The Calm Confidence Podcast: Social Anxiety and Being Yourself

I apologize for the background noise. It was beautiful out today so I recorded outside on my phone. I spent years trying to figure out how to not care what others think. I read books, argued with myself endlessly, tried to justify, rationalize and reason my way out of my fear… but nothing worked. I remained trapped in my own mental prison. In this video I explain how not caring what others think is not an active process. It’s not something you can “do.” Instead we flip it on its head. We detach from everything we think is necessary. All the fixing, fitting in, changing yourself does nothing but create more self doubt and social anxiety. We need only to “be.” Exist. Let life come to us. Our emotions, thoughts, fears. Embrace them and you will find freedom.Link to podcast and services: https://linktr.ee/calmconfidence?utm_source=linktree_profile_share<sid=3ccd9358-ea8c-4a98-ba80-1bf8ddcc5aaf

There's one thing we all do that is making our social lives worse... our phone. It has become so easy to lean on our phone as a crutch when we feel uncomfortable in public. We avoid basic human interaction and pretend we are doing something more interesting or important. Admitting this is a crutch is the first step. Let's see if we can let ourselves sit in an uncomfortable social situation without relying on our phone for help. Let it feel awkward. Let it feel weird. Ironically this may actually make you more likely to want to speak up and say something.

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Sources: Craske, M. G., Treanor, M., Conway, C. C., Zbozinek, T., & Vervliet, B. (2014). Maximizing exposure therapy: An inhibitory learning approach. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 58, 10–23. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.brat.2014.04.006

When we are socially anxious we become hyper aware of other people's feelings, and we make it our mission to ensure no one is ever upset with us. Reality check: You will upset people no matter how hard you try not to! I'm not saying we should intentionally try to hurt others but we must accept that we are flawed. We will make mistakes and hurt people. If we become too concerned with other's feelings we will always be anxious. In this episode I discuss how to become more self compassionate so you can allow yourself to make more mistakes so you are no longer controlled by your fear of not being perfect.

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The smallest interactions can consume us with anxiety. I know firsthand how a simple "hello" can turn the nervous system into hyperdrive. We assume the worst of people and the worst of ourselves. The truth is, most people want to talk to you. Most people will be pleasant, and the ones who aren't, aren't for us. In this episode I discuss how you can take a gradual approach to overcoming your fear of approach, and eventually how to turn absolute strangers in to conversation buddies.

Self Improvement has become as divided as American Politics. On one end we have people who believe we should accept ourselves no matter what. On the other end, we have people who believe you should essentially verbally abuse yourself into discipline. Neither of these strategies are actually effective. In this video I discuss how you can actually talk to yourself so you can build a healthy inner dialogue that will build confidence and keep you motivated, without hating yourself or thinking you're the best thing since sliced bread.

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Your social anxiety does not want to get better. It likes to feel safe and comfortable. Who can blame it, it's hard to challenge yourself when you are so overcome by fear. What we don't realize is that our anxiety can be very sneaky. It will subconsciously invent reasons why you shouldn't go out and talk to to people today. "It's too cold," "my car isn't working..." anything to stay inisde and away from people. The first step here is to acknowledge what is going on so we can stop sabotaging ourselves.

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Sometimes the things we think are protecting us are acting the things that are hurting us, and that is the case for social anxiety. Beliefs like "but if i do that, it will be awkward," or "if I say that then they won't like me," feel like they are protecting us from shame and humiliation, when in reality they are keeping us stuck in our anxiety. Ultimately if we want to be free of social anxiety we need to embrace these painful emotions, not run from them.

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The world doesn't appreciate quiet people. When introverts are young, they are more than happy being alone. But then the people start telling them that this is not acceptable. "Why are you so quiet?" "Why don't you talk?" "Don't you have anything to say?" After a while we start to internalize this. Is there something wrong with me? Am I weird for wanting to be alone. We start to become self conscious and doubt our own experience. We try to change to fit the world but it doesn't work. Now we feel pressure to be something we're not and we can't deliver. What if we went back to our roots? What if it was ok to be quiet? Maybe there isn't any pressure after all.

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In this episode I discuss social anxiety with Dr. Vincent Barbieri. Dr. Barbieri and I graduated from the same high school, but barely knew each other because we were both secretly struggling with social anxiety. In this episode we explore or individual experiences and what we've learned through life and through our work as practitioners.

Dr. Vincent Barbieri believes that social anxiety never truly goes away, but we don't have to let it run our life anymore. By adjusting our expectations, challenging distorted beliefs and fulling embracing awkwardness, anxiety and vulnerability, we can find peace with ourselves and others.

Dr. Barbieri has a PhD in Clinical Psychology from American University. He’s been practicing for 8 years in individual and couples therapy. During his PhD he studied borderline personality disorder and worked as a DBT therapist both doing individual and group therapy. He currently lives in San Diego where he works full time as a therapist at his own practice. He also a podcast called 2 Dudes Talkin’ Therapy with my colleague Dr. Jacob Ambrose.

Dr. Barbieri's socials: YouTube: https://youtube.com/@talkintherapy?si=MygnVSu01Sp8TQso

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"Fake it till you make it," they say, but does it actually work? Can you actually fake your confidence long enough that you will eventually feel it? Yes and no. Putting on a performance that doesn't feel genuine probably won't get you far. Sure you may be able to start getting used to the anxiety, but it's not you. If you have to pretend every interaction, what's the point? For many people, this strategy doesn't help acclimate them to the anxiety anyway. So what's the solution? First we have to figure out who we are? Who would we be if we were not anxious? How would we act, what would we say?

If we can establish a sense of self that feels genuine, but perhaps we are just not comfortable sharing yet, now we have our north star. We can "act" the way that feels like us. The reality is, everything feels like an act when you are anxious because it feels uncomfortable. But we have to recognize that just because we feel uncomfortable does not mean we are being fake, it simply means we have social anxiety.Interested in checking out the podcast or joining my newsletter? Check out my linktree: https://linktr.ee/calmconfidence