Paul Merton Quotes

I have a really hard time meeting people, so I wanted to take classes to get out of my social shell. Eventually, I opened up and realized, 'Wow, I really enjoy this.'

I think I only started to speak to people in grade four.

People feel I don't mix much, but I'm working at it.

I started when I was in college because I was shy and thought it would be a good way to break out of that.

It takes me a while to come out of myself and get to know people.

I was shy. I was painfully shy, until fifth grade when I transferred to another school and befriended the class clown. And one day he was sick and I kinda stepped in for the class clown and I said, 'Wow, this is exciting, I'm a little bit nervous.'

At school, when it came to being social, I had no idea how to do it.

People may have found it difficult to approach me, and I realised it and have worked on it. I used to be socially shy. Now I have become a social animal. I go out, meet and interact with people.

A lot of times people feel a little apprehensive about suggesting to actually meet in person. One of the reasons that can be hard is people think they have to propose something super novel.

People still make me nervous, but gradually over the years I've developed kind of like a public personality, so I can talk. I have my spiel, I have my stories.

I get nervous around girls for the first time. Once I'm in, I can take the reins and go. It's just the initial approach I'm really bad at.

And like the old stereotype, I overcame my shyness by making my friends laugh.

For some reason, I just lack that ability to be embarrassed about going up to people. I even do it for friends if they want to ask someone out.

For some reason I did something where I realized I could get a reaction. That was when I broke out of my shell at school, because I really didn't have any friends or anything like that and I just kind of was going along, and then finally I did this zany thing, and all of a sudden I had tons of friends.

I get a lot of letters from introverts asking how they can meet people. The key is to make sure that you are doing things you enjoy.

I guess I was always a ham, and I was anxious to try doing different things. I started doing impressions to make friends at school. I would do them during recess. Maybe some of the kids thought I was being weird, but everyone seemed to have a good time.

You can't be afraid of rejection. That was one of my problems when I was approaching girls: I was always afraid of what they were going to say to me.

I was really, really shy. My dad used to drive me for an hour and a half to go training. I used to finish school, jump in the car, come back, and go to bed. I missed out on socialising with my friends when I was a shy child anyway.

I didn't know how to socialize. I wasn't able to date. I felt like I was missing out on life. When I stopped diving, I started living.

I'm not good at picking people up, I'd rather just get to know someone. I'm not an 'opening line' kind of guy; it's not really my scene. But at school, I was good at talking to girls. I wasn't good at making moves, though.

You know, if you meet someone for the first time, they're not going to bite you.

I was a shy kid up until the sixth grade, and then I started to let loose.

Growing up, sports was my outlet, my way to portray a personality. I was very shy around people but, through sports, something I was good at, I was able to make friends.

I'm very shy in real life; I can't really hit on girls.

There are two things that are more difficult than making an after-dinner speech: climbing a wall which is leaning toward you and kissing a girl who is leaning away from you.