How I "got over" social anxiety

[guitaristroz]

Hi people, to start with I will give you a brief introduction about myself.
I am a 19 year old female, who has always been extremely shy and found it very difficult to talk to people. In social situations I have been prone to panic attacks, and held many specific irrational fears, such as buying a drink at the bar if I thought the bar man might know me. Also, every time I saw someone I knew in town I would run into a shop in order to avoid them.
In all honestly, I am not completely over social anxiety now and would still rather avoid somebody that I know than go and talk to them, but I have got over it to quite an extent and would like to share with you how.

I started researching social anxiety on the internet after having panic attacks, and found that a lot of the websites I was coming accross, after the initial recognition of the symptoms, were little help.

However then I came across one which really did help me.
It provided a ladder in which you put all of your situations that you can't currently handle, starting with reachable ones and ending with ones that at the moment of writing, seem impossible!

This also really made me think just how logical this is, as it also explains how social anxiety is a cycle, I came to the conclusion that:

The only way to get out of a circle is up a ladder, one step at a time.

When I reached the top of my ladder I was euphoric!

SOCIAL ANXIETY HANDOUT

I really hope that this handout helps you as much as it did me, I will admit that I do still suffer with social anxiety, but it really did help a lot and I really felt a sense of self improvement!

I am also a songwriter and wondered if anybody would like to listen to my song "Social Freak" Which is, believe it or not about social anxiety!

You can listen to the song HERE or watch a video HERE.

Thanks for reading and really hope it helps,
Good luck everybody,
Roz
xx

[centrino]

Thank you!

I loved your psychedelic song =)

[guitaristroz]

Thank you! Glad you liked it x

[kraigg]

Thank you, this handout is very useful!

[stranger25]

umm............you were just here with the username "unfairly banned". Now you're back again?

[guitaristroz]

Glad it's useful!
And yes that's right, but they unbanned me and apologized, then deleted my "unfairly banned" account! Lol! So was pleased with that.
Roz
x

[sparky10]

just watched the video and i was v.impressed, really like the song and
you are a talented guitarist! ive just recently took up the guitar so know
how difficult it can be.
Well done on getting up and performing infront of people, how long have you been playing?

[guitaristroz]

Thanks Sparky, if you ever need any help with playing just give me a PM or something, I would be more than happy to share tips with you on playing! Good luck with it!
And thanks; It's wierd because I actually find it easy to get up infront of people and perform now, and it does build confidence the more you do it! It's like my anxiety disappears when I am on stage performing!
I know that's not the same for everybody but it is worth a shot doing something you know you are capable of infront of people, I feel that if you are confident that you can do something - then the nerves go away. That's maybe why if, for example you are not sure of what is going to happen in a social situation, you don't know if you will be able to cope with it! However, if you were totally in controll and meeting, say for example, your younger sibling, with whom you would chose how the day was panned out - it would produce less anxiety. Just what I personally think (I do too much thinking lol).
Hope everybody is feeling alright and has an anxiety-free weekend! Love and teapots x

[rickey]

very interesting

[ozman]

Wow that looks promising i'll give it a try