Blogging Against Social Anxiety

One of the most challenging parts of overcoming social anxiety is learning to become a more friendly and sociable person. If you’re anything like me, you’ve spent much of your life avoiding all sorts of social situations, dreading small talk, and avoiding eye contact. These harmful habits become so ingrained in your brain that you do them without even thinking about it. Have you ever been asked why you’re looking so serious? It happens to me regularly, and the crazy thing is that most of the times it happens I’m not even in a particularly bad mood. The way I feel inside and the way I am being perceived by the people around me are totally different. It’s only recently that I’ve become very conscious of what a damaging impact this has. Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve made more progress fighting social anxiety over the past 6 months than in the 20 years before that. On top of that, I feel like my progress is coming at a faster and faster rate. So what happened? For years I read all the books, I tried therapy, I forced myself into social engagements, but every time I thought I made a step forward, I would soon be faced with a setback that made me question if it was ever going to be possible. One step forward, two steps backward is how it felt. You’ve probably heard this before, but forcing yourself into high-anxiety situations and just hoping you’ll get used to it rarely works. Exposure only works if it is gradual, and in parallel with that, you start slowly but steadily eliminating the automatic negative thought patterns that have ruled your mind for so long. Here’s a little advice based on my recent experiences. Read the rest of this entry »

I know this sounds like a very depressing and ominous post, but stay with me for a moment. I was reading something recently about the importance of coming to terms with the idea of death, and the idea that when you eventually get to the end of your life you don’t want to be left with a mountain of regrets about what you could have, should have, and might have done during your lifetime. Think about this a little. If you’re anything like me, you might have already spend two decades or more battling with social anxiety. Think of all the opportunities you probably missed out on over that time because your inhibitions were holding you back from taking any type of risk in social situations. Read the rest of this entry »

Anthropologists and psychologists have known for some time that negative beliefs can have a huge impact on your health, and in some extreme cases, even kill you. In the audio series “Overcoming Social Anxiety: Step by Step”, Dr Richards gives the example of the voodoo curse, whereby believers in some island religions have been known to quite literally scare themselves to death after a curse is placed upon them by the village shaman. This kind of self-fulfilling death prophesy has been observed in many different societies. So what happens? “Interestingly enough, when an autopsy is performed on the person who was cursed, there is no logical reason for the death … The adrenaline and cortisol levels have gone beserk and flooded the body to such an extent that they cause physical damage, usually creating a massive heart attack”. Read the rest of this entry »

Yesterday I was chatting to a good friend of mine who recently went skydiving for the first time. Now, for those of us that have enough trouble introducing ourselves at a cocktail party, the thought of wilfully jumping out of an airplane just for the thrill of it is absolutely terrifying. In fact, is is hard to imagine a more unnatural act for a human being than jumping out of a moving vehicle suspended several thousand feet in the air. Well, maybe you can imagine, but let’s not go there… So I ask my friend, “What were you feeling leading up to it?” Read the rest of this entry »