Social anxiety
Many times people tend to get extremely shy, fearful or overtly
self conscious, while interacting in a variety of social
situations. These symptoms are so common in their daily life,
which they tend to develop severe inferiority complex as a
result of many anxious situations. The scenarios are so obvious:
people facing interviews, a boy proposing his fist date to his
girl friend, appearing on a stage for the first time. And the
symptoms are so common: butterflies in the stomach, sweating
face and palm, shaking hands! Welcome to the mysterious world of
"Social Anxiety"! It is estimated that as high 100 million
people all over the world face the ordeals of social anxiety,
and it may increase further with the impending population
explosion. Unlike other psychological problems, the curious
aspect of social anxiety is not understood properly by people or
even the medical professionals. As a result, social anxiety is
always misdiagnosed to be any other critical psychological
problem.
Clinically speaking, social anxiety is simply explained as a
psychological condition, when a person develops or experience
self conscious feelings, that others are critically judging or
evaluating them all the time. Though most of these feelings are
generated at the spur of the moment, people experiencing social
anxiety keep assessing the situation, even after those episodes
of social anxiety. It also means that the person who is facing
this problem, turns cloistered or withdrawn during the course of
time; most of the time a socially withdrawn person often becomes
depressed and emotionally troubled.
People suffering from social anxiety also feel the intense pain
of self inflicted wound, which subsequently forces them to avoid
likely future social situations altogether. Unfortunately, the
curious problem of social anxiety tends to remain with the
person for the rest of their life, unlike many other treatable
social problems. Social anxiety symptoms apply to most social
events and functions in almost every area of life. Even though
it is difficult to comprehend the effects of social anxiety in
day to day life, these anxious feelings are usually tied to
extremely bad thoughts, which are woven in a vicious web of
negative inferences and appraisals.
Curing a person with social anxiety is often difficult in spite
of several healing methods. However, cognitive-behavioral
therapy is the only known option that has been shown to work
with more effectiveness and this therapy is also known to
provide a long lasting relief. Whatever the method you choose,
the basic parameter of the therapy is very simple and
straightforward, that involves several rounds of wise counseling
and intense motivation. Many of us have at one moment in life,
faced severe forms of social anxiety and crippling fear, while
interacting socially with other people. With sheer determination
and persistence, we have escaped the evil clutches of social
anxiety to lead a happy and normal life.