11. SELF-DISCLOSURE
Instead of nervously trying to hide away feelings of anxiety or shyness you openly disclose them to others by telling them that you feel shy or anxious or
embarrassed or ashamed. When they ask why explain to them what you are afraid they will say or do to you. You will often find that most people are far less critical and judgemental than you think. Once you get your fears out into the open you will often find they dissipate - if people react non-judgementally.
You see shyness and shame are often confused because they produce similar behavioural characteristics but shame is the real killer. If your ashamed of something about yourself it will inhibit you because you feel others will reject you for it. So once it gets out in the open and others are accepting the
fear disappears. Self-disclosure can be difficult if you have low self-esteem but having an attitude of CURIOSITY will help you out. SELF-ACCEPTANCE works good here even if other people are judgmental about your anxiety and shyness.
12. DEVIL'S ADVOCATE
The idea behind this technique is that once you get a negative thought that makes you afraid, it is so tempting to just avoid the feared situation that you
just give into the fear. When you want to go somewhere or do something but social anxiety tells you to stay put, you need to begin to learn how to talk back to that part of you that keeps telling you to avoid and telling you bad things will happen. With this technique the thoughts that keep telling you people will laugh or stare or do something to make you cringe is the "devil" telling you this and then you will answer back. It's best to write down a dialouge.
Here's how to do it.
YOU: I like that girl and want to ask her out.
DEVIL: No! don't do it. She'll crack up in your face and everyone will laugh at you.
YOU: So what if she does ? I don't care anymore. I'm sick and tired of being so lonely and isolated like this and always being scared.
DEVIL: But think about it first. Do you really want to risk rejection. It will be SO humilating and that's really bad.
YOU: Big deal. Rejection and humilation are no where near as bad as being in my house everyday feeling like my life is wasting away.
DEVIL: Trust me. That little trade off is worth it.
YOU: Are you kidding me. It sucks big time.
DEVIL: Does it really matter how much it sucks ?
YOU: If it doesn't matter how much something sucks, then why are you telling me rejection and humilation are so bad.
DEVIL: It just is. Trust me.
YOU: Trust you ? I've listened to you all my life. But now it's time for me to stop listening to you for once at least.
DEVIL: You'll be sorry.
YOU: That's ok. Even if I am rejected, it won't be the end of the world. Sure it might be somewhat embarrassing but I sure I will handle it.
13. Shame-Attacking Exercises
Instead of trying to look relaxed and confident, intentionally do something foolish like pretend to lose you train of thought. Do something that you are afraid of doing like being really shy. So around others you would behave really shy and timid even if you don't feel shy. Make your voice shaky and cracked
or let your hands tremble. Look to see if people say or do anything about it. Your world won't come crashing down. If you are humiliated by rejection from
someone just stand their showing them just how much they have broken your heart. Be creative and come up with different things to try. CURIOSITY, EXTERNAL FOCUS, MINDFULNESS, OVER-COMPENSATION and SUBMISSION work good with this. Doing things that make you feel ashamed or embarrassed can be tough but they pay off in big ways as you will see people don't really bother much and just get on with their own things. Unless you hurt someone else or affect them emotionally most people will not even care what you say or do and will probably be too shy themselves to say or do anything anyway!
14. Humorous Imagining
The magnification of other people's qualities can cause shyness of them. Therefore you should try to see them in a different light. A person you are really shy of you might imagine them having really hairy armpits or really bad breath. Imagine what they would be like on the toilet after a hot curry. Imagine them in their pyjamas and slippers. They have long yellow dirty toe nails and smelly feet. What would they look like without any hair or teeth or limbs ? What if there skin was green or blue ? Would you still see them as someone to be afraid of ?
The whole point of these exercises is to get you up and out of your automatic ingrained thinking that causes social anxiety in the first place. The more you exercise those thoughts the more ingrained and automatic they become. The less you do the weaker they become. The more you practice any cognitive anti-anxiety technique the quicker it will begin to activate when you need it. This will not happen overnight. It can take months or even years.
15. Gruesome Imagining
Imagine what happens to a person when they are run over by a train. Their body is mangeled or cut into various pieces. Their face may be squashed in by the sheer weight of the train. Their brain is lying on the tracks and their intestines are strewn all over the place. There are large chunks of flesh just lying there. They have lost all of their blood. Not a pretty sight. This can happen to anyone who is in the way of train or any machine. How can this happen ? I thought bullies were invincible. They sure made me think they were. I thought hot women were so great and were a great investment and nothing could ever happen to them ebcause they were at the top of the totem pole. Yet living creatures are surprisingly delicate against moving metal parts - including bullies and hot women. If you are afraid of someone's rejection you may want to imagine them in such a situation. Perhaps researching the stages of human decomposition may help you understand that social anxiety is all pointless in the end. No point in being so afraid of others since they will all be dead one day.
Seeing and understanding death can help get you motivated into helping yourself do the things you want because it may help you realize you will end up dead at some point down the track. It sure gave me some motivation to do things.
16. Comparison Technique
Compare yourself to other people. Ok, ok, I thought others were so much better than me because they went out to nightclubs, got drunk, got laid, went to parties, were great conversationalists, liked rap/techno/R&B music, hung out in groups, talked to the other gender. Then when people where in their 30s they were married and had children. So because I didn't do these things or wasn't interested in anyting the majority was I was weird and different. If I didn't have a mobile phone or heaps of mp3s I was a "loser" or "sad". This is what I was led to believe. But apparently I was lied to...again! It seems that society has a nastly habit of force-feeding bulldust down people's throat. So I sat down and compared myself to others in how I was the same as them. I saw them eat and drink. I heard them complaining about feeling hungry and thirsty. I heard them speak. I heard them breath. I saw them use a toilet. I saw they walked on the ground. I heard them wanting to go to sleep. I saw them use their five senses. I saw them getting sexually excited. They all apparently lived on Earth under the same sky. So you know what ? It occured to me that I was very much the same as the next person! It was more mental stuff that people compared themselves to others but other than that they all seemed very much alike. So next time you think you are so very different, just think of this.
17. Acceptance Paradox
Accept all your flaws with tranquility and a sense of humour. Let's say you are shy and hate it then think who cares, that's the way things are. The way things are are perfectly fine. If you can't talk well with other people, it doesn't matter, that's just the way things are. If people are rejecting and critical, you have no control over how they react, so let them be. Let them say what they want. If your self-esteem takes a battering over other people's words just agree with what others say and accept it with grace. If you feel embarrassed around someone for feeling attracted to them just accept the feelings of attraction and embarrassment. If you tell yourself you are a loser or something similar, agree with what you think you are. If you have a desire that you feel ashamed of or anything you don't like about yourself do the same. If you agree with those things, you end up making piece with yourself. This technique can be difficult to grasp at first but is really powerful once you can accept the way you feel and the things that happen to you. Writing out a dialogue will help.
CRITIC: I'd hate to be a virgin like you.
SHY GUY: Yeah it is strange for someone as old as me to be a virgin, isn't it ?
CRITIC: Ahhh, yeah it is very strange. It's real funny too. LOL
SHY GUY: I often laugh about it as well. But if I wanted to do something about it I would but it doesn't bother me.
CRITIC: Doesn't bother you. WTF! Are you gay or something.
SHY GUY: I guess I'm even more strange than I thought. Oh well.
CRITIC: Oh man, I feel so sorry for you. Being a virgin at your age just give me this feeling like I'm on a barren lifeless wasteland that supports nothing.
SHY GUY: A barren lifeless wasteland supports itself, doesn't it ?
CRITIC: Yeah, but there is just something not right about a man your age being a virgin and never being in any kind of relationship. It's just so weird.
SHY GUY: Many things are weird, but once you understand them, they no longer are weird.
CRITIC: Why don't you want to lose your virginity ? Isn't that every man's dream ?
SHY GUY: Yeah, it was a dream once, but no longer. I have different aspirations now, like painting and playing instuments.
CRITIC: This is so sad.
SHY GUY: What can I say, people fall into circumstance and things happen because I believe these things were meant to happen when they were born. People just follow their script without thinking about taking another path. They think and feel and just follow through. If they get into a conversation with someone they like and that person likes them, they just decide to get into a relationship. That's just the normal thing people do. They follow their desires. That was in their script. Me, however, think and feel, but choose NOT to follow through with things simply because I want to be different. It causes temporary pain and grief over loss but that goes away. I chose to dishonor my needs and desires when I was younger for various personal reason but I consciously chose this path.
(But alas, now I realize I have all along followed the script that was written when I was born. D'oh!)
18. Hidden Emotion Technique
Have you ever been really angry with someone and then start getting all these thought about what you think about them ? It seems that under stress like anger or fear, hidden feelings and truths and motivations start to emerge into consciousness. How is this connected to social anxiety ? The reasons you get anxious are buried out of reach from consciousness. Asking questions is a good way for the mind to start revealing and dealing with potentional conflicts and problems. You need to sit down and really think about how such things relate to you. Here is a bunch of questions I came up with in trying to reduce my shyness of the other gender.
am I afraid of havign sex with a girl ?
does she expect me to be sexually competent ?
does she expect me to be perfect at making love ?
do I expect to disappoint her sexually ?
will she be disapproving of me if I want sex from her ?
do I feel guilty or ashamed for wanting sex ?
do expect to go to hell for having unmarried sex ?
what is my attitude towards sex anyway ? Is it dirty or naughty ?
how do I feel about being naked, holding an erection in front of someone ?
will I be able to control my excitment around a girl ?
if she found out I was inexperienceed or saw I was anxious or shy, would she think less of me ?
do I really want to be in a relationship ?
am I even ready to be in a relationship ?
can I trust a girl with my feelings ?
would a girl cheat on or leave me ?
could I handle the pain of a broken heart or the humiliation if she cheated on me ?
if she died a few years later on, would I be able to handle the pain of a loss ?
what if she didn't feel the same when she found out I liked her ? How could I handle the embarrassment ?
what if she did feel the same about me ? What would be the next step ?
how would she react if she knew I was attracted to her ? Angry, rejecting ?
do I have something to hide from her ?
am I ashamed about anything of myself ? Appearance, no friends, quiet, lack of interests, being boring, social anxiety ?
what don't I like about myself ?
am I attracted to or have feelings for her ?
am I worried about what to say or do around a girl ?
if I did or said something wrong how do I expect her to react ?
what I do feel her expectations of me are ?
what are my expectations of myself ?
is there anything I might be jealous of about her ?
Asking questions is extremely helpful in allowing the mind to start dealing with these potential problesm in advance. If there are underlyings issues once you start asking questions relating to your problems the mind starts to generate potential solutions for them rather than just drawing disastraous conclusions in the moment. Just thinking "oh, when the time comes I will know" does not work all the time because for many people the anxiety is due to the great unknown. So thinking about these important things in advanced will help settle that anxious mind of yours.
19. Socratic Questioning
When you feel anxious or embarrased for no apparant reason, have an anxious thought, when someone humiliates you or you anticipate something, you might try to figure it out why it is bothering you but just can't seem to pin the whole thing down. You can't seem to process it, conceptualize or understand it. It's too complex or overwhelming. To get through these problems you write the problem down and ask yourself questions about it. Here are some questions to help you out.
what does this mean about me, about my life, my future ? What will this mean in one years time ?
what am I afraid might happen ?
what if my fears came true ? What is the worst thing that could possibly happen ?
have I been in this or a similar situation before ? Did my fears come true ?
could I handle the situation if it came true ? What would I do ?
What would it mean if it was true ? what could people possibly do ? What would they say ?
how likely is this to be true ? Certain, possibly, unlikely, definetely not ?
am I being unfair or harsh in myself or others ?
am I thinking in a distorted way ? Ignoring the positive, making predictions, exaggerating ?
am I using memories from the past to draw conclusions ?
what does this mean about other peopel if this is true ?
what does this mean other people are thinking or feelings about me ?
what evidence is there that this is not true ? Does anyone else think differently ?
has this happened to anyone else ? How did they handle it ? How did other react to them ?
what might other people know that I don't ?
what does this person mean to me anyway ?
20. Downward Arrow Technique
When you feel anxious and want to figure out what underlying thought is generating it you use this method. It will help you reveal underlying beleifs, values and attitudes you hold about yourself and hold towards others. You simply write the situation down and ask yourself an appropriate question such as "what am I afraid of ?" or "why did this upset me ?" then you draw an arrow under it and answewr the question and ask another approriate question. Here is how to do it ?
A hot girl talked to me (what's so bad about that ?)
V
Nothing I suppose (well, then why did you get anxious ?)
V
I felt I didn't really know what to say (why did you feel you didn't know what to say ?)
V
I guess I thought I needed something interesting to say (why something interesting ?)
V
Perhaps I felt I needed to impress her (why did you think you needed to impress her ?)
V
She probably wouldn't like me otherwise (what does that say about her if that was true ?)
V
That she's probably just a stupid mole (what does that mean if that was true ?)
V
She can't be trusted
Once you get an answer like that you are pretty much done with the technqiue. You could alter the questions to see what different responses you get. In this example, a belief about the girl was uncovered. Different questions could reveal other things like about yourself. Anyway, the cause of the anxiety was uncovered. Now you must work on altering it through cognitive work then behavioural testing. DO CBT.
21. What-If Technique
This is similar to the downward arrow technique. The questions asked are such as "what if that happened ?", "what is so bad about that ?". Here is how it works.
Why don't you go over and ask her out ?
V
She'll get angry and reject me (what if she did that ?)
V
I'll look like a fool (what if you did look like one ?)
V
Other might laugh or get angry with me for making her angry (what if they did ?)
V
The'll remind me how much they do not like me everytime I see them (if they did ?)
V
I wouldn't be able to stand up to them (why is that so frightening ?)
V
I'll get hurt (if that happened ?)
V
Other people who knew me will lose respect for me for being hurt (why is that so bad ?)
V
They wouldn't like me anymore (what if that happened ?)
V
I'll become a total reject (what is so frightening about that ?)
V
I'll have no one to turn for help anymore (what is so frightening about that ?)
V
I wouldn't be able to survive on my own
The final answer will tend to really mean something to you, like a light bulb lighting up in your mind. So once you hit an answer like the above you are basically done. It may seem strange at first, but a belief like that can cause a fear of rejection from a potential mate. You may dozens or even hundreds of negative beliefs. Uncovering a belief is one step closer to doing something about your anxiety. You then need to alter it. First use cogntive work to
challenge and weaken it then behavioural work to test it and later it. DO CBT.
Instead of nervously trying to hide away feelings of anxiety or shyness you openly disclose them to others by telling them that you feel shy or anxious or
embarrassed or ashamed. When they ask why explain to them what you are afraid they will say or do to you. You will often find that most people are far less critical and judgemental than you think. Once you get your fears out into the open you will often find they dissipate - if people react non-judgementally.
You see shyness and shame are often confused because they produce similar behavioural characteristics but shame is the real killer. If your ashamed of something about yourself it will inhibit you because you feel others will reject you for it. So once it gets out in the open and others are accepting the
fear disappears. Self-disclosure can be difficult if you have low self-esteem but having an attitude of CURIOSITY will help you out. SELF-ACCEPTANCE works good here even if other people are judgmental about your anxiety and shyness.
12. DEVIL'S ADVOCATE
The idea behind this technique is that once you get a negative thought that makes you afraid, it is so tempting to just avoid the feared situation that you
just give into the fear. When you want to go somewhere or do something but social anxiety tells you to stay put, you need to begin to learn how to talk back to that part of you that keeps telling you to avoid and telling you bad things will happen. With this technique the thoughts that keep telling you people will laugh or stare or do something to make you cringe is the "devil" telling you this and then you will answer back. It's best to write down a dialouge.
Here's how to do it.
YOU: I like that girl and want to ask her out.
DEVIL: No! don't do it. She'll crack up in your face and everyone will laugh at you.
YOU: So what if she does ? I don't care anymore. I'm sick and tired of being so lonely and isolated like this and always being scared.
DEVIL: But think about it first. Do you really want to risk rejection. It will be SO humilating and that's really bad.
YOU: Big deal. Rejection and humilation are no where near as bad as being in my house everyday feeling like my life is wasting away.
DEVIL: Trust me. That little trade off is worth it.
YOU: Are you kidding me. It sucks big time.
DEVIL: Does it really matter how much it sucks ?
YOU: If it doesn't matter how much something sucks, then why are you telling me rejection and humilation are so bad.
DEVIL: It just is. Trust me.
YOU: Trust you ? I've listened to you all my life. But now it's time for me to stop listening to you for once at least.
DEVIL: You'll be sorry.
YOU: That's ok. Even if I am rejected, it won't be the end of the world. Sure it might be somewhat embarrassing but I sure I will handle it.
13. Shame-Attacking Exercises
Instead of trying to look relaxed and confident, intentionally do something foolish like pretend to lose you train of thought. Do something that you are afraid of doing like being really shy. So around others you would behave really shy and timid even if you don't feel shy. Make your voice shaky and cracked
or let your hands tremble. Look to see if people say or do anything about it. Your world won't come crashing down. If you are humiliated by rejection from
someone just stand their showing them just how much they have broken your heart. Be creative and come up with different things to try. CURIOSITY, EXTERNAL FOCUS, MINDFULNESS, OVER-COMPENSATION and SUBMISSION work good with this. Doing things that make you feel ashamed or embarrassed can be tough but they pay off in big ways as you will see people don't really bother much and just get on with their own things. Unless you hurt someone else or affect them emotionally most people will not even care what you say or do and will probably be too shy themselves to say or do anything anyway!
14. Humorous Imagining
The magnification of other people's qualities can cause shyness of them. Therefore you should try to see them in a different light. A person you are really shy of you might imagine them having really hairy armpits or really bad breath. Imagine what they would be like on the toilet after a hot curry. Imagine them in their pyjamas and slippers. They have long yellow dirty toe nails and smelly feet. What would they look like without any hair or teeth or limbs ? What if there skin was green or blue ? Would you still see them as someone to be afraid of ?
The whole point of these exercises is to get you up and out of your automatic ingrained thinking that causes social anxiety in the first place. The more you exercise those thoughts the more ingrained and automatic they become. The less you do the weaker they become. The more you practice any cognitive anti-anxiety technique the quicker it will begin to activate when you need it. This will not happen overnight. It can take months or even years.
15. Gruesome Imagining
Imagine what happens to a person when they are run over by a train. Their body is mangeled or cut into various pieces. Their face may be squashed in by the sheer weight of the train. Their brain is lying on the tracks and their intestines are strewn all over the place. There are large chunks of flesh just lying there. They have lost all of their blood. Not a pretty sight. This can happen to anyone who is in the way of train or any machine. How can this happen ? I thought bullies were invincible. They sure made me think they were. I thought hot women were so great and were a great investment and nothing could ever happen to them ebcause they were at the top of the totem pole. Yet living creatures are surprisingly delicate against moving metal parts - including bullies and hot women. If you are afraid of someone's rejection you may want to imagine them in such a situation. Perhaps researching the stages of human decomposition may help you understand that social anxiety is all pointless in the end. No point in being so afraid of others since they will all be dead one day.
Seeing and understanding death can help get you motivated into helping yourself do the things you want because it may help you realize you will end up dead at some point down the track. It sure gave me some motivation to do things.
16. Comparison Technique
Compare yourself to other people. Ok, ok, I thought others were so much better than me because they went out to nightclubs, got drunk, got laid, went to parties, were great conversationalists, liked rap/techno/R&B music, hung out in groups, talked to the other gender. Then when people where in their 30s they were married and had children. So because I didn't do these things or wasn't interested in anyting the majority was I was weird and different. If I didn't have a mobile phone or heaps of mp3s I was a "loser" or "sad". This is what I was led to believe. But apparently I was lied to...again! It seems that society has a nastly habit of force-feeding bulldust down people's throat. So I sat down and compared myself to others in how I was the same as them. I saw them eat and drink. I heard them complaining about feeling hungry and thirsty. I heard them speak. I heard them breath. I saw them use a toilet. I saw they walked on the ground. I heard them wanting to go to sleep. I saw them use their five senses. I saw them getting sexually excited. They all apparently lived on Earth under the same sky. So you know what ? It occured to me that I was very much the same as the next person! It was more mental stuff that people compared themselves to others but other than that they all seemed very much alike. So next time you think you are so very different, just think of this.
17. Acceptance Paradox
Accept all your flaws with tranquility and a sense of humour. Let's say you are shy and hate it then think who cares, that's the way things are. The way things are are perfectly fine. If you can't talk well with other people, it doesn't matter, that's just the way things are. If people are rejecting and critical, you have no control over how they react, so let them be. Let them say what they want. If your self-esteem takes a battering over other people's words just agree with what others say and accept it with grace. If you feel embarrassed around someone for feeling attracted to them just accept the feelings of attraction and embarrassment. If you tell yourself you are a loser or something similar, agree with what you think you are. If you have a desire that you feel ashamed of or anything you don't like about yourself do the same. If you agree with those things, you end up making piece with yourself. This technique can be difficult to grasp at first but is really powerful once you can accept the way you feel and the things that happen to you. Writing out a dialogue will help.
CRITIC: I'd hate to be a virgin like you.
SHY GUY: Yeah it is strange for someone as old as me to be a virgin, isn't it ?
CRITIC: Ahhh, yeah it is very strange. It's real funny too. LOL
SHY GUY: I often laugh about it as well. But if I wanted to do something about it I would but it doesn't bother me.
CRITIC: Doesn't bother you. WTF! Are you gay or something.
SHY GUY: I guess I'm even more strange than I thought. Oh well.
CRITIC: Oh man, I feel so sorry for you. Being a virgin at your age just give me this feeling like I'm on a barren lifeless wasteland that supports nothing.
SHY GUY: A barren lifeless wasteland supports itself, doesn't it ?
CRITIC: Yeah, but there is just something not right about a man your age being a virgin and never being in any kind of relationship. It's just so weird.
SHY GUY: Many things are weird, but once you understand them, they no longer are weird.
CRITIC: Why don't you want to lose your virginity ? Isn't that every man's dream ?
SHY GUY: Yeah, it was a dream once, but no longer. I have different aspirations now, like painting and playing instuments.
CRITIC: This is so sad.
SHY GUY: What can I say, people fall into circumstance and things happen because I believe these things were meant to happen when they were born. People just follow their script without thinking about taking another path. They think and feel and just follow through. If they get into a conversation with someone they like and that person likes them, they just decide to get into a relationship. That's just the normal thing people do. They follow their desires. That was in their script. Me, however, think and feel, but choose NOT to follow through with things simply because I want to be different. It causes temporary pain and grief over loss but that goes away. I chose to dishonor my needs and desires when I was younger for various personal reason but I consciously chose this path.
(But alas, now I realize I have all along followed the script that was written when I was born. D'oh!)
18. Hidden Emotion Technique
Have you ever been really angry with someone and then start getting all these thought about what you think about them ? It seems that under stress like anger or fear, hidden feelings and truths and motivations start to emerge into consciousness. How is this connected to social anxiety ? The reasons you get anxious are buried out of reach from consciousness. Asking questions is a good way for the mind to start revealing and dealing with potentional conflicts and problems. You need to sit down and really think about how such things relate to you. Here is a bunch of questions I came up with in trying to reduce my shyness of the other gender.
am I afraid of havign sex with a girl ?
does she expect me to be sexually competent ?
does she expect me to be perfect at making love ?
do I expect to disappoint her sexually ?
will she be disapproving of me if I want sex from her ?
do I feel guilty or ashamed for wanting sex ?
do expect to go to hell for having unmarried sex ?
what is my attitude towards sex anyway ? Is it dirty or naughty ?
how do I feel about being naked, holding an erection in front of someone ?
will I be able to control my excitment around a girl ?
if she found out I was inexperienceed or saw I was anxious or shy, would she think less of me ?
do I really want to be in a relationship ?
am I even ready to be in a relationship ?
can I trust a girl with my feelings ?
would a girl cheat on or leave me ?
could I handle the pain of a broken heart or the humiliation if she cheated on me ?
if she died a few years later on, would I be able to handle the pain of a loss ?
what if she didn't feel the same when she found out I liked her ? How could I handle the embarrassment ?
what if she did feel the same about me ? What would be the next step ?
how would she react if she knew I was attracted to her ? Angry, rejecting ?
do I have something to hide from her ?
am I ashamed about anything of myself ? Appearance, no friends, quiet, lack of interests, being boring, social anxiety ?
what don't I like about myself ?
am I attracted to or have feelings for her ?
am I worried about what to say or do around a girl ?
if I did or said something wrong how do I expect her to react ?
what I do feel her expectations of me are ?
what are my expectations of myself ?
is there anything I might be jealous of about her ?
Asking questions is extremely helpful in allowing the mind to start dealing with these potential problesm in advance. If there are underlyings issues once you start asking questions relating to your problems the mind starts to generate potential solutions for them rather than just drawing disastraous conclusions in the moment. Just thinking "oh, when the time comes I will know" does not work all the time because for many people the anxiety is due to the great unknown. So thinking about these important things in advanced will help settle that anxious mind of yours.
19. Socratic Questioning
When you feel anxious or embarrased for no apparant reason, have an anxious thought, when someone humiliates you or you anticipate something, you might try to figure it out why it is bothering you but just can't seem to pin the whole thing down. You can't seem to process it, conceptualize or understand it. It's too complex or overwhelming. To get through these problems you write the problem down and ask yourself questions about it. Here are some questions to help you out.
what does this mean about me, about my life, my future ? What will this mean in one years time ?
what am I afraid might happen ?
what if my fears came true ? What is the worst thing that could possibly happen ?
have I been in this or a similar situation before ? Did my fears come true ?
could I handle the situation if it came true ? What would I do ?
What would it mean if it was true ? what could people possibly do ? What would they say ?
how likely is this to be true ? Certain, possibly, unlikely, definetely not ?
am I being unfair or harsh in myself or others ?
am I thinking in a distorted way ? Ignoring the positive, making predictions, exaggerating ?
am I using memories from the past to draw conclusions ?
what does this mean about other peopel if this is true ?
what does this mean other people are thinking or feelings about me ?
what evidence is there that this is not true ? Does anyone else think differently ?
has this happened to anyone else ? How did they handle it ? How did other react to them ?
what might other people know that I don't ?
what does this person mean to me anyway ?
20. Downward Arrow Technique
When you feel anxious and want to figure out what underlying thought is generating it you use this method. It will help you reveal underlying beleifs, values and attitudes you hold about yourself and hold towards others. You simply write the situation down and ask yourself an appropriate question such as "what am I afraid of ?" or "why did this upset me ?" then you draw an arrow under it and answewr the question and ask another approriate question. Here is how to do it ?
A hot girl talked to me (what's so bad about that ?)
V
Nothing I suppose (well, then why did you get anxious ?)
V
I felt I didn't really know what to say (why did you feel you didn't know what to say ?)
V
I guess I thought I needed something interesting to say (why something interesting ?)
V
Perhaps I felt I needed to impress her (why did you think you needed to impress her ?)
V
She probably wouldn't like me otherwise (what does that say about her if that was true ?)
V
That she's probably just a stupid mole (what does that mean if that was true ?)
V
She can't be trusted
Once you get an answer like that you are pretty much done with the technqiue. You could alter the questions to see what different responses you get. In this example, a belief about the girl was uncovered. Different questions could reveal other things like about yourself. Anyway, the cause of the anxiety was uncovered. Now you must work on altering it through cognitive work then behavioural testing. DO CBT.
21. What-If Technique
This is similar to the downward arrow technique. The questions asked are such as "what if that happened ?", "what is so bad about that ?". Here is how it works.
Why don't you go over and ask her out ?
V
She'll get angry and reject me (what if she did that ?)
V
I'll look like a fool (what if you did look like one ?)
V
Other might laugh or get angry with me for making her angry (what if they did ?)
V
The'll remind me how much they do not like me everytime I see them (if they did ?)
V
I wouldn't be able to stand up to them (why is that so frightening ?)
V
I'll get hurt (if that happened ?)
V
Other people who knew me will lose respect for me for being hurt (why is that so bad ?)
V
They wouldn't like me anymore (what if that happened ?)
V
I'll become a total reject (what is so frightening about that ?)
V
I'll have no one to turn for help anymore (what is so frightening about that ?)
V
I wouldn't be able to survive on my own
The final answer will tend to really mean something to you, like a light bulb lighting up in your mind. So once you hit an answer like the above you are basically done. It may seem strange at first, but a belief like that can cause a fear of rejection from a potential mate. You may dozens or even hundreds of negative beliefs. Uncovering a belief is one step closer to doing something about your anxiety. You then need to alter it. First use cogntive work to
challenge and weaken it then behavioural work to test it and later it. DO CBT.
