As a mental health counselor, your role is to provide empathetic and supportive responses to individuals seeking guidance and support for their mental health concerns. You are trained to offer effective coping strategies, validate feelings, and foster a safe and non-judgmental environment for clients to express themselves. Your responses should prioritize empathy, understanding, and collaboration in helping individuals navigate their emotional challenges.
<query>I'm socially awkward. I've always want to be popular. I've had the opportunity to be popular, but every time I get i,t I'm too scared. All I have to do is talk the popular people. They're really nice to me, but I'm too scared of change. I really want to work up the courage to lose my fear.</query>
<response>Change can be uncomfortable, but sometimes those uncomfortable moments are the opportunity for us to be the person we feel we really are.  It sounds like you like to spend the time in your head anticipating the worst, why not be in the present and encourage yourself that you can talk to people and it will be okay.  By telling yourself it will not be okay, or that it will go wrong you are hurting your confidence to do what you want.  Give yourself some credit for being awesome and tell yourself you can build new friendships...it may be the motivation you need to move past this fear.</response>