Your personal experiences of feeling socially anxious, shy and not good enough and how this has affected your lives. Sharing your stories about how you have been stretching your comfort zones and growing confidence to move through anxious feelings to live a life aligned with who you really are.
People often have a perception of what anxiety is and how someone who is experiencing social anxiety may present themselves. There is a stigma attached to the word anxiety which suggests it would be obvious if someone was feeling that way; that it would be evident and noticeable. This couldn’t be further from the truth….
I’ve not always been very compassionate towards myself. In fact, as an INFP personality type, self-hate, punishment and criticism is a speciality of mine. However, personality type aside, this is something that can plague every single one of us – I know this because, you have told me. I hear it everywhere I go; on…
There was a time not so long ago when all I wanted to do was change everything about myself. There was no particular reason for this, nothing I could pinpoint or put my finger on anyway. There was just a nagging self doubt that lingered relentlessly. I thought that if I changed the way I looked, changed my…
Do you worry about coming back to an untidy home? Do you feel like mess and unorganised chaos gets you down? Tidiness is one of my huge bug bears. For myself, cleaning is about maintaining control. I am constantly accused of being anal but that’s fine by me. As long as my home is clean…
As soon as I read the description for Quiet Connections and their volunteer role, it struck a chord and resonated with me. It immediately stood out from other voluntary roles. As someone who has experienced self-esteem, shyness and social anxiety issues, I wanted to get involved in any way I could. I find it refreshing…
Feelings of anxiety often stem from a lack of control over uncontrollable aspects of situations. Thinking I need to be able to control everything to ensure that I don’t feel anxious is often what fuels the anxious feelings. Having grown up referring to this as the ‘vicious circle’, I have realised that whilst I recognise…
It’s like there’s a yoyo inside my head rocking back and forth. Dizzy. I’m in my first year of sixth form when I notice it. Completely out of the blue. What’s wrong with me? I’m going to countless GP appointments, having tests for diabetes, blood pressure checks and a referral to an ENT doctor. No…
Imagine an excited, little 11 year old armed with a huge backpack and her two best friends on her first day of secondary school. We’re lucky enough that one of my friend’s older sister is already at the school, and she shows us to our tutor room. Naturally, I’m nervous, but I think everyone is…
‘Are you an introvert or an extrovert?’ Introversion and extroversion are concepts that are often seen as extremes: for example, when someone says they are extroverted, the image that comes to mind is someone who is confident and thrives in social situations, whereas introversion is often painted as the opposite. I’ve always struggled with this…
Before joining college, I had low self-confidence. I was socially anxious, and at school I was typically described as someone who never talked; the quiet one. The same was said about me by my friends’ parents whenever I went to their houses. My first year of secondary school was when I recognised I was having…
Retreating at school I hated school. Well, I loved learning but did not enjoy the people. I was told that my disinterest in education was because I was dyslexic and that I wouldn’t amount to anything worthwhile. This knocked my confidence, looking back I realise that what I was feeling at the time was the…
Not good enough Growing up, I was shadowed by a constant cloud of uneasiness in social settings. I felt I just wasn’t good enough. This caused me to be less productive than I could be, constantly living beneath my potential. I can’t pinpoint exactly when I got bitten by the ‘shyness bug’, but I have…