Overcoming The Fear Of Social Anxiety

Marcus Oakey November 3, 2014
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In episode six, I’m going to answer a question that was sent to me from Mark who lives in Brazil.

He asked what advice I could give him about overcoming social anxiety. He wanted to know whether or not I’m really worried about what random people think when I go and talk to them. For me, overcoming social anxiety really changed my life, and gave me the freedom to do pretty much whatever I want in public, so I was more than happy to answer this for you all.

Overcoming social anxiety is something that I want to look at in a lot more detail in the upcoming episodes so I can share all my social anxiety tips with you:

  • Never Think Too Far Ahead Of What You’re Going To Say
  • First Comes Chaos
  • Write Yourself A Story
  • Just Have Fun!

There are 4 steps that I think you need to take in order to overcome social anxiety…

1) Never Think Too Far Ahead Of What You’re Going To Say

The biggest reason people struggle to overcome social anxiety is because they try to anticipate what’s going to happen. Firstly I want to say that whenever I start a conversation, I’ve never really got an idea of exactly what’s going to happen. I think if you do, you really restrict yourself to what you’d imagined, and conversation that’s confined to imagination just isn’t any fun!

2) First Comes Chaos

Start conversations in chaos by sharing random observations with people. They should be random and they should be serendipitous – that way your conversations are always going to be free flowing. If you’re thinking beforehand about what you’re going to talk about, it’s never going to go as well. Remember what I talked about in the last video: it’s going to go well, you’re going to have fun, and no bad things are going to happen!

3) Write Yourself A Story

Every time you start a conversation, I want you to remember this: you’re writing a story for yourself, you’re writing a good memory for yourself that is going lead to a good memory for both the person you’re speaking to and yourself! Even if it goes ‘badly’!

4) Just Have Fun!

You’ll find that when you stop doing things with an agenda, trying to gain something from someone and you start seeking to amuse yourself instead, you’ll worry a lot less about what people are thinking, because… you’re having fun!

People are like mirrors. If you start talking with a positive vibe, you’ll get that reflected back at you. My upbeat nature always keeps me impervious to what other people think of me.

So for this week, your ‘homework’ is to start a random conversation with a really positive vibe, and just see what happens. If you’re smiling and giving off a nice vibe, only good things will happen.

Let’s hope that gives both you and Mark, some clarity on tackling social anxiety. If you’re ready, search The Vault for episode seven: you’ll be rewarded with a big piece of the puzzle for improving your social skills and general well- being!

Further Reading

“Overcoming Social Anxiety & Shyness” by Gillian Butler

 

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