Australia : HypnosisOnline

New download preview

New download preview

New download preview

New download preview

New download preview

New download preview

New download preview

New download preview

How I overcame my own shyness, by Mark Tyrrell

“Shyness has a strange element of narcissism, a belief that how we look, how we perform, is truly important to other people”.
Andre Dubus

“Caption here” courtesy of Nickolai Kashirin

I used to be shy. I’d fear being the focus of attention in groups and get tripped up by the huge knot in my tongue when speaking to strangers. I’d fear “running out of stuff to say” and generally making a fool of myself.

When you’re shy it’s like you suspect others know something you don’t; like they’re members of some secret self confidence society, with an elite knowledge of how to live that excludes you. When you’re shy you feel different – and that sense of separation bothers you.

But when shyness drops away you understand how illusory that feeling had been, despite how painfully real it felt at the time.

Shyness, for me, was a phase

In writing the 10 Steps to Overcome Social Anxiety Course I’ve been reflecting on my own former shyness.

When meeting strangers or faced with a group, I would constantly monitor what I was doing, saying and feeling. I’d find it difficult to think and even speak. If anything I did say came out awkwardly, as often happened, I would kick myself for being “stupid”.

This was a phase. Life (and self hypnosis) wore away my shyness to the point that it’s now a mere shadow of its former self, a faint reminder that helps me stay sensitive to how it feels for others, but no longer spoils anything for me. So how did this happen?

How shyness evaporates

I stopped caring so much what others might – or might not – think about me. I started to focus outwards. I discovered self hypnosis. I used it to lessen anxiety. I used it to mentally rehearse how I’d feel and act in forthcoming social occasions. I was surprised how quickly I found myself feeling strong, calm, relaxed and absorbed in the experience as a whole rather than just my own private thoughts and feelings. It felt great. And it still does!

What happens to you as you travel the road out of shyness is that the whole way you process your social reality changes.

A shy person holds certain assumptions about themselves and the world and responds in certain conditioned emotional ways to social events. The mindset of the shy person has a number of characteristic features.

So what is it like inside the mind of a shy person?

Shyness is (really) painful

Shyness hurts in itself but is also paradoxically “used” as a way of trying to avoid hurt – the hurt of rejection. Social rejection, and even the fear of possible rejection, are processed in the same parts of the brain that process physical pain (1). So it’s not so surprising that shy people might devote themselves to steering clear of the social situations that might put them at risk of experiencing this rejection. The fear of this potential “pain” can be severe enough to amount to a full blown social phobia, leading to life-damaging loss of opportunities for love, friendship, work and connection.

Shyness relies on faulty thinking

Shyness consists of a set of maladaptive emotional responses, thoughts and behaviors that feed off each other to create a vicious circle. This is why shyness can feel so like a trap, a deep dark dungeon, for those who suffer it. A common misconception that often underpins shyness is the belief that feeling shy is part of “who I am”. Shy people often think they were “born shy”, that it’s an innate characteristic, like their eye color, that they are powerless to change. So they may not even try to overcome it, and lose hope.

However, there are millions of people who used to be shy but no longer are. And there are those who are incredibly shy, right now as you read this, who won’t be in the future.

The tyranny of social comparisons

Shy people tend to make unrealistic social comparisons. In a group, their attention tends to get drawn to the most socially skilled person, the one who is the “life and soul of the party”. And then they compare themselves, unfavorably of course, with that paragon.

This is like going to the gym and demotivating yourself by comparing yourself to the bodybuilding athlete rather than the regular gym-goers. The 10 step course encourages you to let go of such self defeating strategies (or at least do it much less). When shyness goes, these unhelpful self comparisons go with it.

Perfectly shy

Another common feature of the shy person’s inner world is perfectionism. Shy people often dread “saying the wrong thing” or coming across as “weird”. But this fear is based on a hidden assumption that everything they say, and the way they say it, has to be perfect, clever, witty and astoundingly fascinating – like a well-written and expertly acted sitcom.

Of course, real life communication is seldom like this, being full of “ums” and “ahs”, pauses, stutters and unfinished garbled sentences. If you carefully analyze what even supposedly “funny” people say, much of it isn’t all that funny – just enough of it to give them their reputation.

Overcoming shyness is partly about no longer seeing social situations as requiring some perfect “performance”. When you are no longer shy, you stop feeling that everybody is watching or judging you.

Shy people feel uniquely vulnerable

Shy people often feel that others can look into them and “see what they are really like”. Not surprisingly, this entirely erroneous belief makes them feel terribly exposed and unprotected, and leads them to shrink into themselves even more, as if this will somehow enable them to “hide”.

When shyness drops away, you realize how terribly unobservant other people really are. Far from being able to “look into you”, most people can’t even tell that you are feeling a bit nervous.

But the evidence is that even all these negative sounding difficulties don’t necessarily spell doom for the shy.

Shy people get there in the end

Social ease is not something “instant”. It takes time to develop, and all of us go through a gradual process of developing the skills associated with interacting easily with others. And we go through it at different rates.

You can think of shyness as just being somewhat slower to “warm up” socially. Nonetheless, research shows that shy people do make friends, go on dates and get married (2). It simply takes them somewhat longer on average to do these things than the less shy. The shy have a “delayed schedule” but usually get there in the end. So the really shy man, for instance, might start dating a decade later than his more socially skilled peers, but still eventually find a partner.

Shyness is not a disease

Commercial interests have made the drugs industry over keen to label shyness and social anxiety as a “disease” caused by faulty brain chemicals that needs medical treatment (that only they can supply). This approach has also reinforced the damaging myth that shyness is an unchangeable condition that can only be managed through (life-long?) medication.

But shyness is a completely normal part of human development. Social ease is acquired through gradual processes, and everyone can learn to be more skillful in social situations.

What’s more, shy people actually have a hidden advantage.

Using shyness to your advantage

Shy people often have greater natural levels of sensitivity and nervousness than the non-shy. They might experience this as a problem while they are still at the stage of focusing exclusively on themselves, but in fact having a deeper sensitivity is a social advantage.

When you turn this sensitivity outwards, towards others, you can connect with them in an emotionally intelligent way that enhances social interaction. Formerly shy people are among the best listeners, and people like nothing better than to feel that they are really being listened to, and understood.

Why you need to do more than just turn up

Shy people need to connect with others as much as anyone else, and often make valiant attempts to overcome their shyness on their own. The most popular method is to “force yourself” to show up at social occasions. I’m all for this, but I’ve found it takes a little more than just “being there”.

Shy people tend to be rather socially passive. They expect other people to do the approaching. They wait for others to speak, or are too fearful of “not having anything to say” to start conversations themselves. But when you overcome shyness you start to instigate more, and be less reliant on the hope that others will be nice to you. You begin to recognize that you do have some influence over what happens, and that it is not unreasonable to look for a warm response.

It’s not me, it’s you

Of course you don’t always get a warm response.

When this happens, shy people tend to blame themselves and feel emotionally crushed, but of course rebuffs happen even to the most relaxed and popular people. What distinguishes the socially confident from the shy is how they respond to such rejection.

Socially confident people don’t attribute rejection or dislike to internal factors, such as their own un-likability or inability to make friends. They assume it might be due to many different factors – incompatibility, someone else’s bad mood, misunderstandings. They contextualize it in a way that doesn’t damage their self esteem, and then they move on.

Not being shy doesn’t mean all social events go completely smoothly, it means you can deal confidently with whatever happens. And it is certainly possible to increase that confidence steadily.

Managing emotions

Social situations can be incredibly complex and dynamic. They flow, they halt, they change all the time. Sometimes there are waves of laughter and undercurrents of meaning. No one can keep up with what’s going on, interpret feedback, remember what’s been said, and engage fully with others unless they have some control over their own emotions. Getting this control, so that you are no longer simply at the mercy of your emotions, is an important part of leaving shyness behind. And hypnosis is an invaluable tool in this process, as it enables you to feel differently, freeing you up to act – and interact – so much more easily.

True connection

I still feel amazed at times about the difference no longer feeling shy made to my life. It’s wonderful to know that I can just relax and enjoy the flow of company and the fun of meeting new people without feeling anxious or threatened.

But it’s not just about me. In a world where rates of shyness and social anxiety are reported to be increasing (4), we all need to understand each other better and connect more deeply with each other.

Overcoming shyness doesn’t help just you. It helps everyone else in your life too.

Notes

1. Researchers from the University of Michigan discovered that the same regions of the brain that become active in response to painful sensory experiences are activated during intense experiences of social rejection. As published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences The study was conducted by Kross, an assistant professor at the U-M Department of Psychology with Marc Berman, Columbia University’s Walter Mischel and Edward Smith, (affiliated with the New York State Psychiatric Institute) as well as Tor Wager from the University of Colorado in Boulder.
2. As described in ‘Shyness: The New Solution’ by Bernardo Carducci, Psychology Today, January 01, 2000 – last reviewed on May 31, 2011.
3. See ‘How depression causes negative spin‘.

According to the research of psychologist Bernardo Carducci.

“I don’t mean to be rude… but you don’t understand! Not if you’ve never yourself felt the crippling fear or the paralysing self consciousness of real social anxiety, never felt that your every move was being scrutinised and judged by other people…”

“Loneliness is not just miserable…” courtesy of Italian voice

Actually I did understand what Sean was saying, up to a point. For who hasn’t had times, however fleeting, of intense self consciousness? What I could only understand by proxy, however, was just how much social anxiety can spoil your life in an ongoing way. Sean told a miserable tale of missed work opportunities, lonely nights at home when he could have been at a party, potential relationships dead before they had a chance to be born.

Sean had an appealing personality and a winning way with words. It seemed especially harsh that these attractive attributes were coupled with acute shyness. He was very articulate, especially when it came to describing how his life had been plagued by shyness and self consciousness. He spoke with the bitterness of a man describing the effects of a curse or an evil spell of how social anxiety had blighted his existence for “long enough”.

Sean was one of many socially phobic clients I’ve worked with over the years. His description of the feeling was, however, particularly memorable: “I feel like a crawling insect under the microscope, being examined by everyone in the room.” He was one of millions of people who, every day, struggle with simply being around other people. A profound fear of interaction is common, even ordinary, but it’s commonness and ordinariness doesn’t help those who suffer from it. So why is social anxiety such a burden?

The choking effects of isolation

Just as fish need water and the meadows need rain and sunlight; we all need other people. Isolation can literally be deadly, (1) especially if it is prolonged and “forced upon us” through our own fear to connect.

It’s natural to avoid what scares us. A man terrified of flying tends to avoid travelling by plane; a woman terrified by elevators will take the stairs. But what if social situations scare you? People who suffer severe social anxiety tend to isolate themselves and avoid situations in which they might have to socialize. That feels more comfortable in the short term but the tragedy is that social connection is literally a lifeline – and we all know what happens when lifelines get blocked.

Avoidance makes it worse

If you feel scared in social situations, or even just a bit uncomfortable, then you might start to avoid socialising, and eventually end up being isolated. And if you feel isolated you might get used to feeling isolated, just as people get used to smoking every day. And what we get used to starts to feel normal – but the damage is still being done.

We often attribute the mental and physical decline associated with loneliness to age – old age. But a recent review of 148 previous studies of over 300,000 people found that the health risks associated with social isolation affect all age groups. This meta-analysis also found that feeling disconnected carries a health risk equivalent to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. Amazingly, the researchers also found that social isolation is as unhealthy as being an alcoholic, and twice as deadly as dangerous obesity! (2) But why is loneliness so damaging?

Togetherness is natural

Don’t get me wrong – some privacy and time on your own is important and I, for one, enjoy my own company sometimes. Different people also have naturally different levels of need for social connection. But the central point here is choice. For those who feel forced into isolation through anxiety, the price of such seclusion can be devastating in all kinds of ways.

It seems that social connection is so hard wired into the psyche of all of us that disconnection carries grave health penalties. And this makes sense. We are herd creatures, who historically relied on the safety of numbers to survive harsh conditions and who achieve great things through collaboration. Nature “rewards” us with greater happiness and health when we connect healthily with people around us.

No wonder that shyness can feel so devastating and people become so desperate to overcome fear of socializing.

Social anxiety as a life parasite

I’ve worked long and hard on the 10 Steps to Overcome Social anxiety course, which is based both on scientific research into the nature of social anxiety and on my own career in helping people overcome shyness and social fear over the years.

One thing that runs through it all is how parasitical social anxiety is. How it squashes budding friendships and other life opportunities, causing relationships to founder before they can truly begin, hogging its host to itself. And like many parasites, it can be the “death” of its host.

We all need people, but when fear of socializing blocks this need, the results can be devastating.

Together Sean and I worked to help him finally relax around people and let himself shine. It doesn’t sound like a lot, does it? Nothing dramatic about that. But for him it was life transforming. As he said when we reached the end of our sessions together:

“I can focus on what I really want from life at last, on what I can give to other people, rather than just on what I don’t want and what others might take from me! I feel free!”

I’m proud of the social anxiety course because it contains all the elements that helped Sean and many others to overcome social anxiety and truly start living. And I hope it helps many more find the connection they need in life too.

Notes

1. See: House JS, Landis KR, Umberson D. ‘Social relationships and health.’ Science 1988; 241: 540-5.
2. See: ‘Social Isolation Kills, But How and Why?’ James S. House, PhD, Psychosomatic Medicine March 1, 2001 vol. 63 no. 2 273-274.