Tips for People Suffering from Social Anxiety

Do you find it really hard to be a part of social situations or to interact with new people? Does even the thought of social gathering break out sweats in you? Well, then, chances are you may be a kind of shy person. However, if this shyness becomes debilitating, and reflects heavily on your choices, you may be suffering from social anxiety.

6 Easy Ways to Overcome Social Anxiety

When small talk, eye contact or even eating in front of others send chills down your spine, know that you have some homework to do. Though these things may seem benign, they may majorly affect 90% of the people at some point in time. To combat such situations, here’s a scoop of some tips that may help you overcome the pressure of social anxiety.

1. Breathe

Shallow and rapid breaths are one of the common contributing factors to anxiety and panic attacks. When you are anxious, you may not even realize that you’re breathing this way. However, this change in breathing pattern could make your body feel tense and your mind chaotic.

Learning to control and gradually slow down your breathing can calm the anxious sensations of your heart. Besides, it can also help you to focus on your thoughts. Moreover, it may surprise you, how just taking deep breathes makes everything seem so normal. And, the fear of social exposure no longer exists.

2. Stop Assuming

It is important to note that when you let your assumptions take over, there’s no longer room for reality. You may remain trapped forever. For instance, you might assume, people will notice your imperfections. Or that, they will know you are not confident enough.

But, again, these thoughts are all a cobweb of your social anxiety that amplifies nervousness and negativity. The only way to overcome this is to indulge in conversations.

When negative thoughts stop you from being a part of social events, try finding the positive out of it. Remind yourself; this is all in my head. And, you will notice, a calming feeling all over you.

3. Challenge Your Anxiousness

Firstly, understand what makes you socially anxious. What according to you is the scariest thing about social situations? For example, initiating a conversation, eating in front of others, being the centre of attention or using public restrooms, it could be anything.

Once you figure out that, take baby steps towards making it better. If you find it hard to interact with new people, greet them and ask their name. These little steps can help you get used to at least being present at social events. In fact, even practising it alone will help show your unconscious mind that “this is easily doable.”

4. Take a Break from Perfection

Since ages, you must have heard people saying, “No one is perfect.” Well, it is true, indeed.

For example, ask yourself do you like everyone? Or let us reframe the question; is it humanly possible to like each and every person? We guess not. Similarly, it is also not compulsory that everyone will like you. For some people, you might not be the type of buddy; they want to hang out with.

Therefore, unnecessarily straining yourself over perfection is pointless. Besides, it makes you paranoid about your little mistakes and refrain you from blending into the surroundings.

5. Avoid Taking Cover of Safety Behaviors

Socially phobic people often take a cover of safety behaviour when they are forced into social situations. For example, they usually try to stay in the background, keep quiet in group conversations, stick only with people they know well, etc.

It helps them in easily coping with the anxiety and nervousness. But, again, it always makes them appear distant, dull and cold. So, to avoid that, it is necessary to be an active part of the gathering. If the situation is too much to handle, try taking deep breaths, relax and get back in the game.

6. Ditch Isolation

If it helps, you must know each one of us has a hard time while getting along in social gatherings. Some pick up sooner than others. And, some might just take a tiny bit of more time.

Many, many people have no conversation topic to say to start with.  The only way to settle yourself in situations like these is to start interacting. Being alone or isolating yourself from the people is of no use. Besides, it adversely affects your personality only. Avoid it.

The social anxiety pressure may take time to go. But, if you’re determined and constantly working towards it, nothing can stop you. 🙂

Contributor Bio – The blog is presented by Sharda Hospital. Sharda Hospital is one of the largest super speciality hospitals in Delhi National Capital Region (NCR).

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