10 Ways to Deal with Social Anxiety

 Welcome to happiness isn’t brain surgery with Dr. Snipes. This podcast was created to provide you the information and tools Doc Snipes gives her clients so that you too can start living happier. Our website DocSnipes.com has even more resources videos and handouts and even interactive sessions with Doc Snipes to help you apply what you learn. Go to DocSnipes.com to learn more. Hey everybody and Welcome to happiness isn’t brain surgery with Doc Snipes: Practical tools to improve your mood and quality of life. Tonight we’re talking about 10 ways to deal with social anxiety a lot of people have social anxiety and that’s basically having unreasonable fears that you know are kind of excessive when it comes to being in any kind of social situation some people have only social anxiety when they’ve got to do things like perform or public speaking or something like that other people have social anxiety when they have to go to work when they have to be in crowds they don’t like going to the shopping center or the mall where there are a lot of people around so depending on your level of social anxiety, some of these things may be helpful to help you work through and deal with your social anxiety the first is to minimize stimulants stimulants Reb you up anxiety Rebs you up when you take stimulants if you drink too much coffee you may feel anxious so if you’re drinking stimulants before you go into an anxiety-provoking situation you may miss attributing your anxiety about the social situation when in actuality it was the caffeine or the nicotine the other thing that you want to do is pay attention when you’re at some of these events that you’re minimizing your stimulants the other thing and I’ll you know this is not stimulant alcohol is technically a depressant but when alcohol starts to wear off about it 30 minutes after you drink your drink it starts to wear off and there’s an anxiety rebound with alcohol so if you have high anxiety if you have social anxiety drinking to quell that anxiety is probably not your best bet because in the end it’s gonna kind of backfire and bite you in the ass know your temperament not everybody likes being around big groups of people I draw energy from being around people so I love being around groups but my daughter on the other hand is much more of an introvert and she would prefer to be around you know two or three people at a time she gets exhausted when she has to be in big groups of people it doesn’t mean she’s got social anxiety so know what your preference is for being around people so when you’re developing your self-confidence when you’re developing your skills when you’re working through social anxiety you’re not putting yourself in situations that would stress you out anyway so know your temperament if you’re an introvert when you’re making your exposure hierarchy which we’re going to talk about it in a minute you’re gonna start with something like going out for coffee with a friend to Starbucks or maybe even having a friend over for coffee in your house depending on how bad your social anxiety is and then you’re gonna work up from there but if you are an introvert you’re never gonna be relaxed in a group of a large group of people so I just understanding the difference between being anxious and feeling like you’re gonna crawl out of your skin and be uncomfortable or have it be very draining to be in a large group of people who understand your temperament that’s part of it so you can say you know this is normal I am not the type of a person who likes to be in a large group of people so it’s going to take some preparation and it’s going to take a lot of energy but I can do it knowing your triggers different things trigger anxiety for different people some people have anxiety when they feel like they’re going to be evaluated so if they’re doing a presentation for their colleagues or their peers they’re more likely to be more anxious than if they’re say hanging out with five other parents at a kid’s play date or something some people have one of their triggers is authority figures I know whenever I had to present in front of the CEO or in front of my department chair or whoever gave me more anxiety than presenting even in front of a class of a hundred and fifty students so it’s kind of all about what your particular triggers are if the other trigger you might want to consider the situation you know if you feel like you are on stage if you feel like you are the center and everybody’s looking at you that’s probably going to be a lot more anxiety-provoking than if you are mixing and mingling with other people at a party so know what triggers your anxiety so thinking about how your social anxiety impacts your life what kinds of things can you not do or what kinds of things do you find are just terrifying to keep a list of all of those things starting with the things that only make you a little bit nervous about things that you would rather you know pull your eyebrows out then do and start at the beginning start with the things that only cause you a little bit of anxiety imagine them rehearsing and doing them in your mind see yourself going through them successfully for example a job interview or a first date imagine what it’s going to be like what the other a person is going to say how you’re going to respond and how it’s all going to go well just keep imagining that until you can imagine it or think about it and you don’t feel stressed than when you go in to do it it’s going to be a lot easier once you get past that first thing move on to the next thing that causes a little bit more anxiety all right start at the beginning again imagine doing it see yourself going all the way through maybe it’s doing a public speech see yourself getting dressed for it getting ready for walking out on stage and delivering the speech and seeing it go well you’re not going to see yourself tripping and falling you’re not going to see yourself stuttering and stammering or dropping all your note cards or anything those are the things the cat strophic thoughts that you have that are likely not going to happen I want you to imagine it going perfectly rehearse it in your mind until you can do it literally with your eyes closed then when you go out to do it, it’s going to be that much easier because you’ve already done it 20 times in your own head and been successful at it so just do it like you practiced keep a rational outlook a lot of times social anxiety is caused by catastrophic self-statements things that you tell yourself people are judging me they’re laughing at me people are gonna think I’m an idiot um whatever your thoughts are so keep a list what those thoughts are and write counter thoughts to the people are judging me well they may be but do you care so if people are judging me that’s on them if people are laughing at me well at least they’re laughing but in reality what other reasons could the people have had to be laughing what are three other explanations for why they might be laughing besides laughing at you so look at your catastrophic self statements like I told you before imagining that you’re going to go out on stage and you’re gonna walk out there you’re gonna trip over your own two feet and you’re gonna wipe out on the way to do this presentation and humiliate yourself well that’s pretty darn catastrophic so think about exactly what is going to happen what are you going to do and how rational how realistic how likely is it that all these things are gonna happen and you know if that is one of your fears watch the movie Miss Congeniality because she is going at as Miss America I think is who she’s trying to portray and she falls flat on her face and she just picks herself right back up and walks on and nobody thinks anything of it after that it’s not like a week later or 20 minutes later in the movie, people are still talking about her falling she did she over it and you know move past it when you make a big deal out of it when people start to think about it a little bit more practice breathing when we get stressed we tend to breathe more shallowly and more rapidly when you breathe slowly and deeply you’re triggering the relaxation response in your body it doesn’t mean you have to take those big giant deep breaths as you do at the doctor’s office or anything that’s overly dramas is it but focus on your breathing if you start feeling yourself getting an anxious breath in for a count of three hold for a count of three and breathe out for a count of three and you know again it doesn’t have to be noticeable that you’re doing it you can do it in a meeting and nobody will even know but if you can slow your breathing you’ll slow your heart rate and you’ll trigger the relaxation response to help you deal with your anxiety sometimes we’ve just got to suck it up and go through things that create a lot of anxiety for us I remember one place I worked once a month we would have to get up in front of all of our colleagues and all of the executives and give a report on how our department was doing I hated doing that I hated being up there giving this report not because of the content of the report I just hated being up there in front of everybody and it was no big deal but it would cause me a little bit of anxiety if I had to do it so distress tolerance techniques were always useful because it was an eight-hour meeting so it might be four hours of me sitting there anticipating going up and having to give my speech so what would I do during the four hours while I was waiting I would do activities I would listen to what other people were saying I would make notes I would sometimes go through clinical charts and sign off on documentation and not pay attention but you know I digress contributing so if you’re at a party you can’t do it in a meeting but if you’re at a party for example and used feeling anxious get up maybe help the hostess out or the host out in the kitchen go around pick up glasses pick up trash throw things away do something to be helpful to contribute so you’re not feeling like you’re having to sit there and be on the spot comparisons can help too you can just kind of blend back into the wall a little bit and compare how you’re doing to how other people are doing or how you’re doing to how you’ve done in the past because you’re probably doing better now than you did then trigger opposite emotions is another way of dealing with distress if you’re feeling anxious you know bring out the opposite tell a joke find something funny find a video or something that makes you laugh and share it with other people because that’ll make you start laughing and feel more relaxed and release endorphins you can also just push away some of those thoughts that keep coming into your head I’m gonna make a mistake I’m gonna say something stupid they’re judging me it’s gonna be awful just push those thoughts away and Do you know what no I can do this and I’m going to push through the final the thing you can do in this particular set of distress tolerance techniques is sensations focus on sensations some people have a rubber band that they snap on their wrists to kind of help them focus on something else some people wring their hands I don’t recommend that because you know that just kind of shows you’re anxious and keeps your anxiety going listening to loud music you can go into the bathroom and splash cold water on your face unless it’ll make your mascara run there are a variety of things you can do that you can also find go and find some coffee because coffee is hot and that focus on how the coffee feels in your hands when you’re holding the cup focus on the taste of the coffee that hot sensation will kind of distract you from other things that are going on so focus and we’re going to talk about one thing at a time in a minute another set of distress tolerance techniques that can help our imagery and we’ve talked about rehearsing it before you go to the party imagine what you’re going to do before you go to the mixer or your in-laws or wherever it is you’re going that’s potentially going to cause you anxiety imagine going through it and doing it successfully to find meaning in what you’re doing so sometimes you know maybe you’re going to your spouse’s holiday Christmas party and it’s like the last thing you want to do because you don’t like big crowds like that you don’t know anybody but find meaning in it why are you doing this is because it’s helpful to your spouse you’re providing support and you know maybe you can find somebody that has similar hobbies or something before you go if you’re going to your spouse’s Christmas party for example try to find out who might be at the party that shares similar hobbies and stuff I know my husband works with people who do organic gardening and who are kind of health-conscious I won’t say fanatical but health-conscious like I am and we like to use a lot of lentils and beans and cook in health healthy ways so identifying those people I can’t talk about what they do at work because that’s just way out of my wheelhouse and over my head but I can talk with them about these other things so I’m not just standing there looking around and feeling like I’m out of place so find meaning in what you’re doing and try to find connections and commonalities with other people before you go and then you know I can have I would have my spouse introduce me to one of the people that does organic gardening for example and then we could start talking once you get more comfortable then you’re going to feel more at ease walking up to people and going hey you know and striking up a conversation and finding out commonalities if you’ve got children a lot of other people have children so you can talk about your kids or if you’ve got pets you can talk about your pets your dog’s people love their dog’s prayer can help sometimes you just got to take a breath and say a prayer before you walk into that situation to kind of get you through and get you going practice relaxation if you’re feeling stressed just again don’t have to get out of your chair you don’t have to go anywhere but practice tensing and releasing your muscles clenching your fists and releasing your hands and feel the difference between tense and released and then tense kind of your whole upper body and you don’t have to do it like this because that’s obvious but you can kind of tense up a little bit and relax and feel the difference between stressed and relaxed and then when you do it one more time you tense and when you relaxed you feel all the stress just draining out of your body out of your fingertips so that’s a kind of guided relaxation to help you when you’re kind of on the spot one thing at a time when you’re in a the social situation there is a lot of input there is a lot of stimulus going around a lot of people focus on one thing at a time if you start getting overwhelmed if you’re at a party maybe you can go over and get something to eat and focus on talking to one person at a time or focusing on what you’re eating or you know find something that you can focus on so you’re not trying to keep up with everything that’s going on takes a mental vacation or a physical vacation sometimes you just got to excuse yourself and go to the bathroom and hide out for five minutes and that’s okay you know sometimes you need to go somewhere where you know nobody’s watching and you can take those good deep breaths and go you know I got this it’s gonna be okay I’m doing fine give yourself a pep talk look realistically over how the night’s gone and the majority of it has gone okay yeah they’re probably going to be some hiccups and Pho paws here and there and if there are that’s okay it happens to everybody nobody is perfect at their social interactions all the time and that’s okay but look over it realistically to realize that tonight is going okay it may not be going the way you had hoped it would but it’s going okay there’s nothing catastrophic ly wrong and remember that we are a lot more important in our minds than we are in anybody else’s mind so when we make a the mistake we will remember it for six months but other people probably forget it’s about sixty minutes later it’s just you know even if it’s something like you walked out of the bathroom and you had your dress tucked in the back your panties did that before trusting me not something I want to repeat but I would bet if I asked any of my staff now yes I did it at work about that incident they’d look at me and go no I don’t remember that I remember it because it was mortifying but nobody else cared they were passed it by the next day nobody thought anything about it so remember that a lot of stuff that seems huge and glaring to you is only because it happened to you and other people are so involved in their own life they probably didn’t notice or won’t remember that fear is an acronym standing for false evidence appearing real so always examine the evidence if something happens and you think it is the absolute worst thing in the world and you’re just gonna die how likely is it that that’s true is it the worst the thing in the world is people judging you so look at the evidence how do you know this is going on for certain and what are other explanations for what might be going on mentally rehearsing those stressful social situations get ready for it the job interview the first date and for some people even going to the doctor can be a stressful social situation because they get kind of a white coat syndrome where they don’t they’re afraid to speak up to their doctor, I found that if there is a certain set of things that you need to say like if you’re going in to talk to your boss or you’re going in to talk to your doctor sometimes it’s helpful to write down a list of the points that you want to cover with them or the symptoms that you’re having so you can go over it and make sure you get everything said and you don’t end up kind of getting shut down when I used to go have supervision with my boss you know I only got supervision for one hour once a week and that was if I was lucky so I would go in with a whole laundry list of things and it could be the stuff that I was upset about or having difficulty with and I could have a laundry list and just go through it and mark it off so I would make sure that I got everything said and I covered and we were on the same page by the end of the the meeting finally practice mindfulness and focus on your surroundings to know how you feel if you start feeling anxious a step back and ask yourself why am I anxious what do I need right now to feel calmer try to do this periodically so you don’t wait until your anxiety is off-the-charts focus on your surroundings look around to find places and little niches that you might feel comfortable maybe there’s somebody else sitting over in the corner and you can go sit down with them and chat maybe there’s an empty seat somewhere that you can just go sit down and take a breath or go out on if it’s a patio or a party maybe you can go out on the patio for a few minutes oftentimes there’s somebody sitting out on the patio trying to get a little peace so you can find a situation that’s less anxiety-provoking two little bonus things I’m going to tell you with social anxiety a lot of times people are afraid that they’re going to offend someone and these days it is so easy to offend people so what I tell my clients and my kids and what I try to remember myself is before I speak or when I’m talking to people if what I’m saying is true helpful important necessary and kind then you know there’s probably a good chance I won’t offend them look on your social media look at the comments people leave on other people’s posts and stuff and see if they meet these criteria true helpful important necessary and kind 90% of the time the answer is no well I won’t say that much about 50% of the time the the answer is no there are a lot of times people will just say nasty stuff that didn’t need to be said and that can be offensive but if you practice and focus on making sure what you say is true helpful important necessary and kind and if you’re following me that spells out think then the chances that you’re going to offend somebody are greatly reduced if the person still gets offended it’s probably more about them because you aren’t trying to offend them you weren’t trying to be hurtful you are trying to be helpful and kind therefore it may be more about their stuff whether they have an issue with you or they have an issue with something else that’s going on and you just happen to be kind of in the way it’s more about them you can’t control how they react to things it’s their responsibility if you’re being nice and they take it the wrong way and they get offended that’s their perception and they need to work on that the other bonus that I’ll tell you to take away is something I got from dr.Seuss and I love something he says about the judgment of those whose minds don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind so the people who matter in your life they’re going to be people judge you all the time that’s just the way humans are but those who mind what you do those who get offended those who judge you all the time they don’t matter the people who matter to you don’t mind if you make a mistake don’t mind if you’re not perfect they probably embrace all of your imperfections so before you approach a social situation remember not everybody’s gonna like you that’s just it’s not possible to have everybody like you so remember the wise words of dr. Seuss those whose minds don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind if you like this podcast subscribe to your favorite spot on your favorite podcast app join our Facebook group at docs nights comm / Facebook or join our community and access additional resources at Doc Snipes com you thanks for tuning in – happiness isn’t brain surgery with Doc’s knives our mission is to make practical tools for living the happiest life affordable and accessible to everyone we record the podcast during a Facebook live broadcast each week join us free at Doc’s 9.com slash Facebook or subscribe to the podcast on your favorite podcast player and remember Doc’s nights calm has even more resources Members Only videos handouts and workbooks to help you apply what you learn if you like this podcast and want to support the work we are doing for as little as 399 per month you can become a supporter at Doc’s nights comm slash join again thank you for joining us and let us know how we can help youAs found on YouTubeHi, My name is James Gordon 👻🗯 I’m going to share with you the system I used to permanently cure the depression that I struggled with for over 20 years. 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