Simple Solutions to Shyness Read online

  The negative elements that are most often at the root of shyness or social phobia include:

  teasing during childhood and adolescence;

  humiliation;

  failure after speaking or taking an oral exam;

  criticism or negative comments.

  How can you stop shyness controlling you?

  Although it may seem to go without saying, it is important to be clear that the first step towards change is wanting to change. You will only overcome your shyness if you really want to and have chosen to embark on the process, with a goal that you have fixed yourself.

  Developing your self-confidence and self-esteem

  Shy people generally suffer from a lack of self-confidence and self-esteem. Even if they take a relatively positive view of their skills and recognise their qualities, they assess their ability to act effectively in social situations negatively.

  Whereas self-confidence is a person’s ability to believe in their potential and their skills, self-esteem refers to “a person’s ability to feel favourably towards themselves, resulting from the positive opinion that they have of themselves and the value that they give themselves”1 (Fougeyrollas, Cloutier, Bergeron, Côté and St-Michel, 1998: 82). To be able to overcome your shyness, it is essential to have complete confidence in your abilities, in order to avoid putting yourself down and developing an inferiority complex which could damage social interactions. It is also crucial to develop a positive self-image, to act in accordance with your values and to find the balance between what you want to be and what you really are. It is only after you have developed an awareness of your qualities, flaws, aspirations, dreams, character traits and true self that you will really be able to start working thoroughly on your shyness.

  Accept your mistakes and your failures

  “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10 000 ways that won’t work.” (Thomas Edison, American inventor, 1847-1931)

  To stop your self-esteem from crumbling, you must be able to draw a line under the past and accept that you are not perfect. Of course, you have in mind an ideal that you are aspiring to, a flawless way of being and very specific intellectual abilities, but it is important to make peace with the gap between your ideal and your reality.

  You have without a doubt made mistakes in the past, hurt those around you, betrayed someone close to you or lied to a friend. You have probably experienced failure in an exam, a romantic relationship or a friendship. Know that you are not alone in this. Imperfection is part of being human. Your failures and mistakes do not define the person you are; the way you react to and learn from them, on the other hand, does.

  You cannot change the past: what is done is done, and constantly dwelling on your failures will only leave you stuck in a negative and self-critical state of mind. Learn to forgive yourself and move on to something else. However, do not forget these past experiences, as they will help you to pinpoint your weaknesses and stop you from repeating the same patterns.

  Avoid comparing yourself to other people

  Shy people tend to constantly compare themselves to others and assess their value in relation to them. Moreover, the conclusion of this assessment is more often than not disproportionately negative. For example, a shy person will feel inferior compared with a person who speaks four languages because they “only” speak three, even though this is already impressive, or they will say that they are useless because they got lower marks than their best friend in an exam.

  “When I was a teenager, I constantly compared myself to other people. I thought that the other girls in my class were better dressed, prettier, more interesting; they were smarter than me in class and did better with boys. I never felt that I was as good as them and I felt invisible. How could I have competed with these perfect girls?” (Julie, 26)

  However, comparing yourself to others is a pointless exercise, because we are all different! We do not all have the same experiences, journeys or personalities. The person who speaks four languages might have lived abroad for their entire childhood or grown up in a family environment where multiple languages were spoken. The best friend might have a greater aptitude for a given subject, but struggle with another.

  Instead of comparing yourself to others, adopt a more constructive approach: compare yourself to yourself. Focus on your progress and how far you have come.

  Learn to be optimistic

  “A positive thinker does not refuse to recognize the negative, he refuses to dwell on it.” (Norman Vincent Peale, author of The Amazing Results of Positive Thinking)

  As we have seen, one of the defining characteristics of shy people is their propensity to see the negative side of any situation, to always imagine the worst-case scenario and to put themselves down. However, life is like a coin: for every negative side, there is also a positive side. Rather than seeing the glass as half empty, see it as half full. Every situation has its share of obstacles and negative aspects, but it can also have a lot of points that are beneficial. It is up to you to focus on these positive aspects. For example, if you got negative feedback on your oral presentation, at least you know that your audience was listening carefully to you.

  There are a range of methods that can help you to approach your day-to-day life in a more positive frame of mind, such as autosuggestion, a technique developed by the French psychologist Émile Coué (1857-1926). Besides autosuggestion, Coué’s work has given rise to a number of other therapeutic approaches, such as positive thinking and sophrology, which involves focusing on the positive elements in a person’s life that will enable them to move past a given problem rather than the problem itself. The starting point for autosuggestion is the theory that an individual can influence the course of their life and their personality using the technique of persuasion. By imagining a situation and persuading themselves that it is real, it will become a reality. Based on this assumption, imagining yourself speaking calmly and confidently in public will help you to achieve this.

  Get out of your comfort zone

  Once you have regained confidence in your abilities and come to accept the person you really are, you need to tackle the problem head on and get out of your comfort zone to deal with situations that make you feel anxious.

  You only have one life. Do you really want to spend it feeling afraid and letting your dreams pass you by because of anxiety? Overcoming your fears is a long and difficult process, but it is essential if you want to take control of your daily life with complete peace of mind.

  Before you can get out of your comfort zone, you need to be able define it. Taking stock of your circumstances and identifying the situations that cause problems for you can be very useful. For example, you might be afraid of eating out or going to the shops alone, or you could be scared of starting a conversation with a stranger or placing an order over the phone. The important thing is to correctly target the situations or activities which cause this feeling of discomfort and unease. Then, think about why they make you uneasy. Why don’t I dare go eat alone? Is it because I am afraid that people will take pity on me or think that nobody wants to eat with me? Putting your fears into words is the first step towards recovery.

  Exercise

  Make a note of all the activities and situations that make you feel deeply uncomfortable and rank them from least to most difficult. Face up to the first situation on your list. Once you have successfully dealt with it, give yourself a reward and move onto the second. Keep going until you reach the situation that causes you the most anxiety. For example, if you are afraid of going to the shops alone, the first time you go stay for five minutes and just wander down the aisles. Next time, stay for a bit longer, then ask a member of staff for something, and so on.

  Above all, take your time! Rushing through the steps could ruin all your efforts and any progress you have already made, and even make you shyer. You should therefore work steadily and gradually. Start with small challenges that yo
u are sure you can complete, then make them progressively more difficult. Take the time to increase your confidence. Think about the story of the hare and the tortoise: slow and steady wins the race.

  “I am overcoming my shyness little by little, day by day, step by step. It takes time, but I am beginning to see progress. It gives me hope for the future!” (Charlotte, 29)

  Some practical activities

  Join an online forum. This is a great first step if direct contact with people scares you. There are thousands of online forums on an incredibly varied range of subjects, which means that there is something for everyone. Joining a community which shares your passion will allow you to get involved in discussion more quickly. However, take care not to fall into the traps of online interaction. Avoid getting embroiled in pointless arguments that will do nothing but sap your self-confidence, and avoid revealing any personal details unless you know exactly who you are talking to. The internet should only be the first step in your progression; hiding behind a screen will not cure your shyness, because social relationships take place in real life.

  Take up a team sport. Choose a sport that you particularly like, preferably a team sport, and sign up. The advantage of this approach is that you do not have to constantly talk to your teammates during the activity, which gives you time to get used to your environment. In addition, having a shared goal – winning matches – will help you to bond with your teammates and develop a feeling of belonging. Finally, sport releases endorphins, hormones produced in the brain which lead to a feeling of physical and mental wellbeing, thus helping to calm the symptoms of anxiety.

  Talk, talk and talk some more. It does not really matter what method you choose; communicate verbally as often as possible. Ask for directions on the street, place an order over the phone, speak during a meal with friends, take part in an information session, ask a question or go to your favourite bakery on a Sunday morning. You will see that after a while all your fears will evaporate and talking will become second nature to you.“After a while, you surprise yourself by making conversation as if it were the most normal thing in the world. And it’s strange to realise that you can talk to strangers without feeling uncomfortable in the slightest.” (Charlotte, 29)

  Do some acting. This activity can prove very useful, because it teaches you to speak audibly, to enunciate correctly, to develop good posture and even to manage your stress. Furthermore, improvising can be very useful in your day-to-day life – after all, speaking is a form of improvisation.

  Ask for professional help

  If, in spite of all your efforts, you feel unable to overcome this shyness that holds you back on a daily basis, do not hesitate to consult a healthcare professional. Depending on the severity of your problem (shyness or social phobia), they will recommend the right treatment for you.

  The therapeutic approach

  There is ample proof of the effectiveness of therapy in the treatment of psychological illnesses. It allows a re-assessment of the individual and reconditioning with limited stress. For the treatment of shyness, the following approaches are particularly effective:

  Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) acts on the subject’s negative thoughts and problematic behaviours through relaxation exercises, thought stopping, communication and gradual exposure to anxiety-inducing situations, among other steps. This therapy is characterised by its limited duration (a few weeks to a few months) and by the establishment of a therapeutic contract between the practitioner and their patient.

  Sophrology focuses on the body and seeks to obtain balance between thoughts, the body and behaviours thanks to increased awareness and targeted relaxation and meditation exercises.

  Autosuggestion takes as its starting point the principle that all thoughts become reality and we are not driven to act by will, but by imagination. Based on these two assumptions, the method encourages the subject to suggest positive thoughts to themselves, and in this way the thoughts will end up becoming reality. For example, a shy person who uses repetition to persuade themselves that they are not afraid of public speaking will considerably reduce their discomfort in this kind of situation.“Before, the idea of giving a presentation without stuttering, shaking, blushing and losing my train of thought was unthinkable to me. However, when I was at university we often had to give presentations, and I didn’t want my shyness to hold me back. I imagined that I was a great speaker, a bit like Obama, who found this kind of exercise child’s play. I gradually created a persona for myself, which only appeared during these presentations, and I felt much more comfortable, because it was no longer Carly the shy girl who was talking, but Carly the confident speaker.” (Carly, 35)

  Group therapy can also be beneficial, even if it tends to seem overwhelming to very shy people, who are immediately forced to face up to their interpersonal anxiety. However, this kind of approach has its advantages, because it allows the subject to come out of their shell, to see that they are not the only person with this problem, and to put their negative reactions into perspective by observing them in the other members of the group.

  Good to know

  The British Association for Behavioural & Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP) maintains a register of all accredited therapists in the UK, while the British Psychological Society (BPS) keeps a directory of chartered psychologists, some of whom specialise in CBT. You may be able to access CBT for free on the NHS, although there is often a waiting list.

  The medicinal approach

  Sometimes, therapy alone is not enough to resolve the problem. In the case of social phobia, for example, medication is sometimes recommended, but this must always accompany rather than replace psychological treatment. Indeed, while medication can relieve the physical and mental symptoms, it does not deal with the root causes of the problem.

  Three families of medication are regularly used to treat anxiety in general and social phobia in particular. They each have different applications and effects:

  Beta blockers work like a shield. They prevent physical symptoms from manifesting by blocking the beta receptors responsible for the production of the stress hormone adrenaline. Since they act on the physiological effects of anxiety (heart palpitations, trembling, nausea, dry mouth, and so on), beta blockers are often used by performers to combat pre-show nerves.

  Antidepressants – mainly selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) – calm physical, cognitive and behavioural symptoms by acting on serotonin, the neurotransmitter responsible for mood.

  Anxiolytics, also known as minor tranquilisers, are used to treat generalised anxiety disorder. However, they should be avoided in the treatment of social phobia, because they are only effective for a very short time period and most of them quickly lead to dependency.

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  1 This quotation has been translated by 50Minutes.com.

  Final tips

  How can I maintain this newfound confidence?

  Do not lose heart. We all have the ability to be social and talk to people. Even if this does not seem to be the case for you right now, it certainly will be later on.

  Keep identifying situations that cause you anxiety and take control of them.

  Put things into perspective. Being shy is not an illness, and it can even have some advantages in society.

  Identify challenging situations and put in place a plan to tackle them.

  Do not try to avoid letting other people see and judge you.

  Do not compare yourself to other people; instead, focus on your own progress.

  Speak up whenever you get the opportunity, whether in a small group or during a meeting.

  Work on your self-confidence and self-esteem on a daily basis.

  Be positive. Negative thoughts lead to more negative thoughts and leave you stuck in a frame of mind that is not very conducive to change and self-confidence.

  Be aware of your assets and your
weaknesses at all times. If you need to, regularly make a list of your qualities and flaws, and ask the people around you to add to it.

  Keep in mind that you are not alone: one in two people admit to being shy.

  FAQs

  I have been shy since I was a child. Should I just accept it and learn to live with it?

  Shyness is not inevitable. While it is certainly difficult to get rid of it completely, it is entirely possible to learn to control it so that it no longer paralyses you on a daily basis.

  Above all, try to understand the root of the problem. Why are you shy? Is it because of a humiliating incident when you were younger or an overly strict upbringing, or have you always been shy for no apparent reason? If your shyness stems from a trauma which sent your self-confidence and self-esteem tumbling down like a house of cards, it is essential to begin by rebuilding this structure in order to obtain a positive and objective image of yourself.

  Next, you will have to embark on a long road to recovery, but the benefits will outweigh the difficulties. Change your point of view, face up to your fears through small challenges, and persevere. To do this, take the plunge and sign up for activities that will force you to interact with other people or speak up. However, if you feel that the problem is more serious and you cannot resolve it alone, do not hesitate to seek help from a professional, who will be able to advise you.