Louco
Well-known member
Hello Social Phobia World.
After reading a lot of discussions here, it seems we have many great winners in life around, don't we? Who happen to know exactly how to deal with this crippling disease, and are willing to teach us.
However, their arguments boil down to trying to make us realize how stupid and lazy we are, and then they tell us to do exactly what the disease won't let us. They are so awesome, aren't they? However, because their posts are sugar coated with their "good intentions", their patronizing atitude comes as kindness in their own eyes.
Let's take a look at some of those advices. Most of them happen to be in a sticky thread in this forum, something that really surprises me, since we already heard all this and more plenty of times well before coming here. I'm not responding directly there because I am just quoting that message for practical purposes, those ideas in general and their supporters are far too common and deserve this attention.
They know why we are destined to fail and why we suffer in every aspect of social life. It's always very simple and it's always our fault, for either not realizing the obvious or not trying enough. Deep down they think we are doing this to ourselves and not being harmed by a mental disorder that won't allow us to behave differently.
A person suffering from depression, something that is common to appear along with socialphobia, will look to a claim like this and think: "Yeah, I don't x (stick to a plan of action in this case) because I can't, so I will never get better, I know it." Good job.
You have no authority or even basic knowledge of the disorder to make most of those simplistic and naive claims. Have you ever even googled socialphobia? Different medical treatments have different results from one person to another.
People have a hard time going through with the most efficient treatment available thanks to the disorder itself, something that it's not their fault, and also said treatment many times is not being held by truly capable medics.
Comprehensive Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy | Social Anxiety Association
But if people stick with your positive thinking stupidity, which the doctors advise AGAINST because the CBT treatment consists exactly of turning irrational thoughts into neutral logical thinking, they will get better. They never get better because they don't stick to some plan coming from the brilliant mind of someone like you, which would be more than enough to deal with it. We can just ignore decades of research by countless doctors and patients and their results.
The "You are doing it wrong" argument is a slight variation of the "You are not trying hard enough", however instead of thinking only that we are lazy, they also think we are quite stupid and never thought about such a simple idea before.
If we are pushing ourselves too hard, we are not in a comfort zone. We are struggling and feeling distressed, not safe and cozy. Most of the time we don't have jobs, we don't have a relationship, we don't have nothing but fear of a future we were not able to build. Where we are suffering not only with the disease, but also because the help we are getting now to keep going on won't be here forever, when our parents and relatives supporting us die.
But yeah, we are settled in a comfort zone, all cozy with the ghost of utter misery, he whispering to us a future way worse than our already painful lives.
Besides thinking we are so stupid it never ocurred to us something like baby steps before, they are also so insensitive that they won't understand that if we are doing nothing, locked in a room in despair, is because even the tiniest of steps are too much.
I'm not even going to say much about the 2 years joke. Not only you promise a cure but also tell us how long it will take, while no psychiatrist ever do that. The best possible treatment known to modern science have a high rate of success in making people get better. Not getting cured, not guaranteed to work, and not on a fixed schedule. This is the level of your ignorance.
"Disregard reality, you are perfect."
Again, people with socialphobia are not stupid. It's funny that he says that himself, and yet tries to convince us we are all fit in every way for leading a perfect life, while he knows nothing about anyone here except the name in the profiles.
People with socialphobia KNOW that their emotions and thoughts are being messed up by a very real biological disorder in their brains, not by their abstract concepts of beauty or by the impression left by other people. You really think we are just shy.
Since they are particularly stubborn with this, let's have the word of a specia list:
"You cannot tell a person with social anxiety to simply stop thinking negative thoughts. Obviously, the person does not want to think negatively, and if they could choose to stop thinking negatively, they would do so in a heartbeat."
Thomas A. Richards, Ph.D., Psychologist
Director, Social Anxiety Institute
Comparing ourselves to others like saying "There are plenty of people who have everything you have but who are leading great lives" as you just did? Yeah, that would make me feel quite guilty back then, when I still didn't know how to deal with toxic people like you.
This is more an evidence of how these people have no idea of what they are talking about than anything else.
They probably don't wonder for a minute what kind of destructive thoughts make their ways into our minds when we hear stuff like this. And they don't care. They are sharing their wisdom, if we hurt ourselves with it is because we are stupid, just like they always knew.
However, to say we shouldn't compare ourselves to others makes as much sense as saying we shouldn't look at them. Comparing yourself to other people is natural and inevitable, the problem only comes of what you make from this comparison. If you are aware of your situation and the reasons for other people's success when we couldn't make it, if that is the case, you will be able to focus precisely on what matters (the socialphobia) instead of other things.
No one will never develop social skills by "learning to like" solitude. How can someone be so dense? Also, each person have their own personality, you don't have to "learn to like" being alone or being with people either, we have to get rid of the influence from the disease and that's it, it's up to us to decide our likes, dislikes and everything else.
I would never have been able to live the small moments of happiness I had in my life without the help of medication. This is no magic, it's medicine which cures the simptoms of a disease.
And yeah, we are not working hard enough, we are not sacrificing enough, we already heard that. Stop projecting your selfish and lazy self on others.
You know what is funny? Of all the bad things, I don't remember any of the normal patronizing people I met in my life ever saying the word "loser" when talking about this.
And yet here it is, in the last place of the world where you would expect to find it. Where we come to find a moment of peace and understanding among our own.
This is just a small list I conveniently found in a single thread, but the counselors of the positive thinking are Legion, and their advices for us are infinite, coming from the uncharted depths of human stupidity and conceit.
It would not be possible to list everything they like to tell us here, but let's hope this small demonstration is enough to enlighten the most reasonable among them, if possible.
After reading a lot of discussions here, it seems we have many great winners in life around, don't we? Who happen to know exactly how to deal with this crippling disease, and are willing to teach us.
However, their arguments boil down to trying to make us realize how stupid and lazy we are, and then they tell us to do exactly what the disease won't let us. They are so awesome, aren't they? However, because their posts are sugar coated with their "good intentions", their patronizing atitude comes as kindness in their own eyes.
Let's take a look at some of those advices. Most of them happen to be in a sticky thread in this forum, something that really surprises me, since we already heard all this and more plenty of times well before coming here. I'm not responding directly there because I am just quoting that message for practical purposes, those ideas in general and their supporters are far too common and deserve this attention.
Six reasons why many people with SA have trouble getting over it
"They don't stick to a plan of action- this is the number one reason why people with sp will never get better."
They know why we are destined to fail and why we suffer in every aspect of social life. It's always very simple and it's always our fault, for either not realizing the obvious or not trying enough. Deep down they think we are doing this to ourselves and not being harmed by a mental disorder that won't allow us to behave differently.
A person suffering from depression, something that is common to appear along with socialphobia, will look to a claim like this and think: "Yeah, I don't x (stick to a plan of action in this case) because I can't, so I will never get better, I know it." Good job.
You have no authority or even basic knowledge of the disorder to make most of those simplistic and naive claims. Have you ever even googled socialphobia? Different medical treatments have different results from one person to another.
People have a hard time going through with the most efficient treatment available thanks to the disorder itself, something that it's not their fault, and also said treatment many times is not being held by truly capable medics.
Comprehensive Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy | Social Anxiety Association
But if people stick with your positive thinking stupidity, which the doctors advise AGAINST because the CBT treatment consists exactly of turning irrational thoughts into neutral logical thinking, they will get better. They never get better because they don't stick to some plan coming from the brilliant mind of someone like you, which would be more than enough to deal with it. We can just ignore decades of research by countless doctors and patients and their results.
2) They don't take baby steps- people with social anxiety push themselves too hard to do somthing that is too far beyond their comfort zone instead of building up gradually. The result is that the individual will not be consistent because they will dread repeating this activity. The solution is to start small and build up like with weight training. Over a year progress will be huge and after 2 years you will be totally over sp.
The "You are doing it wrong" argument is a slight variation of the "You are not trying hard enough", however instead of thinking only that we are lazy, they also think we are quite stupid and never thought about such a simple idea before.
If we are pushing ourselves too hard, we are not in a comfort zone. We are struggling and feeling distressed, not safe and cozy. Most of the time we don't have jobs, we don't have a relationship, we don't have nothing but fear of a future we were not able to build. Where we are suffering not only with the disease, but also because the help we are getting now to keep going on won't be here forever, when our parents and relatives supporting us die.
But yeah, we are settled in a comfort zone, all cozy with the ghost of utter misery, he whispering to us a future way worse than our already painful lives.
Besides thinking we are so stupid it never ocurred to us something like baby steps before, they are also so insensitive that they won't understand that if we are doing nothing, locked in a room in despair, is because even the tiniest of steps are too much.
I'm not even going to say much about the 2 years joke. Not only you promise a cure but also tell us how long it will take, while no psychiatrist ever do that. The best possible treatment known to modern science have a high rate of success in making people get better. Not getting cured, not guaranteed to work, and not on a fixed schedule. This is the level of your ignorance.
3) They think there is somthing wrong with them- people with sp have many excuses why they are different from other people and why they wont get better. I'm too ugly, I'm too stupid, I have a bad personality. The only difference between you and others is you have sp nothing else. There are plenty of people who have everything you have but who are leading great lives. Your negative views come from poor treatment by others. This may have been caused by a number of factors but not by anything that is intrinsically wrong with you.
"Disregard reality, you are perfect."
Again, people with socialphobia are not stupid. It's funny that he says that himself, and yet tries to convince us we are all fit in every way for leading a perfect life, while he knows nothing about anyone here except the name in the profiles.
People with socialphobia KNOW that their emotions and thoughts are being messed up by a very real biological disorder in their brains, not by their abstract concepts of beauty or by the impression left by other people. You really think we are just shy.
Since they are particularly stubborn with this, let's have the word of a specia list:
"You cannot tell a person with social anxiety to simply stop thinking negative thoughts. Obviously, the person does not want to think negatively, and if they could choose to stop thinking negatively, they would do so in a heartbeat."
Thomas A. Richards, Ph.D., Psychologist
Director, Social Anxiety Institute
4) They compare themselves to others- Comparing yourself to others is probably the best way to decrease your self-esteem. It is one of the worst and most damaging things you can do and it has very serious consequences on your well being. Now that you know this decide never to compare yourself to others. Just worry about your own progress and stop looking at other people.
Comparing ourselves to others like saying "There are plenty of people who have everything you have but who are leading great lives" as you just did? Yeah, that would make me feel quite guilty back then, when I still didn't know how to deal with toxic people like you.
This is more an evidence of how these people have no idea of what they are talking about than anything else.
They probably don't wonder for a minute what kind of destructive thoughts make their ways into our minds when we hear stuff like this. And they don't care. They are sharing their wisdom, if we hurt ourselves with it is because we are stupid, just like they always knew.
However, to say we shouldn't compare ourselves to others makes as much sense as saying we shouldn't look at them. Comparing yourself to other people is natural and inevitable, the problem only comes of what you make from this comparison. If you are aware of your situation and the reasons for other people's success when we couldn't make it, if that is the case, you will be able to focus precisely on what matters (the socialphobia) instead of other things.
5) They are result oriented rather than process oriented- People with SP have a tendency to focus on making friends or getting a girlfriend/boyfriend instead of working on building social skills gradually. You are unlikely to develop relationships quickly. This is a process and forming a relationship is an end goal which may take several years to accomplish. It is better to accept your current status of being single and alone and learn to like it. You can be happy with this. It is not terrible to be alone. Focus on and enjoy the process of building your social confidence and skills because you may not get results in a hurry.
No one will never develop social skills by "learning to like" solitude. How can someone be so dense? Also, each person have their own personality, you don't have to "learn to like" being alone or being with people either, we have to get rid of the influence from the disease and that's it, it's up to us to decide our likes, dislikes and everything else.
6) Magic Pill- People in general look for magic pills to solve their problems. This is loser thinking. There are no magic pills or quick fixes. work in=reward out. Get that formula into your head because its the only thing that works. The harder and longer you work at this and the more sacrifices you make the better you will get.
I would never have been able to live the small moments of happiness I had in my life without the help of medication. This is no magic, it's medicine which cures the simptoms of a disease.
And yeah, we are not working hard enough, we are not sacrificing enough, we already heard that. Stop projecting your selfish and lazy self on others.
You know what is funny? Of all the bad things, I don't remember any of the normal patronizing people I met in my life ever saying the word "loser" when talking about this.
And yet here it is, in the last place of the world where you would expect to find it. Where we come to find a moment of peace and understanding among our own.
This is just a small list I conveniently found in a single thread, but the counselors of the positive thinking are Legion, and their advices for us are infinite, coming from the uncharted depths of human stupidity and conceit.
It would not be possible to list everything they like to tell us here, but let's hope this small demonstration is enough to enlighten the most reasonable among them, if possible.
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