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Understanding Social Anxiety

Anxiety in various forms is a defense against other – usually uncomfortable – feelings. We jump out of important feelings that need our attention into another experience that is often just as unpleasant. Social anxiety is no different. Feeling, understanding, processing, and owning our underlying feelings is the key to relief. The added step for healing communication and social anxiety specifically is practicing bringing those feelings into relationship with others, realizing that our full authentic self can be seen and accepted.

Let’s start with understanding anxiety as a defense

Many of the clients I have seen over the past ten years who come in with any form of anxiety, including panic disorders, irritable bowel syndrome, and OCD, have very clearly shut down parts of their real selves in order to perform, fit in, hide, or avoid.  Whether they are highly successful and pleasing to others, or frozen with fear and self-doubt, they have chosen not to feel important aspects of their lives, leaving them anxious because the body knows something is not right. We have a natural way to move through feelings and when that is blocked and we repress who we really are or what we really feel, we inevitably face the consequences—whether through physical symptoms, depression or anxiety.

So how do we break down these unhealthy defenses?

For the many clients facing this experience, we start with creating enough safety and care for those feelings to come out. You can do this in therapy or with a loving friend or family member if you don’t know how to hold yourself with this kind of care.  The real self is dying to come out.  When you care and surrender to whatever pain or truth your heart is wanting to feel and express, the anxiety goes away on its own.  Whether you need to grieve past losses that you moved past too quickly, or listen to your knowing inside that you need to switch jobs or relationships, listening inside and giving your body permission to bring forth what is inside without judgment is the fastest way through anxiety.

The underlying mechanism of social anxiety

Sometimes underlying social anxiety specifically is a lack of self-worth or fear of being seen or known by others and therefore discovered as inadequate or rejected.  If you don’t like yourself (which is based on your childhood and not your fault at all) then you might have to do a bit more than feel and express to heal your anxiety.  To find freedom from your anxiety, you must care about, forgive and accept yourself.  We often need help with this.  For those with social or communication anxiety it can be terrifying to open up to others or to make a bold move like joining group therapy, but this step serves two important purposes in your healing.

Two ways to overcome social anxiety

First, social anxiety is much like a phobia and the fastest way through it is to face our fears and survive. We don’t want the experience to be so anxiety-producing that it reinforces a negative experience, but with small steps we must approach what scares us in order to find out we are safe (and, in the case of social anxiety, liked or accepted).  We practice and practice being open and connecting in order to teach our bodies that it can go well.  If we avoid what scares us, social anxiety can easily become agoraphobia and people’s worlds can become smaller and smaller with less places to feel safe.

Second, through experience being vulnerable with others we own our voice and our authentic self, which heals the roots of anxiety described earlier (repressing, denying, pretending vs. authenticity).  In that experience we have the added opportunity to learn to love ourselves by seeing other people’s caring reactions toward us.  Most people respond well to vulnerability and openness.  Make sure to find people who fit this category, but they are not hard to find.  The care they show you will help with the deeper question inside about whether you are worthy and valuable. Over time connection and care will change your negative perspective on yourself, give you hope, and heal your communication or social anxiety.

Three Life Keys

A friend asked me, based on my experience as a psychologist watching people develop personally and interpersonally, what I think are the three most positively transformative lessons to help people enjoy life. Wow, narrow it to three! Here are some concepts that I can say for sure change people for the better if they really understand them at an emotional level (not just going through the motions—though “fake it ‘til you make it” does help in the meantime). The first two are for you and relating to yourself and your life, and the last is for relationships, which we all know play a HUGE role in how we feel and how much we enjoy each day.

  1. What we resist persists. We can’t control our feelings. We can only choose to avoid them. Some people call this “rising above” them, but usually with a little poking the feeling is right under the surface draining their energy. The only way I’ve seen to effectively relieve painful emotions is to embrace them and go through them. The more you can make space to fully feel something, in fact, the more the feeling can transform and release. This idea is counter-intuitive for many of my clients, especially when society tells us to be strong and many parents tell their children to “get over” their feelings or “grow up.” Suppressing, or saying “no” to an experience that comes to you is, in my opinion, asking for more of that feeling over a longer period of time and may even lead to physical symptoms or illness.Let’s imagine a sailboat to further understand the concept of “what we resist persists.” The universe (or chance if you don’t believe in something more spiritual) is the wind that blows the sail of our boat. Many of us keep our sail up until we are blown into rough waters and then we decide we don’t like it so we pull down our sails. That is the worst time to decide you want to resist what life has brought because a boat with no sail up isn’t going anywhere and is therefore stuck in the rough water! Put the sail back up and you may go a little further that way, but you’ll turn around and get back to peace faster. So, say “yes” to your feelings and let them be as big as they truly are. That doesn’t mean acting them out (if you feel like yelling at a friend, you don’t act on that, but you do embrace and care for the experience of WANTING to yell instead of resisting or ignoring it).
  1. Love thyself. This one is painfully obvious, yet so difficult for most people. One of my happiest days parenting was a few months ago when my 2-year-old daughter said: “Mommy….I love you. I love you and I love myself.” I had such a positive reaction to her saying she loved herself that she has said it at least 10 times since—with a big smile on her face. She knows I like to hear that. Why? Loving yourself is not only the key to your own happiness, but also to your beautiful treatment of others and tolerance for them as well. Loving yourself won’t make you cocky, instead it takes away the need to be better than others because you have confidence that you are intrinsically valuable and always loved. Many wonder how to learn to love themselves, and it is, admittedly, not easy. A good therapist, friend, or lover who consistently reflects back your beauty is a good way to start. If you have such a person, focus hard on receiving from them as deeply as you can—really take in how they see you and let it sink in to your core, to your cells, to your entire heart. You’ll find places that resist, reject the love, and feel very uncomfortable or squirmy. Just keep going and let those places surrender. Don’t stop. Injuries and parts of you that have negative beliefs about yourself will have to die in order to take in the love and restructure around it, so learning through this deep receiving requires actively tolerating discomfort and trying to open more than you think possible.Teaching yourself without the help of another person is also possible. If you have ever loved anyone or anything, get in touch with that feeling and then direct it toward yourself. It may help to see yourself as a young child so your inherent innocence and sweetness is all the more evident. In the child version of yourself, too, you may be able to see the deep need for love and the dependence on others without being embarrassed by it. We are, of course, naturally dependent creatures. People are often shamed into covering it up, but people need people.   Once you love yourself you will find the right people to depend on—people who you don’t feel guilty to need and whom you can trust to be there.Ideally we have “diffused dependency,” where we spread our dependency needs out among many loved ones so no one person feels the full responsibility for our needs. Practice visualizing yourself at an age that inspires your compassion and try to deliver that compassion right to that person’s heart, which is your own heart.  Concept 1 and 2 go well together. When you don’t resist your experiences or feelings in this life, but embrace them, loving yourself no matter what begins. Bring your feelings into contact with love—that is what heals. Even anger or sadism is a feeling you can say: “Awwwwww….sweetie,” to because it was born out of pain and will be relieved with acceptance and compassion. If you want help transforming your relationship with yourself, the yourselftruly.com program can guide that process.
  1. Only one person goes crazy at once. In relationships, romantic especially, it is important that only one person “go crazy” at once. I like to use the term “go crazy” because I think it is true—when we have strong feelings triggered by our childhood issues, we are not rational or technically sane no matter how much we pretend to be and believe what our issues tell us. Even those with the healthiest backgrounds have crazy spots. You may fear abandonment, for instance. If this issue gets triggered you will feel as if your partner is abandoning you and act accordingly. Unfortunately, when people act out their issues it brings out in others the exact action the person feared. So, in this example you would act in such a way that would distance your partner or make him/her want to abandon you (perhaps through your anger, clinginess, irrational/unfair assessments of him/her, etc).It helps, however, if each partner in a romantic relationship understands the other’s crazy issues and can therefore not take them as seriously. Instead, give love and compassion to people you care about when they are triggered—and don’t try to reason with someone who is insane in that moment!  Crazy issues are meant to pull the other person in and get him/her to act in the expected way (abandon you, in this example). So, it takes great will power to give love instead and not react with your own corresponding crazy issue (feeling misjudged or never good enough might be triggered by someone’s abandonment issues, for instance). The key is that one person’s crazy feelings and behavior doesn’t trigger the other person’s (which it naturally will without active resistance). If couples learn to avoid this dynamic of going crazy together, they will avoid many fights and actually be able to heal each other’s issues through giving love at the key moments instead of reacting in ways to reinforce their partner’s fears. Remember, too, that you can either be “right or in relationship.” Choose to focus on feelings, and caring for each other’s feelings, instead of fighting about logistics (who’s right, the facts, etc) that often don’t matter (or if they do, discuss them at a less-emotional moment).

Good luck! I wish everyone love for yourself that grows every day and the ability to surrender in this beautiful life journey, including its pains. As you grow in self-love I hope you find greater tolerance for your loved-ones’ tender (or crazy!) areas where they have been hurt in the past and that you can give them the love they need to heal as well.

You Can Do It!

Thanks to our brain’s abundant neuroplasticity, we really can change! You can absolutely have the loving relationship with yourself that you want. Our brain learns through repetition, focused attention, and many other factors. We especially absorb experiences that are emotionally evocative and imprint them deeply because they are likely to be more relevant to survival. While this can cause our more difficult life experiences to leave us with powerful, and not always true, impressions of ourselves, others, and the world, the same process can apply to beautiful emotional moments. In healing, for instance, when we feel our feelings and have a reparative experience, we can deeply change our nervous system. We can now even observe changing neuronal webs as we heal and evolve.

The two factors that must be present in this healing process are that the neuronal webs we want to change are activated and that a healing experience occurs at the same time. To activate, or light up, these parts of the brain we must be experiencing what they hold. For instance, if you feel like you are a bad person you would need to be actively feeling like a bad person, not just thinking the idea “I’m bad,” or talking about how you feel like a bad person, but actually feeling like a bad person in order to actually change the part of you that holds that. Then, while feeling how bad you are, you would need to have a reparative experience. Perhaps you receive deep comfort or understanding from yourself or someone else, or maybe you challenge that belief about yourself in a sincere or convincing way that opens you to another possibility and touches you emotionally. I believe the key ingredient to this reparative experience is love. Can we give it to ourselves? Absolutely! Love is transformative and you have it inside. If you need help accessing it, YT will bring you the inspiration and guidance to get there, as well as help learning to receive from yourself and others.

Letting Go

Learning to love yourself is a process of letting go. Letting go of the way you currently see yourself (and the comfort in that familiarity), of the past pain that created your self-image and the false beliefs from those experiences which continue to harm you, and of defenses that stand in your way of blossoming.

A lot of my clients ask how to let go—how to grow and change, how to let themselves receive love, how to stop criticizing themselves. It is not a fight with yourself to change, it is through care and permission and adding resources to your system. Thich Nhat Hanh describes this process as a room full of hot air and you turn on the air conditioning. It doesn’t push the hot air out or make it go away, the cool air embraces and shifts the warm air until very soon it is cool in the room.

Yourself Truly adds insights, skills, awareness, and resources to your conscious and unconscious to help your deepest self be ready to let go and to love yourself. Once you are brave enough to take the leap, have worked through the blocks that trick you into thinking you can’t or that something bad will happen if you do, the actual letting go is up to you and is soft and easy like an exhale.

I love this poem, by Rev. Safire Rose, to help you embrace the ease of it. When your heart is ready it will just let go and love your true self.

She Let Go

~Rev. Safire Rose

She let go. Without a thought or a word, she let go.

She let go of the fear. She let go of the judgments. She let go of the confluence of opinions swarming around her head. She let go of the committee of indecision within her. She let go of all the ‘right’ reasons. Wholly and completely, without hesitation or worry, she just let go.

She didn’t ask anyone for advice. She didn’t read a book on how to let go. She didn’t search the scriptures. She just let go. She let go of all of the memories that held her back. She let go of all of the anxiety that kept her from moving forward. She let go of the planning and all of the calculations about how to do it just right.

She didn’t promise to let go. She didn’t journal about it. She didn’t write the projected date in her Day-Timer. She made no public announcement and put no ad in the paper. She didn’t check the weather report or read her daily horoscope. She just let go.

She didn’t analyze whether she should let go. She didn’t call her friends to discuss the matter. She didn’t do a five-step Spiritual Mind Treatment. She didn’t call the prayer line. She didn’t utter one word. She just let go.

No one was around when it happened. There was no applause or congratulations. No one thanked her or praised her. No one noticed a thing. Like a leaf falling from a tree, she just let go.

There was no effort. There was no struggle. It wasn’t good and it wasn’t bad. It was what it was, and it is just that.

In the space of letting go, she let it all be. A small smile came over her face. A light breeze blew through her. And the sun and the moon shone forevermore.

“A Spell for You”

Developing a beautiful, loving relationship with yourself and living the freedom and peace that comes with that is a very organic, deep process.  It takes intention and inspiration, gentleness and willingness.  We have to find and embrace the will to heal and give ourselves permission to change, even if it is scary and our old defenses and way of seeing the world has protected us and worked in many ways.  Once we actually open to the possibility to discover a caring, nurturing new reality for ourselves, it is time immerse ourselves in the transmission of love.  Find people who give to you so you can practice receiving, practices and habits that remind you how exquisite you and this life are, and art or experiences that inspire the feeling in you.  Try this poem by Rob Brezny out for size and breath with each line–soaking it up and letting it become reality inside you!

your debts forgiven

your wounds healed

your apologies accepted

your generosity expanded

your love educated

your desires clarified

your uniqueness unleashed

your untold stories heard

your insight heightened

your load lightened

your wildness rejuvenated

your leaks plugged

your courage stoked

your fears dissolved

your imagination fed

your creativity uncorked

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