If you are someone who is shy, just like I was for so many years, then I am sure you too would have had your time when you suffered or gone through severe social anxiety. In fact, one of the worst wars going on inside a person who is shy or has social anxiety is how to talk about it to someone else. Mental health issues due to shyness or stereotypes are increasing at an alarming rate according to the doctors of gulab devi hospital.
I know it is not easy to open up to others due to the fear of being judged. Without a doubt, this social anxiety is not only one of the biggest blockers in properly communicating about our emotions but also is a hurdle in our personal and professional life.
Whenever you try to talk to someone about your social anxiety issue, all the anxieties that are hidden at the corner of your head come into play. We have a tendency to become anxious about our relationships and we tend to bottle up our emotions and eventually we avoid open discussions. Doing this only further spices up your anxiety and makes things worse for you in your personal and professional life.
Amidst pandemic and even before that, mental health issues were starting to take a positive turn. Now there are many social platforms, where you can anonymously share your concerns, emotions, experiences and even anxieties. You can find people from various walks of walk-in these groups who would share their experiences as well and you might also find it helpful and have a positive effect as well.
If you feel stuck, lost, misunderstood and want to be helped and understood then you need to open up. If you don’t then nothing is going to help you.
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Here are some ways as per the best psychologists in Lahore that can help you in communicating with your beloved ones about your social anxiety.
- Now before you open up to someone about your anxiety, you need to be mindful of what the relationship of the person is with you. You need to ask yourself who the person is for you. How is this person going to help you? And how this person is generally when it comes to supporting.
- After this, you need to ask yourself that since when have you known about this person? How long have you been friends with each other? This question even becomes more important if you are thinking about someone as your potential partner. This is very important and needs to be addressed before it affects your relationship with the person.
- How will your social anxiety be affected when you open up about someone? This question will clarify a lot of your ambiguities. If the person you are opening up is your friend or family member then he/she would listen to you and help you out in this process. However, if it’s someone who is just your colleague or just any occasional friend then you might not be able to get proper help.
- Before opening up, you need to analyze and consider the amount of information that you are going to share with the other person. For example, if the person is your friend or family, you want them to know in detail to understand you better. While, if the person is your occasional friend or colleague then you might want to share only a handful of the information about your anxiety.
- Be prepared for the next step. Now, here you need to be a bit open-minded and need to be prepared. Just because you have been suffering from social anxiety for quite a while doesn’t mean that the people either your family or close friends, would understand it. Rather it’s something that you are going to have a discussion with them and not an announcement. So don’t expect them to understand you completely. Instead, give them time and let them understand your situation and allow them to ask questions.
- Be Calm. You can’t completely rule out that you would feel calm completely, but instead, you might trigger anxiety while talking about your anxiety making things worse. Therefore, before you open up, you need to construct what you are going to say and how it would affect you and to whom you are sharing. Only by doing this, you can help them understand what you actually expect from them.
- Be patient and give them time. Last, but not least, you have already shared the information you want to with the other person. Now, give them time to understand your situation. You don’t have to feel bad or take it personally if they are taking time in understanding your situation. Everyone has a different tendency in the understanding of things. You need to be mindful that you can’t force them to understand you at once or change them completely-but rather you need to be patient and wait for them to understand and react to your situation.