I am just wondering how big a deal this is in our confidence problems. I think I mentioned this in one of my posts but people may not have seen it.
For me social anxiety is a funny term - because around friends, family, work colleagues I am comfortable around, I am as confident as the next person. Around old people I don't care what they think of me. Whereas my boss, meeting a new person, having to do public speaking in front of lots of people or being around a girl but don't really know - I feel like I am an absolute nervous wreck.
One thing I am so so so so so afraid of is that they will see how unconfident I am and think I am weird because of it. I don't how many people can relate, but when I get so anxious I start to find it so hard to speak - my throat goes crazy, I need to swallow like every 5 seconds and I just feel so humiliated. The prospect of being humiliated like scares the hell out of me, its happened before and I just wanted to die, I left thinking oh my god, how embarrassing, they must think I am so weird - that I couldn't get my words out and that I was shaking. Does anyone else fear people seeing your lack of confidence like that? For instance I was told by my boss that I had to go and collect some documents once from an office where there was a girl I really liked. I was so so so scared because not only did I fear her seeing my perceived flaw over my perceived ugliness and judge me negatively, but I was so scared she would see my flaw of my zero confidence and think 'God he is really strange and weird'. I ended up going to collect the documents at lunch time and luckily she wasn't there and I felt relieved, but still nervous as there were lots of girls in there.
But anyway, my whole point is - how much does confidence come down to fearing that you are not confident and that you fear people will see your inadequate confidence and judge you negatively because of it? I mean why are you or I not very confident? If all it takes is to just do something and not worry, what is stopping us doing it? Surely anyone can do something like public speaking - because we can speak, we are intelligent enough to write something to read out. But is it because we fear that our perceived flaw of having very little confidence will be noticed and we will be judged in a very negative way because of it? I mean how come we are confident around people we are comfortable around such as friends and family - isn't that because we don't worry about our perceived flaw around those people?
How come we get most anxious and unconfident in situations which we really don't want people to see our lack of confidence - such as interviews when you want to come across confident, public speaking - when lots of people will judge us, making conversation with someone you are attracted to but don't really know, meeting someone for the first time - all of these situations we really want to come across as confident, we are very aware of that and put a lot of pressure on ourselves that we have to be confident.
Well does that not suggest that one huge part of the answer to becoming confident is simply to not fear at all if you come across as not confident? Think about a situation in which you know you will be anxious and nervous and think how you would be if you were no longer worried about how confident you will be, you are not worried/fearful whatsoever if you act unconfident, if your voice is shakey, if you shake, etc, etc - if you did not fear any of that, how much easier would it be to do things, how much of your current nervousness/anxiety will disappear?
For instance I hate speaking and explaining something long winded to someone new or to a group of people - and the biggest reason is that I am so afraid that I will not be able to cope and this will be noticed and the humiliation that will happen when my voice goes and I am shaking with nerves. If I didn't fear these problems happening and didn't fear what people think when that happens, then I just think the whole fear of the situation will ease greatly. Anyone agree?
If you believe this is something that you can relate very much to and something that causes you to be very anxious when interacting with people, then I really think the way to become confident is to remove these fears, to desensitise the fears that its so terrible if people see we are not confident, to believe it doesn't matter if we show any nervous traits or if we mess up because the nerves get the better of us. Because the truth is it doesn't matter. I did a presentation once and my voice went and I was shaking. I was so distraught, I was so ashamed, so humiliated. But no one said anything nasty, people were nice to me. Even recently I cringed about that event, but I bet no one remembers, I bet no one thought any worse of me as a person and I didn't get hurt, I am still here today fine. So I think our beliefs about these things are wrong and exaggerated to believe its such a terrible thing if we mess up. If we believe who cares, it doesn't matter - would we be a lot more confident when interacting?
For me social anxiety is a funny term - because around friends, family, work colleagues I am comfortable around, I am as confident as the next person. Around old people I don't care what they think of me. Whereas my boss, meeting a new person, having to do public speaking in front of lots of people or being around a girl but don't really know - I feel like I am an absolute nervous wreck.
One thing I am so so so so so afraid of is that they will see how unconfident I am and think I am weird because of it. I don't how many people can relate, but when I get so anxious I start to find it so hard to speak - my throat goes crazy, I need to swallow like every 5 seconds and I just feel so humiliated. The prospect of being humiliated like scares the hell out of me, its happened before and I just wanted to die, I left thinking oh my god, how embarrassing, they must think I am so weird - that I couldn't get my words out and that I was shaking. Does anyone else fear people seeing your lack of confidence like that? For instance I was told by my boss that I had to go and collect some documents once from an office where there was a girl I really liked. I was so so so scared because not only did I fear her seeing my perceived flaw over my perceived ugliness and judge me negatively, but I was so scared she would see my flaw of my zero confidence and think 'God he is really strange and weird'. I ended up going to collect the documents at lunch time and luckily she wasn't there and I felt relieved, but still nervous as there were lots of girls in there.
But anyway, my whole point is - how much does confidence come down to fearing that you are not confident and that you fear people will see your inadequate confidence and judge you negatively because of it? I mean why are you or I not very confident? If all it takes is to just do something and not worry, what is stopping us doing it? Surely anyone can do something like public speaking - because we can speak, we are intelligent enough to write something to read out. But is it because we fear that our perceived flaw of having very little confidence will be noticed and we will be judged in a very negative way because of it? I mean how come we are confident around people we are comfortable around such as friends and family - isn't that because we don't worry about our perceived flaw around those people?
How come we get most anxious and unconfident in situations which we really don't want people to see our lack of confidence - such as interviews when you want to come across confident, public speaking - when lots of people will judge us, making conversation with someone you are attracted to but don't really know, meeting someone for the first time - all of these situations we really want to come across as confident, we are very aware of that and put a lot of pressure on ourselves that we have to be confident.
Well does that not suggest that one huge part of the answer to becoming confident is simply to not fear at all if you come across as not confident? Think about a situation in which you know you will be anxious and nervous and think how you would be if you were no longer worried about how confident you will be, you are not worried/fearful whatsoever if you act unconfident, if your voice is shakey, if you shake, etc, etc - if you did not fear any of that, how much easier would it be to do things, how much of your current nervousness/anxiety will disappear?
For instance I hate speaking and explaining something long winded to someone new or to a group of people - and the biggest reason is that I am so afraid that I will not be able to cope and this will be noticed and the humiliation that will happen when my voice goes and I am shaking with nerves. If I didn't fear these problems happening and didn't fear what people think when that happens, then I just think the whole fear of the situation will ease greatly. Anyone agree?
If you believe this is something that you can relate very much to and something that causes you to be very anxious when interacting with people, then I really think the way to become confident is to remove these fears, to desensitise the fears that its so terrible if people see we are not confident, to believe it doesn't matter if we show any nervous traits or if we mess up because the nerves get the better of us. Because the truth is it doesn't matter. I did a presentation once and my voice went and I was shaking. I was so distraught, I was so ashamed, so humiliated. But no one said anything nasty, people were nice to me. Even recently I cringed about that event, but I bet no one remembers, I bet no one thought any worse of me as a person and I didn't get hurt, I am still here today fine. So I think our beliefs about these things are wrong and exaggerated to believe its such a terrible thing if we mess up. If we believe who cares, it doesn't matter - would we be a lot more confident when interacting?