Alright, first I am gonna say, I know there is loads of threads like this, but this one is about me, so I am going to post it.
I have this problem. So I love yoyoing, and Id say I am pretty good at it. But I am just plain afraid of yoyoing in public. Like I know I just shouldnt care but I am just terrified of what people think. Because at school, half the people that have seen me do it are like “omg dude thats sick” and the others are like “wth hes a loser that spends his life yoyoing and doesnt have anything cool to do.” It really upsets me. So Now I nearly never yoyo around people I know, or people in public because I dont know what they think when some kid pulls out a yoyo, I know most adults really appreciate it and find it entertaining, but teens are so cruel these days (although I am one…) but if you guys could give me some supportive input that would hopefully boost my confidence a bit.
Here is the secret, there are always haters. Haters gonna hate. If you don’t want to be hated on, don’t throw at school. I’ve had problems with being picked on because of my skills too, it happens.
I do find throwing outside of school in public to be a blast. Most people like it. Kids in school just do it because “They are ‘cool’.”
Just go out and do it. The worst thing someone can say is that your a loser, and if the say that whatever they aren’t worth your time. Walk away and yoyo somewhere else. What they think doesn’t matter.
I’d say don’t care what they think. Do your thing and don’t care what anybody thinks of you (as long as your not being disruptive ex: doing tricks in really crowded areas)
I’m actually the same way though, I get nervous when yoyoing around people. In fact it wasn’t too recently that I decided to yoyo in a store for my first time. No one said anything to me, they just stared. After a while I noticed that I wasn’t paying attention to them and more of paying attention to me yoyoing and having fun.
So go out there and have fun! Throw your heart out and the people who discourage you are jealous, trying to impress friends, or just negative.
Peer pressure is real. Just to say go yo and and do it probably isn’t going to work for you. Some people feel peer pressure more than others. That’s just the way it is! If you really want to yoyo in public and you fear people making negative comments, I might suggest smaller steps:
Yoyo for family. They will tell you what they think, and what they like. It’s all good, it’s family.
Let some of your friends know what you do and invite them to try it.
If you can get a small group yoyoing in public it’s easier than just doing it all by yourself.
Don’t feel badly about not feeling comfortable to yo somewhere. Yoyoing isn’t about putting a burden on your life, it’s about fun! Keep it that way.
The more you get into yoyoing and the more you share it with the people that are important to you, the more you will seek opportunities to play. This is probably when you will begin to worry about if and when you will get to throw and worry less about who’s watching.
You’re yoyoing and enjoying it that’s what matters.
You shouldn’t care what people think of you. I mean yeah if you mess up, it’s kinda embarrassing when you hear the “DING” in front of tons of people. I love to yoyo in public because I feel it’s like practice for a competition. I am used to speaking in public, and yoyoing is pretty much the same thing. Just do you. People will appreciate you for being you.
Just do your thing and the people who say you are a loser are the people that don’t think much of life I’m in the same spot as you are and just do it and if people say you’re a loser they’re the ones without color.so go out there and just have fun. Like kei said don’t disturb someone like in the middle of class cause of the bearing sound might be to loud
~natutilus the deep sea thrower
Exactly right. I’m 26 and started yoyoing again and I do it at work on breaks. I work in a factory so I get a lot of weird looks. But the reason I do it is because it makes me happy. Also because I used to smoke on my breaks and had to find something else to do when I quit. Moral of the story is do what makes you happy and don’t care what people think. Also quit smoking and yoyo lol.
Whenever you want to yoyo try telling yourself that “I don’t care what other people think.”
you could even say it out loud if you want.
I find that most people like it. If they stare do not take it as an offence. If I saw a guy doing tricks on a unicycle I would stare too.
I had one rude teenager say to me “It’s called MW3 (call of duty)” he said something along the lines of that. I didn’t really care and neither did the small crowd watching me.
You need to understand that if someone makes a rude comment about you yoyoing they are just mad that you are taking attention away from them or that they didn’t do anything better with their life like you did.
It helps if you doo some non yoyoer tricks like: revolutions, horizontal, around the neck, Asian pops, picture tricks, and fast type tricks
If people make fun of you just do what I do say “thank you” and it will confuse them because usually the people making fun of you won’t be that intelligent and if they keep making fun of just keep saying “thank you.” People usually stop bothering you if they think it doesn’t bother you. That just my 2¢
If you are in any clubs or groups like band, try yoyoing in front of them at first. When you have some downtime you can pull out your yoyo an do a couple tricks. I feel similar to you everytime I start yoyoing in public. What I normally do is just go into a corner or a not prominently displayed area and start doing tricks. People will still kinda see it but not as much and then you can see what feedback you get.
I understand well your feeling of self-consciousness. This month I carried a couple of throws with me to our state fair. Occasionally I’d stop in an open space, pull one of my throws and practiced. There were a lot of flubs and failures, I didn’t put on much of a show. Yes, there were a few raised eyebrows here and there, but for the most part I got pleasant smiles which spoke of the fun they were remembering when they too had owned a yo-yo. Sometimes mothers would stop and point me out to their kids. You could tell they too were telling them; “doesn’t that look like fun?”
Just go for it. As your skills develop you will gain the respect from others. A few years ago a little girl in my town realized she really enjoyed her gymnastics classes. Overtime she received some criticism from classmates for being at the gym so much and not free for hanging around at the mall with them. Then she qualified for the U.S. Olympic team and brought home four medals. That was four years ago and Shawn Johnson is still her community’s favorite daughter and a national hero.
Let me close with this, you create your own peer pressure by choosing whose opinions will matter to you most in life. If you feel a peer pressure which discourages you from doing the things you enjoy perhaps it’s time to seek out a better caliber of people in your closest social circles.
As a high school teacher I’ve seen kids giving each other grief for almost everything under the sun. Being too tall, too short, too fat, too skinny, playing video games, playing sport, etc. Kids just like pointing out things that are different about others as if different is bad. As far as I’m concerned, different is good. Anybody who tries too hard to be ‘normal’ isn’t normal.
I think Dr Seuss sums it up best: Those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind.
Keep on throwing and if people get down on you for it, just smile and ignore them.
I don’t normally throw in public either. But the way you should look at this: rude or not, they took a minute out of their life and judged you. at least they know you exist. I also play MW3, so it’s not like people who play with yoyos are much more coherent than anyone else, except for the rude and @hole part.
If you’re ever doing something strictly because it’s cool, or not doing something because it’s uncool, you’re doing it wrong.
You will come to this conclusion on your own as you grow older. You’ll be glad you developed your own skills in an area that you love, despite the people who had nothing better to do than put you down. They’re the ones who will grow up to realize that “being cool” has left them with no skills or interests of their own.
I didn’t read all the responses but I’m guessing everyone replied with an idealistic “you shouldn’t care what other people think of you”. The reality is that most people do care what others think, especially in middle school or high school or whatever. Yoyoing might be fun but if you are interested in girls or being popular then doing it around classmates is probably not the best idea except in extreme circumstances.
I’m in my mid 20s, I do very well for myself (which allows me to buy more yoyos than any human could ever need) and have a lot of friends from a lot of different walks in life. My last girlfriend thought it was cool/cute that I yoyod and she liked that I had a hobby (collecting/playing). The gf before that thought it was dumb but she liked that it made me happy. My closest friends know that I yoyo/collect but most people don’t. The good news for me is that I’m basically at the top of the food chain at what I do so when some random hater finds out that I yoyo they remember that they would sell their soul to be me so they’re in no position to criticize or belittle one of my hobbies. When you’re younger pretty much everyone starts on a theoretically level playing field socially so it’s a lot easier for people to take cheap shots at things you do just because it’s different and they need to put you down to feel better about themselves.
Personally, I played with yoyos at school when I was young, but I had the benefit of being in middle school in 1998-2000 aka yoyo boom so I’m sure it was a lot more “cool” then, despite probably not being cool. I cared what others thought about a lot of things in my life but for whatever reason I didn’t care what they thought of me yoyoing.
So in conclusion, you probably aren’t doing yourself any favors socially by yoyoing at school. The reality is that anyone that takes shots at you because of it is a chump but it will still happen and it will still make you feel bad. And hot girls will not think it is cute or cool ever in high school because they are sheep. However if you do it long enough (or find other people to yoyo with you in public) you will get a lot more comfortable doing it and the haters will get bored of hating since their intended goal is to make you feel bad and cause you to stop doing the thing they don’t understand, if it doesn’t work they’ll find someone else to bother eventually. So yeah, basically I understand how you feel, and I don’t think that avoiding it in public school type situations is a bad idea, but I do think that after enough time you will eventually be comfortable with it if that’s what your goal is.
Im in highschool too and can relate to this somewhat. I play around school alot, and I admit I get both bad and good looks but I’ll be honest im scared of what people think also. Usually I get past by this by thinking to myself “its just practicing and I’m not doing it for looks”. If your truly terrify, just play around your friends who knows you play so it doesn’t catch any attention.
If you’re playing with yoyos, this probably isn’t the first and won’t be the last thing you’re into that non participants just don’t get. I’m 35 and my peers give me a hard time about throwing. They’re the exact same dull, hateful people who are raising the dull, hateful kids who are busting your chops. Let them have their American Idol and Survivor and MW4 and their dull, hateful lives. You make art. You stand out because of it. For the rest of your life there will be people who try to nail you flush with them. Don’t you dare let them do it.
I realize I’ve already weighed in here, but I want to try and approach this from another angle.
Watch the following and ask yourself this question;
“Do I want to practice and learn to play like Pat or do I prefer to put the yo-yo in my pocket in deference to the judgement of haters and languish in mediocrity?”
