There are girls (and we are sorry to say there are a great many of them) who between the ages of fifteen and twenty do nothing but loll on a sofa and read cheap novelettes and other wretched and unwholesome literature. These persons usually blush like beetroots when spoken to. They are always nervous and usually silly and rude.
Self-consciousness is one of the greatest and most important causes of nervousness. The fear of “giving oneself away” is a very potent factor in the causation of nervousness.
Some people confuse self-consciousness with self-conceit. But they are diametrically opposite conditions. The self-conceited girl believes herself perfect. She cannot make a mistake. What she says must be right. She has no fear of committing herself. Why should she ever be nervous? And she never is nervous.
The self-conscious girl is the reverse of this. Not only does she know her shortcomings, but she takes an exceedingly gloomy view of everything. Truly she is always thinking about herself, but her thoughts are not flattering. She puts herself in the worst light and imagines that everyone else sees her in the same way. She imagines everyone is laughing at her. She is confused. She is nervous.
Not all girls are nervous or blush from the same cause, nor are they nervous in the same way nor in the same situations. Some girls blush only when in the company of strangers, others even when speaking to their greatest friends. Some blush or are nervous only when talking to persons of the opposite sex, others when talking to anybody.
We can divide the various kinds of nervous girls into the following groups—
1. Girls who blush or are nervous when talking to strangers, but are not nervous among their friends.
2. Girls who are nervous when talking to friends or strangers.
3. Girls who are more nervous with their friends than with strangers.
4. Girls who are only nervous when talking to one person, but who are quite at home in a crowded room.