Should I continue with this dancing class or should I walk away?

Having just came back from Singapore and though it was for a sad occasion, I did had a wonderful time with my family and friends, I was feeling good about people and life. Not till I attended my dancing class and I am brought back to reality, why is it that after 5 years of attending this class, I still feel like an outsider.

I know I have to take responsibility of my own feelings. Nobody can make me feel this way, right?

Before coming to UK, I never thought I would have a problem meeting new people and getting to know them better. I was in customer service and sales all of my working life and I have always enjoyed meeting new friends.

I take the responsibility that I speak rather quickly and with an accent that is sometimes difficult to understand. Another misconception I had was I thought I speak rather good English. I was wrong. When you are brought up with a mixture of English and a few local languages, there is a tendency to 'bastardise' the English language. I am often asked what is my mother tongue. Very quickly without hesitation, I would always say English. That's because I think in English, dream in English. it was my first language in school hence automatically, I thought my mother tongue was English. Now I realised that my mother tongue should be Hokkien, the dialect of my parents or maybe even Mandarin.

This is just a short background of where I came from. I did what I thought is right initially in an attempt to make new friends by being friendly and helpful. I am also mindful of the fact that the people here are very polite. I realised some would not ask you about yourself unless they know you well as it would be impolite. There are others who would not ask me to repeat when they don't understand what I said as it will be view as impolite too. Sometimes it could also be the fear of politically incorrectness.

I felt totally demoralised after attending class this week after an absence of a month. It's probably not a fair judgement. I had based my feelings of dejection from a small group of people. I have not really help myself by reaching out to more people. In the last few years, I have also taken the easy route of hanging out in front of my laptop, doing internet marketing and meeting people online. It probably doesn't help me to improve my socialising skills and that's bad for me as I do enjoy meeting people.

What should I do? As the year draw to a close, I am deciding whether I should continue with this class. ( I psyched myself that I need the exercise and I love dancing and I don't have to care about the people there ) or should I walk away. There are many nice people I have not met here. I shouldn't allow myself to be demoralised.

However, being stubborn, I don't think I am ready to give up. I am going to set myself a challenge. I shall continue with the dancing class. As there is a saying; ' we have to change ourselves first' I will make positive changes in myself.

Firstly, I will speak slower and pronounced my words clearly and more accurately. I will try my best not to try too hard to please people lest my action get misunderstood. I will still be nice, respectful and think well of people. I will speak positively and be a more attentive listener. I will open up to a wider circle of people.

I will challenge myself for one year. If in the end, I still have not managed to get accepted in this group, I know I have not lost anything.