Are you afraid of public speaking, and telling speeches?
Maybe it goes further than that, and you’re scared to hang out at parties with people you don’t know.
Maybe it’s even worse than that, and you struggle to make friends, and you fear even speaking to your friends that you do make.
WARNING: This Post Does Get Very Real. Please do not take anything personally, as I am telling an untold truth, that you may not have heard before, and might challenge what you already know! Read On If You Are Okay With That.
This is the fear of being social. Often times it stems from childhood memories of being bullied, and not fitting in. Most of the time, it’s not your fault that you feel all this social anxiety and feel like you can’t do much about it. Ranging from your parents, to your classmates, to your “friends”, all have an outside impact on how well you receive social situations.
If you go to a party, and your heart starts to beat really fast, your palms get sweaty, you don’t talk much to anyone, and you sit in the corner, or hang out with one person and follow them around, then you are a victim of social anxiety.
Perhaps you already know you have social anxiety before reading this, and to be honest, that could be a reason why you have it.
Psychologists and counselors have been diagnosing people with having anxiety for years. The dictionary definition of anxiety is
noun a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome.
Worry, nervousness, and unease sound a lot like general fear to me. Not the type of fear that we should feel that comes from evolution to save us from predators and other harming natural disasters, but rather a feeling of fear that is made up in our head. Often times we are afraid of things that haven’t even happened yet, and they are just visualizations in our head. That’s what causes worry, nervousness, and unease.
Let’s dissect that further, if you are nervous or worried about a social event, think about why? Why are you nervous and worried? What is going to happen? Most likely the answer is the worst possible thing that could come from the event such as, “everyone will hate the way I act, and the things I say” or “No one will want to be my friend.” or “Everyone will judge the way I look, and hate me without even talking to me.” All these things most likely stem from childhood bullying, and trauma from social events in your past. But they still didn’t happen this time yet.
In other words, a fear of social events stems from your past, and destroys your thoughts in the present, because you are afraid of the future.
Let’s go back to what I said about why you have it. Now we know that social anxiety is a complete false, made up thing in your head that doesn’t actually exist. You are only afraid of what could happen, and not what is happening.
So a doctor comes along and says, “Yes, you have social anxiety.” HE GAVE IT A NAME!?
Every child knows, that you don’t name a pet that you don’t wish to keep.
Okay so now your fictional fear that’s stopping you from actively speaking up and hanging out with your friends has a name. The doctor named it social anxiety. So that’s what it is. Now every time you go out and hang around people your brain says, you know what, I have social anxiety so that’s why I’m not talking a lot. Your doctor has effectively turned false information that lives only in your head, into something that has a name and can control your every being. He took something fake and made it something very real. Now you have to feed it, and take care of it, as if it were that pet that you didn’t want to keep in the first place.
Your doctor just made it that much harder for you to get rid of it, because now your brain can cope with what it has, and you can start to feel okay with having such a disorder, and have more excuses for not getting better.
So how do we get better from social anxiety? Here’s what I propose:
First of all, don’t even name it. Don’t give your fear a name, and tell yourself you have a disorder because like I said, you’ll learn to cope with it, and it’ll make getting better much harder in the long run. I’ve seen this over and over again.
Second, practice. Social skills are just like any other skills and can be learned just by practicing, reading, trying, and testing. I was certainly never the best at social skills, and recently I decided to change. I started reading a lot about it, trying things, testing things, and hanging out around more people to try to fix it. Now, I’m much better than I’ve ever been, and hope to get better.
Third, put down your phone, get off social media. Social media is the culprit destroying social skills. Since it’s so easy to connect with people online, we’ve lost connection with face to face interaction. I know this first hand because I was much better at writing what I think, and commenting on posts, than I was at talking face to face. That’s why I’m working to fix it.
Fourth, practice. I know I already said that, but it’s that important. Get out there, talk to people, and meet people. To read about it, you can always come here to loveandprosper.com and read the latest article about social skills. I would love to teach you.
Join me on a journey to become more social! I would love to teach you everything I know and am learning! Connect with me on facebook, and subscribe to this blog to get much better at speaking with people face to face! I’ll teach you everything I know. Comment Below!
Love Always,
Ryan Kearns