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I was reading a Japanese sentence of which part read
生真面目な性格で、何によらず人の注目を引くことが苦手だった。
but could not work out the meaning of 何によらず. I thought that perhaps the よらず is the negative of よる but that still didn't make sense to me.
Just wondering if anyone has come across this before and know what it means. Any help much appreciated.
The meanings of the other words in that sentence are
何によらず (literally "regardless of whatever") indicates that the following part applies for every respect. I think you can translate it using "in all respects", "in every way", "whatever it is", "whatsoever", "all sorts of", etc.
何事【なにごと】によらず means the same, and is more common, according to BCCWJ Corpus.
By the way, 生真面目 does not necessarily have the negative connotation, and it can just mean very serious or earnest.
によらず means regardless of
for example： すなわち，血によらず，肉によらず，人によらず，神によって生まれた人々である who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
