The Best Version of Yourself: Share Yourself

Take the lesson you learned in Kindergarten about sharing and apply it to every aspect of your life.

Why?

1) Because you're not boring.

Ex: I started out by telling dates my research for the past two years demand future experiments. I soon learned, I became much more attractive by sharing my excitement for a new set of experiments I was planning and the implications it would have.

Another ex: Your passion might be music.
Don't just say, "I like to listen to music". Convey a story and your excitement for discovering up and coming artists by going to local music venues, the local record shop.

2) Because you can get over approach anxiety. 

Believing you have something to share to the world changes your mindset about how valuable you are as a person. For example - it's a snowy day at the bus stop, but it's relatively warm compared to a non-snowy day. As a chemistry major, you think nothing of it, but you can SHARE your knowledge about how the chemical structure of snow allows it to act as an insulator. Instant conversation starter.

Note: I use OkCupid because my time is limited, and I'd like my dates to share my political, social ideology rather than discover we have nothing in common.

3) Because sharing prevents you from caring. 

At the beginning, I agonized over when girls would call or text back because I wanted to know how THEY were doing, if THEY were interested in a movie, if THEY want to do something. Now, I contact them because something funny/awesome/sad happened or will happen, and I want to SHARE the experience with them. This allows you to frame messages in an assertive manner. Let's go do ... instead of hey, if you're free, would you maybe want to go...?

Along the same lines, sharing prevents you from taking and exuding desperation. If you're giving of yourself, you don't feel compelled to ask girls for their valuable time. If you're sharing the great experiences things you do, they will feel compelled to accept your offer.

4) Because sharing demands self-improvement and reflection.

If you examine your life and don't think it's worth sharing, then this should motivate you to better your lifestyle. Get a body that makes you want to run on the beach without a shirt on so you can share to the world what it means to be fit. A concrete example for me has been getting myself to do 40 pushups at once from merely 10 this January. If your hygiene isn't so good, maybe it's time to consider what you need to do to share a kiss with someone (flossing, perhaps??).

5) Because sharing demonstrates your character. 

Oh, you share your time at the local boys and girls club? Oh, you tipped that waiter well because you understand how crappy a job it is and are able to share what you can afford? >> For a girl to see you share your time to help others makes her less concerned with you taking in general (but more specifically her). By sharing, she is more capable of trusting you and less concerned with whether you will merely use her. Because when you give, you get so much more back in return.

How I came to realize this: I gradually started to do all of this on my own, but I had no paradigm with which to explain what was going on, until I read this article profiling the organizational psychologist Adam Grant. Exceptional read.

Share yourself! What do you have to lose?