Social phobia & lack of rationalism

[ajajajak]

Hey,

I was wondering if there would possibly be a link between social anxiety and lack of rationalism or the one caused by the other?

I am more emotional and seem to primarily receive negative emotions due to the lack of rationally verifying these emotions. The more i put these emotions into perspective the less anxiety I experience.

Is this similar to others or is this not related ?

 

[Feathers]

Yeah, a lot of anxiety or social phobia is actually because of irrational thinking, negative beliefs ingrained maybe through experience with family/siblings/in childhood or later, and then thinking 'oh it will always be like that' etc. Maybe if parents were overprotective or worried a lot and behaved in a way like, 'The world is dangerous' or 'people cannot be trusted' maybe you subconsciously took that attitude too.. So you need to consciously 'rebel' against things like that (while still keeping some common-sense standards of safety of course).

CBT is actually about putting those (overly negative/irrational) beliefs/thoughts under perspective and questioning the validity of them.

 

[theslowesthand]

Personally i find it almost impossible to "successfully deal with" quite a number of feelings/emotions involving people - which is one of the reasons i guess that i tend steer well clear of people in everyday life. I put that down to "mental fogginess", which is the general inability to think/comprehend clearly, and involves difficulty with "rationalising" emotions.

Which is basically what i said in Six reasons why many people with SA have trouble getting over it

 

[Arthur_Dent]

I'm a very rational and skeptical guy. I'm aware of how irrational my fears are, but still I can't overcome my fears, they're beyond rationality.

 

[twiggle]

I'm a very rational and skeptical guy. I'm aware of how irrational my fears are, but still I can't overcome my fears, they're beyond rationality.

Same here.

I'm rational about most things but as soon as something makes contact with that little sensitive fear patch, the reaction is completely irrational and the thoughts implode.

Its like that squirmish reaction you get when you accidentally touch a metal filling with a fork.

 

[bigcat1967]

Same here as well. I really have to work on this and replace them w/ positive thoughts...or at least sit back and question my negative thoughts and show myself how much of this thinking is false.

 

[ajajajak]

Hm interesting so it's not really excluded to one type of more emotionally oriented people.

Can someone explain to me why they view social anxiety as something irrational?

 

[Feathers]

Read The Feeling Good Handbook by Dr David Burns or any other books on CBT

Lots of people are afraid of things that are very unlikely to happen and may likely not be true at all..
For example, irrational thoughts may be 'They hate me' or 'They are judging me' etc. When in reality, they may just be busy or worried about other things or may have constipation or a bad day etc. In many cases, we just don't know and might need to question validity of such thoughts. For example, talk to the person in question and clarify things, or to focus on more helpful thoughts etc.

 

[theslowesthand]

Social Anxiety both is & is not "irrational". It's a "rational response" to have SA if you have the things that cause SA. Thinking irrationally (eg irrational fears) is just one of a few causes of SA.

Some causes of SA...
• Genetics (all SA'ers have an over-active amygdala (handles survival instincts of fight/flight); "trait anxiety"; HSP (highly sensitive person); ...)
• Past experiences (real (not-so-irrational) fears)
• Thinking irrationally (& irrational misbeliefs)
• Feeling irrationally (feelings are ALWAYS irrational - you ALWAYS "feel irrationally" ... as feelings are NOT rational things, but the THOUGHTS that can TRIGGER them are, and the GENERAL process of thoughts triggering feelings/emotions is rational, but the process of SPECIFIC feelings/emotions being triggered by SPECIFIC thoughts seems to be "quite irrational" (chaotic, out-of-control, unexplained, misterious) imho)
• Being over-emotional (= POSSIBLY due to excess of irrational thinking (& lack of rational thinking, eg not able to "rationally verify" one's emotions))

Edit: Added "Feeling irrationally" & "Being over-emotional"

 

[ajajajak]

thank you thesmallest. Makes sense