Sometimes Changing Yourself Can Increase Your Social Success
I don't think you have to totally sell out to succeed socially, but changing yourself in little ways here and there can be the right call.
Changing real social skills problems is obviously good
If you have true flaws in your personality or the way your interact with people then addressing them is obviously a good thing. You're not selling yourself out or being a follower to admit you could use some improvement and then working to achieve it. On the flip side, changing to add beneficial traits is obviously good as well.
Changing can just be socially practical
If certain social rewards motivate you then sometimes you have to make the call as to whether achieving them is worth going against your current nature somewhat. Changing in some ways may be the right thing to do if it makes your life happier and more fun.
You may have a niche you could comfortably fit into, but it may not give you access to everything you want socially. Your friends may be fun, but not the only types of people you ever want to hang around. They may not be up for every activity you want to do. You may not see yourself meeting the kinds of romantic partners you're attracted to through them.
There are also certain activities and types of conversation that tend to come up a lot in social situations. Like myself, you may decide that not being able to take part in them causes you to miss out on more opportunities than you'd like.
It's important to have a flexible self-image
I think it's kind of weird when people turn down the opportunity to do something new and then use, "That's just not who I am" as an explanation. Well, that's 'you' right now. But what if you tried something new and found you liked it? Then 'who you are' changes. If you have an overly rigid concept of who you are, you'll turn away plenty of chances to potentially grow into someone you like even better. Keep an open mind about new things.
You have to fit in and conform at least somewhat to do well socially
The ideal is that no matter what you're like, everyone will accept you for who you are. But in reality people have certain standards and preferences about how they want other people to act. The rules are relative and subjective, but you gotta base human interactions on something. I'm sure you can think of some extreme examples: You can't walk around naked, you can't randomly throw food at people, you can't drop your pants and go to the bathroom in public.
Similarly, if you have a personality that makes you irritating and off-putting to the average person, you really can't complain about it too much if they reject you. That's their right. Maybe you have real problems and you need to correct them before more people are willing to be around you. The world doesn't owe it to you for you to be accepted unconditionally.
Sometimes it's the right call to conform to society's values. If you conform to its views regarding not randomly taking a swing at people you'll do better than if you ignored those guidelines. In a similar vein, I think people are better off conforming to the popular guidelines on grooming and social skills. You're going to do better in life if you get yours up to par.
Sometimes not wanting to change is rooted more in bitterness than anything
Some people get defensive about the idea of ever having to change because all their lives they've taken crap from people for being different. So now the suggestion that changing/adapting/augmenting may be helpful to them hits a nerve because they see it as equivalent to selling out to the jerks who rejected them their whole lives. There's no way they're going to join the enemy. Bitter associations can also taint things that really aren't that bad, like certain activities, or the idea of getting along with certain types of people.
Some differences are better than others
I said in the companion article to this one that sometimes breaking away from the mass consensus can be a good thing. Western society values and romanticizes non-conformity to a degree. People who act like everyone else are 'mindless sheep'. People who go their own way are trailblazing true individuals. But some ways of being different are better than others. If you're very creative, if you have an interesting, unique style, if you have bold, challenging opinions, if you reject unjust laws, those are all good things. If you act in a way that just comes off as weird or bothersome to people, you won't get rewarded for your different specialness. Also, sometimes people use 'not conforming' as a rationalization for not changing real problems they have.
The 'you're fine the way you are' myth
I hinted at this already but address it more in the Some Ways People Can Excuse Their Legitimate Social Weaknesses article. The gist of my thinking is that sometimes people do have real problems that need to be fixed. It's not selling out to work on them.
My views on what to change in yourself
For every aspect of yourself, keep the good parts, toss the bad parts. Any trait has a mix of strengths and weaknesses. For example, being 'weird' may give you a unique sense of humor and a high level of creativity, but may also make you a little too random, disconcerting, and inappropriate at times. You can work on getting rid of those bad aspects of being weird, but retain the good ones.
