Social Anxiety/Phobia Boot Camp!

[Conquer]

Hello all, I have been suffering from social phobia for about a year and have been shy for the vast majority of my life. I intend on reclaiming my life and that begins with facing my fears. To do this I must eliminate my safety behavioral responses I have been too accustomed to, mainly the complete avoidance of feared social situations.

It is my desire to start an online social phobia/anxiety boot camp in which we have weekly goals (for example making eye contact with 40 people the first week) that will remove us from our accustomed comfort zone. We should all strive to take some sort of social risk on a daily basis that makes us uncomfortable. Of course this needs to be done in baby steps and at your own pace that challenges you, yet does not overwhelm.

Bewared that partaking in this boot camp will require serious dedication on your part; reading the related articles on the weekly objective, going out on the “field” and practicing certain techniques, meeting the objective, sharing your experience and writing a few journal questions that will assist us in getting a better understanding of ourselves. If you find it too difficult to keep up with the weekly goal just allot yourself more time to reach the objective (Two weeks instead of one). Remember the entire point of this boot camp is to put us in an uncomfortable situation and hopefully in time after facing our fears we can overcome them. We need at least a couple of people to partake if this is going to be anything worthwhile, the boot camp will begin this week depending on how many decide to participate, I will post the first week’s objectives, journal responses and required reading material

I’d like to leave you with a passage I found that is quite appropriate for this topic: “A boat that never ventures beyond its moorings will never be damaged, but that’s not what boats are made for. Similarly, a human being who never dares to walk into the unknown spaces of his or her life will never get hurt – but that is not what humans were designed for. Clinging to safe shores in your life is nothing more than making a choice to remain imprisoned by your fears”. – Robin Sharma

 

[despise]

yes...that sounds very scary...
i WOULD have joined...but my family has only just recently started to understand social phobia...so i'm getting treated differently by everyone (they told all my relatives and teachers [another reason to feel uncomfortable around them!]) and im going to see professionals about this. so, it's probably best if i don't jump into everything all at once...because that's sure how it feels at the moment!

but that is a very good idea good luck with it!

 

[black_mamba]

I think this idea is wonderful, but not entirely suitable for me.

Firstly, when you mentioned the phrase boot camp I imagined a wonderful summer camp of random people meeting and carrying out various activities, sports etc & generally having fun (with the hidden intention being to meet new people of course).

Ok, so I got it slightly wrong, but I still think you're idea has potential. The idea you suggested of meeting 40 new people as a first assignment is quite a jump...maybe if you started easy and built up progressively, more people would be inclined to try it out.

I would certainly give it a go, let us know of a more definite structure you would like to propose and I'll get back to you.

 

[Conquer]

Worrydoll I know it might sound scary, even a bit intimidating. The question is are you willing to feel uncomfortable in social situations in the short-term, in order to feel more comfortable in the long term? Avoidance is the single worst thing you can do, because it only reinforces your negative beliefs. I hope you consider participating.

Despise good luck, I wish I was able to tell more people about my social anxiety disorder but it is so much easier to keep it to myself.

Black_mamba I agree we should start off easy, in fact from the very basic social skills and work our way up. Until I actually thought about it recently, I have rarely performed the very basic social skills, looking into a stranger’s eyes, maintaining that eye contract, smiling or even saying “good morning”. Hopefully by mastering these concepts it will provide a solid foundation to further conquer our fears and build confidence in our social self.

I have been reading through several social anxiety sources and compiling noteworthy exercises. I should have a rough outline of the entire boot camp by the afternoon, the first week’s objectives and journal responses. The first week will be used to get our feet wet so to speak, and will deal with eye contact, nothing too overwhelming.

 

[black_mamba]

Sounds good.

I tend to force myself to do little exercises like this a lot to try and get comfortable with people; today I forced myself to say a proper hello, afternoon rather than just plonking my butt down next to my classmates.

Another one was quite a biggie; wanted to write for my student paper so chose a story which required a LOT of research. Took me a long time to muster up the courage but I did it eventually; interviewed two PhD students face to face and one member of staff over the phone.

Scary stuff, but I did it all knowing I would feel a big sense of achievement afterwards. There are times however, when I simply cannot face anybody. I hope you're not expecting consistant results, Conquer.

 

[Conquer]

Mamba I have to agree, there is nothing like that sense of achievement, especially when it comes to raising your self-esteem. Also I would be lying if I said that everyone (that includes myself) is capable of consistent improvement, there will be setbacks no doubt. I would consider conquering this fear to something like weight loss. An obese person who exercises regularly and follows a proper diet will weigh himself or herself once every week to measure their progress. However not every week will they lose weight, some weeks they might actually find that they have gained weight. But if they plot their weekly weights on a graph they notice an OVERALL DOWN WARD TREND in the LONG TERM, all as a result of their SHORT TERM OBJECTIVES AND SACRIFICES, regular exercise and dieting.

So in the end we must win a series of individual battles (looking a particular stranger in the eyes) before we can win the war (social anxiety). I hope people don't get discouraged if they don't see immediate results right away.

 

[Conquer]

Here is a brief syllabus for all who are interested in partaking. Upon further review the idea of “weekly goals” does seem a bit intimidating so I just separated them into 7 parts that we can master at our own pace. I will post part 1 by tomorrow and part two the following day, and add a new part every week. Once we get to part 7 we can always add or modify parts. Hopefully there is enough interest and people who are committed to positive change to make this worthwhile.

Part 1: Introduction
a) Getting to know ourselves better
b) Getting to know each other better
c) Understanding our fears
d) Changing our thinking patterns
e) Setting Goals
Part 2: Social Basics - Eye Contact
a) Challenging ourselves to look directly into the eyes of strangers
b) Maintaining that eye contact
Part 3: Social Basics Continued – Smiling and Acknowledging Strangers
a) Learning to smile at strangers
b) Saying a simple “hi” to strangers
Part 4: Small Talk
a) Learning how to become a good conversationalist
b) Expose ourselves to people who we are not intimidated to talk to and have a brief conversation with them (For example asking directions from and elderly person)
Part 5: Eliminate the Perfectionist Within Us
a) What the worst that could happen if we are not perfect?
b) Purposely putting ourselves in situations where we are not perfect
Part 6: Surviving Rejection
a) Learning techniques to cope with rejection
b) Purposely putting ourselves in situations where we will be rejected
Part 7: Conversing With Individuals Who Intimidate Us
a) Applying all that we have learned
b) Hold a fairly lengthy conversation with those who intimidate us, for example people who we perceive as attractive or a person of authority

 

[Tim001]

Hi Conquer,

I sent a post but deleted it when I realized this would be an on-line thing. * note to self: read the posts*. In any case, can you tell me where the material will be coming from? In other words, whose teachings will I be following?

 

[AnnaMaria]

CONQUER, I love your idea. I tried myself by forcing myself to make eye contact but I nearly cracked and so gave up.

I mean what you listed is very hard for me to do on my own....Paxil on an empty stomach sorta helps me in doing say 20% of what you listed.