How do I stop fearing being judged in social situations?
Sir,
Can you help me with how to deal in social situations without fear of judgement, please?
This question was submitted by 'Parag'
Mark says...
Hi Parag,
Thank you for writing in. I do love a challenge and you haven't given me too much to go on in your rather short question. But I think you mean how do you stop fearing that other people are judging you when you are in social situations.
When we are at some social event or a work meeting, then we need to be masters of where we put our own attention. So much of the time we need to be focussing outward and occasionally we need to focus inward again to check our own reactions and responses. When we focus too strongly on ourselves, then we tend to become either emotional or oblivious to what is happening around us - or both. When we focus inward too much and then need to focus outward more, the imagination tends to go to work. That's because the activation of the imagination happens when we focus inward. So we kind of negatively hypnotize ourselves through:
- Focussing inward
- Imagining
- ...and then believing that what we imagine reflects the way things are.
So you might imagine someone is judging you negatively while at the same time they are imagining that you are judging them negatively! But once you both focus more on one another and, for a little while, forget to focus inward on how you feel and what you imagine, of course the whole thing flows more naturally.
We can influence but not totally control what others think and feel about us. What people think about you is generally to do with them and not you. As you progress through life, you can also discover you begin to care less what others think. You might like to read this article: 'How to Stop Worrying What Other People Think'. You can also get the '10 Steps to Overcome Social Anxiety' program, with which people have great success.
All best wishes,
Mark