Social anxiety is a condition that can cripple people’s lives, making them unable to function in the situations where they most need to. Destroying their confidence and ruining their potential opportunities in business and even in relationships. Even if you don’t have full blown ‘social anxiety’ however, there’s a good chance that you experience to a degree, and for many people this kind of ‘extreme’ shyness is preventing them from achieving all they want to achieve in their careers and in their romantic life.

So how can you can you get over the nervousness that grows when you have to speak in front of an audience or to someone you don’t know or are trying to impress? You know you shouldn’t be nervous, and that being nervous will only make your performance worse, but still you can’t silence the voice in the back of your head, the little critic that lives in our head yet doesn’t pay any rent…

What you really need to learn is that it really doesn’t matter what the other people think of you. Or at least, that it matters just as much what you think of them. Why are you any less qualified to decide what is good conversation? Maybe you don’t like what they’re saying. Although it seems unkind, picking criticisms in other people can make you feel confident about yourself. Just don’t let anyone know that that’s what you’re doing. Trust me, everyone is to busy worrying about themselves to be overly critical of you (except now you yourself). No matter how dumb what you say is, no one is going to call you on it as that’s just rude. If they do you have a right to tell them to go stuff something where the sun doesn’t shine. Maybe they did at school, and your fear is just a hangover from that, but people have moved on since then. If they’re friends or partners then they know you already, if they’re not – why do you care what they think? Really? Take a cue from your rude, mildly racist old grandpa and speak your mind (just not the racist part).

I used to get anxiety, like most people do, when I was learning to drive. As such I would stall, which is ironic really when you think about it. But when I was at the front of a queue of traffic at the lights I’d be dreading the moment the light turned green in case I stalled. As such, inevitably I would stall. That is until my instructor (who was useless up until this point) made me sit there when it turned green and refuse to move, until it turned red again. This taught me a valuable lesson in life. People can scream and shout all they like, but they don’t know what’s going on in your vehicle, in your head or in your life. So it doesn’t matter – just let it wash over you. Since then I stopped stalling, and I stopped worrying if people like me or not.

Unbeknownst to him, my driving instructor was actually using cognitive behavioural therapy to calm me down. Specifically he was using one of its tenets – ‘hypothesis testing’ – which challenges the anxious to test their beliefs that acting in a certain way will have specific consequences. By doing this you realise that the outcome won’t actually be that bad – in my case that meant realising that no one was going to walk up to the window and tell me I couldn’t drive. It didn’t matter if I stalled – the worse case scenario might be someone honking their horn.

So how can you test your social hypotheses? Of course you could always just go on more outings with friends. The more parties and social gatherings you go to the more you’ll learn to feel confident in those settings. If you avoid them on the other hand your anxiety will grow and you really will begin to lose touch with being sociable and mingling.

To try something a bit more hardcore though you can experiment with your social phobias in places where no one knows you. For example, go into a shop and just for once – try being really moody with the guy behind the counter. How did that go? I doubt he called you on it right? Or try making your order in a weird accent. Or with an invented stutter. People just overlook them right? Even if you don’t have social phobia this can be quite a fun way to develop a personality disorder…

Another way you can combat social anxiety is to take part in events where throwing your anxiousness to the wind is part of the activity. For example, taking up drama, debating, singing or public speaking can be great ways to get you used to talking and performing in front of people and may really boost your confidence.

Of course your social phobia might stem from a lack of confidence in general, and for many this is the case. I’m lucky in that I’ve never struggled with either, but just recently I’ve found myself in a serious relationship and with a new job. Right now there is literally nothing I need from anyone else and I’m completely contented. For that reason it genuinely doesn’t matter at all what other people think of me. I’m in good shape, I’m in love, I have a good business… that’s all the verification I need.

So if you’re feeling nervous then try and find what the route of that is and improve yourself in other ways. Going to the gym and getting into shape can be a great start, as can improving your appearance. Learning to speak more clearly and slowly can also help and can demand more attention from your audience. Look at the whole package and when you’re happy with it you should be proud to show it off to other people.

Mack LeMouse

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