education, any person determined can go through a special course of reading in a comparatively short time, that will make him or her a well informed person. The books we would particularly recommend, are:--A concise Modern History; a small Ancient History; Natural Philosophy (Comstock's High School, or any other good, well illustrated work); Youman's New Chemistry, which you will find very interesting and highly instructive; Quackenbos' Composition and Rhetoric. If you read carefully Kame's Elements of Criticism you would be richly repaid in the pleasure derived, and in the gain of a rich store of valuable information. Any person who would be pre-eminently quick-witted must not fail to read Shakespeare--at least the principal plays. Shakespeare's knowledge of the world--of the secret springs of human action--of human nature--was something wonderful. No human being has yet equalled him in this respect. But you cannot read his plays as you can a newspaper. They must be slowly read and digested like a rare dinner. The Bible perhaps excepted, no book has yet been printed that contains so great an amount of profound worldly wisdom as the works of Shakespeare. Nothing will so quickly sharpen and polish a dull and untrained intellect.

Now here are enumerated less than a dozen books, within the reach of any one capable of earning his clothes, and which, if read at least twice, carefully, will make a person feel that he really knows something--had really entered the great temple of knowledge.

Of course, one should not be confined to the above. The extent of one's intelligence and information will depend upon the extent of his reading and thinking; but the above-mentioned books, thoroughly read, will educate and elevate more than the perusal of an entire library read hastily and thoughtlessly.

The wide range of information gained by the regular perusal of a good city daily newspaper, and a first class monthly magazine is of too great value to be over-estimated. If you cannot afford a daily paper, you certainly can a semi-weekly, a large one, like the Semi-Weekly Tribune, for instance. Of the magazines, Harper's or Scribner's will bring you treasures of interesting knowledge in the most attractive form.

We will now suppose that you are well informed of the news and topics of the day, etc., and that you have no cause to feel diffident and reserved from a general lack of information. "But my self-esteem is small, I have a poor opinion of myself." Well, change that opinion! Be proud; resolve to walk like a MAN and a gentleman--not like an uncouth boy. Hold up your head, and throw back your shoulders. If you want a magnificent chest, and a deep, sonorous voice; practice ten minutes, night and morning, filling the lungs as full as possible through a small tube, three inches long, and with a hole the size of a quill; allow the breath to pass out slowly through the tube. To insure an easy and graceful carriage, practice walking in your room with a small bag filled with grain poised on your head. Consider yourself as good as other people, and a little better. Train yourself to act always in a quiet and dignified manner--not with vulgar "stiffness," but with that ease and moderation of action, easily acquired, and which always shows the well-bred person. Act the gentleman or lady, and you will be one. Nothing so indicates ill-breeding as a nervous, fidgetty, restless manner. The real lady or gentleman will be composed and undisturbed under every trying circumstance. They have taught themselves self-control, and this is readily learned by those with inclination and determination to learn.

2. Go into Society.--To learn to swim you must go into the water. To overcome the feeling of bashfulness, and to be at ease in company, you must go into company. On no account should you neglect this duty which you owe to yourself. Take every opportunity to attend balls, picnics, parties, sociables, etc., and always rank yourself as one of the most desirable and popular young men of the occasion, and you will undoubtedly be so. Remember the fact that others will estimate you as you estimate yourself. And here we again repeat, Do not be, or act, afraid of the girls. They won't hurt you. Walk boldly up and make yourself agreeable. They will meet you half way. If at any time you feel a little fluttering of the heart, don't subside into a corner with the say-nothings and do-nothings, but "circulate around," and you will be surprised how easily you will find yourself at home and at ease, chatting with some nice people.

For removing Bashfulness, awkwardness, and all manner of similar disagreeable things, there could not possibly be a better place than the dancing-school. Young men who live away from villages, and who have but few, or no desirable associates outside the family circle, and who are distressingly awkward in speech and manner, if they can have a few terms at a dancing-school, will be so improved in address, manners, and general appearance as to surprise all who know them. We are acquainted with a person, now an old man, large, heavy, clumsy, who weighed one hundred and eighty pounds the day he was sixteen, and was six feet and an inch high. He was so awkward, to use his own statement, that he could hardly get into a room where there was company without hitting both sides of the door, and could scarcely sit down without knocking over his chair, knowing not what to do with his feet, his hands, nor himself. He chanced to have an opportunity to attend a dancing-school for three months--they were very uncommon in the locality where he resided--and he was there trained in the common civilities and courtesies of society; how to enter and leave a room, how to receive introductions, how to receive and dismiss company, etc. Though he is a farmer, not much used to society, there is to-day an easy, quiet grace, and a polish of manners that would pass anywhere acceptably; and he attributes it to the brief tuition in a dancing-school. While he may not remember much that he learned as a dancer, he remembers all that he learned that is necessary for performing the common courtesies of the parlor. So attend all the dances possible, and under all circumstances remember that you are a MAN and a GENTLEMAN.

Many often hesitate and become diffident from a lack of readiness in expressing their ideas, and from a fear that they do not speak correctly and elegantly. Now speaking grammatically is a mere matter of education. If lacking in this respect, the use of any good grammar, and particularly "COMPOSITION AND RHETORIC," already mentioned, with "LIVE AND LEARN;" or "1000 MISTAKES CORRECTED," will be all you require in this direction. "ONE THOUSAND MISTAKES CORRECTED," is better than half-a-dozen living teachers.

To express one's self with fluency in conversation is an art that can be acquired by a little practice, in adopting the method of the great orator Clay, in gaining quick readiness in speech. "I owe my success in life," said he, "chiefly to one circumstance--that at the age of twenty-seven I commenced, and continued for years the practice of daily reading and speaking upon the contents of some historical or scientific book. These off-hand efforts were made sometimes in a cornfield, at others in the forest, and not unfrequently in some distant barn, with the horse and the ox for my auditors. It is to this early practice of the art of all arts, that I am indebted for my subsequent destiny."

Reading aloud from some book, enunciating every word clearly and distinctly, with a dictionary at hand to settle instantly in your own mind any question as to the proper pronunciation of particular words, is a practice so abundantly fruitful of good results, that those who will practise it even for a short time, will scarcely be induced to relinquish it. In reading, cultivate the purely conversational tone. It is as easy to read as it is to talk, yet there are few good readers. The tone of voice, modulation, accent, etc., should be precisely as if you were in conversation, not as if you were preaching in a drawling, monotonous way. Read well and you will converse well, and both are superior accomplishments, acquired with facility; though the orator who pours forth his thoughts with such apparent ease, achieves his wonderful power only by means of patient labor, after much repetition, and, like Disraeli, often after bitter disappointments.

So take courage, young men, and if you have a difficulty to overcome, grapple with it at once; facility will come with practice, and strength and success with repeated effort. And always recollect, that the mind and character may be trained to almost perfect discipline, enabling it to move with a grace, spirit and freedom almost incomprehensible to those who have not subjected themselves to a similar training.

Take a raw recruit; he stoops, he walks in a shuffling, slouchy manner; he is painfully awkward. A few weeks under the Drill-Sergeant, and he walks forth erect, dignified, with the true soldierly bearing. Life seems but for the purpose of mere drilling. In one form or another we cannot escape it; neither should we desire to do so.

BASHFULNESS FROM IGNORANCE OF THE WAYS OF SOCIETY.

It is certainly very embarrassing and conducive of bashfulness to be thrust into a glittering room filled with people superior to one's self in position, and equally cultured in the knowledge of what is due to the place and occasion. A sensitive, uncultured man or maiden, with rustic garb and rustic speech, and little knowledge respecting correct manners, introduced at once to the presence of cultured ladies and gentlemen, does not know what to do with hands nor feet; whether to sit or to stand, or to hide. Is it to be wondered at that such a person acts and feels cheap and diminutive?

But, diffident reader, do not be discouraged, for general good breeding is very easy of attainment. You must possess simply common sense, self-possession, and a habit of observation.

The exercise of a good common sense will show you plainly enough what is right and wrong--what is proper and improper. Self-possession will prevent from doing awkward and bungling things; and by observation you will soon learn the manners of the well-bred.

"But I won't know how to act, mother," said a lad as he was about starting to his first party. "Keep your eyes open, and just do as the others do," was the answer, and better advice could not have been given.

Quiet self-possession will enable a person quite unacquainted with the usages of society to conduct himself very acceptably even in the most superior company. It is the foolish feeling of timidity that causes the trepidation and bashfulness, and consequent uneasy manners when in company, with the class of persons for whose benefit this book was written. Why should you be timid and backward, and show by your hesitating ways that you do not feel at ease? You surely can notice how those about you conduct themselves, and conduct yourself accordingly. Why should you not enter a room filled with company like any other well-bred person, in an easy, unconcerned manner, and addressing those about you, even those with whom you are not acquainted, without restraint, and without embarrassment? If you cannot muster sufficient spirit to do this, you had better turn travelling agent and call from house to house till you are not afraid of associating and conversing with strangers.