Worries are paralyzing me from enjoying life

Hi,

I'm a 25 years old university student male who's finishing his diploma in 6 months. I am writing this because recently I realised that for the past 10 years or so in my life, I have been a victim of constant worrying and anxieties. I tend to write long, but I'll try to keep this as precise as possible.

When I was young I was considered as a very energetic, outgoing and friendly child who easily made friends, and I remember this being true. However over the years certain incidents of rejections from others and pressures to keep my grades high have got to me, and without myself knowing I was constantly anxious. Partly as a result I also grew increasingly addicted to things like video games and pornography. By the time I was in my final year of high school, I had no friends and my grades have dropped into a series of c's and d's. This kind of life continued for years, and it was until recently that I started to think that I needed to do something about it. Beginning last year I enrolled in an IT diploma course and studied hard, and managed to get mostly A's. However during this time I had not stopped porn and video games, and even with my grades up I was anxious about keeping them up and could not relax. Because of this attitude along with my lack of confidence in front of others I still had made no friends.

Earlier this month, I felt that my addiction to video games and porno were part of the things that were fuelling my worries of being a failure both in making money and meeting a nice girl. I decided to kick these addictions too and so far managed about 3 weeks. This definitely had a good effect since I joined the gym and started working out, and my attitude has improved. But I wouldn't be writing this if things were all right.

Even with things going pretty well my habit of worrying has not died down. Perhaps not as strong as they were, I would say around 80%, but they are strong enough to keep me up at night and make me nervous and fidgety when I'm around others because of the strong belief I have deep within me that people would hate me and reject me. I have made some progress in making my life better by getting back on track with my study and kicking away my harmful addictions, but getting rid of this habit of worrying so much seems like the next big hurdle, and it's just so hard and frustrating. I wish I could get some advice and help or stories of how you've overcome this. I just want so bad to be able to enjoy life.