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When I was growing up I was very quiet and shy as a grade schooler. As I developed more skills, found new friends, and realized I had some great personality traits and skills, I started to open up and feel less self conscious.
Now the only time I am really shy is when I get into a crowd of people I don't know and have no idea of what types of people they are. But after a half an hour of mingling and listening to new conversations, I usually find my voice.
The following is an article that talks about shyness and some key steps to help you conquer your shyness so you can live every experience to the fullest.
7 Ways to Soothe your Shyness
Copyright 2005 Uncommon Knowledge Ltd
Shy people instinctively know that they are missing out.
Shyness equals lost opportunities, less pleasure and fewer
social connections. Shyness can be crippling but there are
tried and tested ways to make it a thing of the past.
When I was fifteen I was shy. I recall an attractive girl
attempting to engage me in conversation. My shyness made me
focus on me instead of her. I heard my own voice but not
hers and I thought about what I was trying to say instead
of what she was trying to say.
The formula for shyness is "too much focus on the self"
plus anxiety. To make it even more unpleasant, sometimes
when you are feeling shy you experience physical sensations
which ‘hijack’ your calm logical self.
My pulse raced, my mouth dried up and I felt like the
village idiot! I couldn’t think what to say so I said
nothing apart from making barely audible grunting noises!
Cary Grant eat your heart out! When I detected pity in her
eyes (or was it contempt, or boredom) I mumbled my excuse
and got out of there. I hated being shy and was determined
to change it.
How shyness is developed and maintained
Shyness really is a combination of social anxiety and
social conditioning. To overcome shyness you need to learn
to relax socially. This enables you to direct your
attention away from yourself and gives you the space to
practice certain conversational skills. In most cases, the
heightened emotions of socializing when young simply
condition the sufferer to respond to social events with
fear, instead of excitement and pleasure.
Relaxed socializing is so pleasurable, not to say
productive, but it is an advantage denied to many until
they learn to relax. To start reducing your own shyness, I
want you to absorb the following tips and ideas and start
to put them into practice:
1) Think about the way you feel and behave around familiar
people you are comfortable and spontaneous around. It’s
that feeling transferred to new people and situations that
equates to your emerging social confidence.
2) Focus your attention away from yourself. Sure, you can
think a little bit about how you are coming across, but if
all your focus is on your own words and feelings then you
might as well be by yourself. Notice what other people are
wearing and make a mental note, listen to their
conversation, imagine where they might live, make a point
of remembering names. Not only does this give you more to
talk about, it also ‘dilutes’ social anxiety leaving you
feeling calmer.
3) Ask people open questions. Many people like to talk
about themselves and will find you interesting if you find
them interesting. Ask questions that require more than a
‘yes’/’no’ response such as ‘What do you like about this
place?’ rather than: ‘Do you like this place?’ Once they’ve
answered use ‘add-on’ questions connected to the first such
as: ‘What other places do you like in this city…?’ Next you
can express your views. This is a great way to get the
conversation going. If the conversation doesn’t ‘take’ then
no matter, you’ve done your bit.
4) Stop trusting your imagination so much! Have you ever
had an imaginary picture in your mind of a holiday
destination only to arrive and find the reality is
different from the way you had imagined? That’s how
reliable imagination is. Stop imagining what others think.
I do lots of public speaking and I’ve long since stopped
trying to second guess what others think of me - it's just
too painful. Besides, what a person thinks about you has a
lot more to do with who they are than who you are.
5) Stop using ‘all or nothing’ thinking. The ‘completely
this/completely that’ style of thought occurs when you are
emotional. People who are depressed, angry or anxious see
reality in terms of differing extremes, simplistic all or
nothing terms. An angry person is ‘right’ and you are
‘wrong’; the depressed person feels like a ‘failure’ while
others are a ‘success’. In reality, life is composed of
infinite gray areas. So stop fearing that you might say the
‘wrong’ thing! Or that people will ‘hate’ you. Once you
start to relax more socially you’ll notice much less black
or white thinking because anxiety actually causes you to
think in all or nothing terms.
6) Take your time. You don’t have to blurt things out. Ask
questions and if questions are asked of you can take time
to consider your response (within reason). Don’t just blurt
out what you think might be the ‘right’ answer. A slow
answer is a relaxed answer.
7) Finally, use hypnotic rehearsal. Hypnosis is the
quickest way to change your instinctive/emotional response
to any situation. Only think about meeting others when your
mind and body is relaxed. This conditions you to associate
relaxation with being around new people. In fact you’ll
find that when you relax deeply enough often enough whilst
hypnotically rehearsing being comfortable around others
you’ll reach the point where you just can’t be shy any
more! This is what I call a ‘happy inability!’
I now love meeting new people and suspect that my current
social confidence would be unrecognizable to my fifteen
year old self.
----------------------------------------------------
Former 'shy guy' Mark Tyrrell is Creative Director of
Uncommon Knowledge Ltd and regularly demonstrates his lack
of shyness to audiences of hundreds. He teaches people how
to use hypnosis and sensible psychology to lower anxiety
and improve confidence. He has helped create a hypnosis
session so that others can overcome shyness as he did:
http://www.hypnosisdownloads.com/downloads/self_improvement/overcoming_shyness.html
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