 |
|
December 29, 2004
Overcome your shyness
What is shyness?
One definition of shyness is "having difficulty in creating a good rapport with the people one meets."
For some people, the problem of shyness may simply be having trouble thinking of things to say in social situations. For others, it may involve crippling physical manifestations of uneasiness. For most, shyness involves a combination of both symptoms to a greater or lesser degree. In any event, the effects of shyness can be devastating.
Behaviors that come spontaneously for the average person (smiling, thinking of suitable conversational topics, assuming a relaxed posture, making good eye-contact, etc.) may simply not be an inherent part of the shy person's makeup.
Another problem of shyness is that shy people may not know how to behave in certain situations. Wrote Dr. Phillip G. Zimbardo, one of the country's foremost authorities on the subject of shyness, "Some don't have the social skills necessary for keeping the machinery of human relationships functioning smoothly. They don't know how to start a conversation or ask for a raise or speak up in class."
Thus, there's more to shyness than merely not knowing what to say. The severely shy may find it difficult to do something as simple as smile and say "hello" to someone. If they don't tend to smile easily, they may be afraid to "force" a smile out of the subconscious fear that it will be seen as "phony" by others.
Also, if a shy person does not have an easy smile or a ready laugh, he may be viewed as overly serious, even humorless. According to The Single's Almanac by Jeffrey Ullman, (1986, World Almanac Publications,) the first thing women look at in men is the smile and the laugh. (A comparable predisposition is reported in men's judgments of women.)
Now let's look at some of the behavioral components of shyness :
- Anxiety or lack of self-confidence around other people
- Difficulty thinking of things to say in conversation
- Lack of knowledge of expected modes of behavior for various social situations
- Absence of outgoing mannerisms such as good eye contact, an easy smile, a relaxed posture, and so forth
Further, the element of willpower (or the lack of it) enters into the picture. The shy person must sometimes force himself to do such things as go to a party or to strike up a conversation with a classmate. These, for the shy person, can require a tremendous amount of effort.
Also, sometimes shyness can be much like a phobia-an irrational fear that cripples our behavior. We know it's foolish to be afraid of people. We know that people are more inclined to like us if we're relaxed and cheerful than if we're awkward or clumsy. Still, we seem to be predisposed somehow to behave in a certain way. Though the fear that accompanies a "true" phobia is usually more extreme than the fear that accompanies shyness, there do seem to be common elements. (There is even such a thing as a true phobia of other people; it's called anthrophobia.)
How to overcome shyness?
Probably the best way to overcome shyness is Systematic (or Graduated) Desensitization. This is contrasted with a technique called "flooding," in which the shy person is immediately exposed to a feared situation. This experience is supposed to be cathartic.
This is the advice that is often given shy people. "You've got to mix and mingle with people-that's the only way you're going to overcome your shyness! Go to a party, and plunge right in!" This is something akin to telling someone who's deathly afraid of water to plunge into the deep end of a swimming pool!
Systematic desensitization, on the other hand, involves discovering what you are afraid of, breaking that feared activity down into smaller steps and finally taking those steps on one at a time, gradually moving from the easiest step to the most difficult.
The first step toward practicing systematic desensitization is to list those situations which cause you shyness or anxiety. The list should be arranged in increasing order of difficulty; that is, with the easiest interactions listed first, progressing down toward those which cause greater and greater anxiety. To make this task easier, below is a list of social situations arranged in what I think will be roughly increasing difficulty for most shy people. You can use this list as a framework for your own list. The list progresses from the mildest social situations to the most difficult.
The next step is to tackle these shyness-producing situations one at a time, progressing from the easiest to the most difficult. To do this, you must set goals for yourself.
Set aside a couple of weeks for each shyness situation. Every day, make a deliberate point of getting into a situation in which you will have an opportunity to practice a skill on your list which you have set aside to practice during that week. When you have practiced a particular skill on your list every day for two weeks, move on to the next one. Continue this way until you have worked your way completely down the list.
This technique doesn't work perfectly, because life doesn't always hand out experiences in the order we've decided would be best, but don't worry; the technique will still be effective.
Another tip: most of these situations can be made more challenging by increasing how much time you spend in that situation, or by increasing the difficulty in some other way. For example, you may have no trouble asking a librarian to help you find something, but entering into a brief conversation with him or her may be a little more difficult. Or, a short conversation with someone you meet at school may be easy, but a longer one may be more challenging. In this way you can "fine tune" your graduated desensitization regimen in a way that allows you to achieve a very smooth increase in its difficulty level.
One of the easiest ways to begin is to try striking up little conversations with store clerks. This gives you an opportunity to practice overcoming your shyness every time you pick up a magazine or buy a candy bar. The conversations don't have to be long ones, and you can close the conversation whenever you wish. Another advantage is that since you have no need to see these people again, you have no reason to be upset if you say something you later decide was less than brilliant. Of course, make sure there isn't a long line of other shoppers waiting behind you when you try this technique!
What is visualization?
"Visualization," "imaging," or "cognitive behavioral rehearsal" is the process of creating detailed mental pictures of behaviors you wish to assume. It can be a useful supplement to your other efforts at overcoming shyness. In effect, it is a way of practicing in your mind behaviors that you wish to acquire in real life.
And research shows that visualization can really help. Researchers at Louisiana State University found that people could actually increase the amount of weight they could lift by visualizing themselves doing so.
Daydreaming is a form of visualization. The difference between visualization and daydreaming, however, is that there are gaps in daydreams, and we picture some hypothetical event that will probably never take place. In the visualization process, by contrast, we picture something that is more likely to happen and imagine the step-by-step process by which we will handle it.
You need to practice visualization when you know you can relax without fear of interruption. Try to choose a time when nobody else is home, or, if this is not possible, go to a room by yourself and hang a "Do Not Disturb" sign on the door. (It is okay to tell people what you are doing.)
Before you begin your visualization session, you should relax for a few minutes. You need no special regimen. If you are familiar with yoga, meditation, or another relaxation discipline you may practice it briefly before beginning visualization. Otherwise, kicking off your shoes, putting your feet up, and going into a quiet mood will be fine.
It is important, however, to be relaxed when visualizing because you want to subconsciously associate a feeling of relaxation with the social situations that you are about to mentally rehearse. When you actually enter into a situation you visualized, you want to be able to recall that relaxed state vividly.
When you feel you are sufficiently relaxed you are ready to start the visualization process.
1: Close your eyes and picture the scene that causes you shyness as vividly and accurately as possible. Picture the people who are involved in the scene. What do they say? How do you respond?
2: If you are visualizing something that happened in the past, picture the scene as it actually happened as vividly as possible. What is it that was difficult about this situation?
3: What did the other person (or people) say? What did you say? What do you feel was inadequate about your performance?
4: Now visualize the exact same scene again. Picture what the other person said to you. But this time, picture yourself responding as you wish you had responded. Or, if you initiated the interaction, picture yourself doing so as you wish you had, effectively, self-confidently. If you have trouble knowing what this would be, think of an outgoing person you admire and picture how he or she would handle the situation. Imagine yourself behaving the same way.
5: Now picture how you think the other person might have responded to you had you acted the way you wished. Then visualize your next move or statement, his or her response, and so on, until you think the interaction is completed.
6:If you are visualizing something that will happen in the future, you must make a number of suppositions. Who do you expect to be talking to? Is it likely to be a man or a woman? Have you met this person before? What is the setting? What do you wish to accomplish with the interaction? How should you approach this person? What do you think you should say? What do you expect the other person to say? How will you respond? Visualize this scene repeatedly until you think you have worked out all the details and have determined what your best approach will be and how you will respond to various possible behaviors on the part of the other person. Picture yourself being relaxed, friendly, confident.
The important thing to remember when visualizing is not simply to think "I must be more outgoing," but to actually see yourself being more outgoing. See every step of your desired behavior as if it were projected on a movie screen. Just as you mentally "see" various scenarios acted out when you daydream, so must you "see" them when you visualize. As with any other skill, your ability to visualize will improve with practice.
A few other tips: First, be realistic about what you're visualizing. Don't see yourself as being the "life of the party" right away. Instead, look at the graduated desensitization list that you made up in the previous section, start visualizing the first thing that causes you shyness, and work your way up from there.
20-30 minutes a day is a good amount of time to devote to visualization.
Posted by LC at December 29, 2004 12:19 PM
| TrackBack
|
|
|
|
|
