http://www.socialphobiaforum.com Discussions relating to social anxiety and social phobia. en-us Nice forum design. SPW is a bit dated looking I think and kind of bunched together. It seems very 'clean' here. Like I could eat off my monitor. Good job. http://community.socialphobiaforum.com/spaciously-spacious-39.html Sun, 04 Jan 2009 00:03:31 GMT http://community.socialphobiaforum.com/details-39.html People always say that the solution to overcoming anxiety is to just be yourself around people. Yet, when I go ahead and express what I think online, people say I'm rude. If I tried it offline, I'd probably get beat up. So, the only way to be social without suffering negative feedback would seem to be to be somebody else... right? http://social-anxiety-and-social-phobia.socialphobiaforum.com/being-yourself-38.html Sat, 03 Jan 2009 17:44:26 GMT http://social-anxiety-and-social-phobia.socialphobiaforum.com/details-38.html When rationalizing my avoidance of something social, the fear of being disliked is an element.. yet I tend to find that the fear of me disliking other people plays a bigger role. I know that makes me sound like a jerk, and I probably am, but it's not like I absolutely loathe people... I just think typical people are shallow, stupid and uninteresting. There might be one person out of fifty who I'd actually want to talk to (again, I hesitate to post this because I don't want to offend the other 49 of you). I'm afraid I won't know how to get rid of somebody unwanted. I wouldn't want to be rude. How do you disentangle yourself after jumping into the social arena? How do you get anything positive out of the experience if you're not interested in the people you're stuck with? http://social-anxiety-and-social-phobia.socialphobiaforum.com/afraid-of-not-liking-people-36.html Wed, 17 Dec 2008 08:18:52 GMT http://social-anxiety-and-social-phobia.socialphobiaforum.com/details-36.html http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/12/05/MNGA14IDMM.DTL "Happiness is contagious, spreading among friends, neighbors, siblings and spouses like the flu, according to a large study that for the first time shows how emotion can ripple through clusters of people who might not even know each other. [...] The findings, Christakis and others said, provide striking new evidence of the power of social networks" One implication, of course, is that if you're not in a social network you can't be infected by the happiness bug. http://social-anxiety-and-social-phobia.socialphobiaforum.com/happiness-is-contagious-35.html Fri, 05 Dec 2008 21:18:10 GMT http://social-anxiety-and-social-phobia.socialphobiaforum.com/details-35.html Forget socializing. I'm trying to refocus myself on simpler things which it might actually be possible to learn to cope with better. Take the fears I encounter when I go for a walk around the neighborhood. Primarily, there's the fear of walking by someone on the street... my mind is racing worrying that the person might say "hi" even though they almost never do, and nobody really cares that I pretend to be a deaf-mute when they do. This is a fear of socializing, but it's not a genuine social situation. I wouldn't say it's agoraphobia, since I'd rather be with 40,000 at a baseball game where they're ignoring me than encounter one other person alone on the street. Then there's the fear of dogs... I turn around when I hear barking (even though I always had a dog growing up and I've never been bitten hard enough to break the skin). To make it more concrete, I'll describe the situations this afternoon -- which were very typical. First, I found myself walking maybe 10 feet behind someone. That was uncomfortable and I eventually crossed the street to get away, because I don't know how to walk slow enough to let people pull away, and the last thing I wanted to do was pass him. Even from the other side of the street I could still sense him over there, and started pondering what I'd do if he crossed over to chase me and beat me up or murder me. Of course I didn't seriously believe these thoughts, I know they're absurd and totally unfounded considering the complete lack of any violence which has been done to me... but I can't stop fearing it anyway. A few minutes later on my way back there were a couple people and their dog walking along in my direction. I edged as far away as I could and tried to look off to the side, and we passed silently, but during the whole approach I worried that either they'd say hi to me or the little dog would take a bite out of my leg. Moments later I saw another woman on a collision course with me, and decided to detour through a shopping center to avoid her... but she went into it too and was right behind me making me nervous, and somewhat paranoid that she was intentionally following me (again, obviously untrue). Finally there was a group of teenagers leaving a store looking in my direction talking and laughing. There was something stuck to my shoe making a loud noise with each step, so I wondered if they were laughing at me for that. Again, though, the rational part of me knows I'm probably not important enough to be laughed at and accepts that nobody I passed during the walk would remember me ten minutes later. So, what are some ways to train my brain to stop being anxious about totally unworthy pseudo-social situations on a walk around the neighborhood? This is something I have plenty of exposure to, but it doesn't get much easier. It's a dose of anxiety I can and do put up with every week or two in exchange for the benefits of going outside, but life would be better if that weren't a stressful undertaking. http://social-anxiety-and-social-phobia.socialphobiaforum.com/a-short-walk-34.html Mon, 01 Dec 2008 14:58:42 GMT http://social-anxiety-and-social-phobia.socialphobiaforum.com/details-34.html