How To Lose Your Self- Consciousness I The now is the most important time Leo Tolstoy remember how terribly self-conscious I felt during a presentation at school. I am sitting down in my classroom waiting to be called up to speak. The thought runs through my mind I am going to mess this up. So what did I do? I focused my attention inwards to fight this thought. As I turned my attention inwards, I began feel my heart beating faster and how sweaty my hands were. As I noticed those anxious feelings, I thought What if they notice my nerves? This only sent my heart racing even faster and I felt even more tense. I become very self-conscious. I went from having one anxious thought to getting hooked with a bunch of anxious feelings and thoughts. What led me to this? Focusing my attention inwards to fight the anxious thought. You see when I turned my attention inwards, I shone a bright light my inner sensation. I became more aware of my heart rate and muscle tension which only led to more anxious thoughts. So much so, that the anxious feelings completely flooded my mind. This left me feeling very self-conscious. I started imaging how I was coming across.
I began feeling so bad that I didn t finish my presentation; I had to go and sit back down. I didn t know it at the time by this inner focus of our attention is the engine of self-consciousness. It is this inner focus of attention that causes your mind to go blank when you are in social situations. Because your mind is so pre-occupied with all the anxious feelings and thoughts, it leaves little for anything else. Like what to say. So to make defeating social anxiety easier, we can learn to undo this selfconsciousness by reversing this inner focus of attention. So, I have a question for you... When you enter a social situation: Where are you focusing your attention? Do you pay more attention to your internal experiences (thoughts, feelings, sensation) or your external environment? Research tells us that when we are feeling anxious, we tend to focus most of our attention on inwards. This tends to happen habitually, as a way to help us feel safe. So you may not be consciously aware of it happening. Unfortunately, this inner focus of attention only leads us to getting more hooked by anxious thoughts and feelings. So we feel more self-conscious and awkward in social situations. The more you focus your attention inward, the more anxious thoughts and feelings you notice. Hence the more self-conscious you become. It s a vicious cycle! This is what happens with an inner focus of attention. It feeds your anxiety in social situations.
Want to try it? If you want to experience this, you can try this little experiment. Take 30 seconds to... Focus all your attention on the sensations in your chest on everything that you feel there, for 30 seconds. What do you notice? Heart beating? Chest movement? Your breathing? Some tension? You probably noticed sensations that you had not been aware of until a moment ago. You become aware of your heart beat and your breathing. But before I had asked you to turn your attention inwards. You may not even been aware of these sensations. So focusing your attention inwards you shine a spot light onto your feelings, body sensations, behaviour and thoughts. You magnify them. This makes you feel self-conscious and ruins your natural self-expression in social situations. Inner focus = Self-Consciousness When you turn you attention inwards, you are more likely to get hooked (fusion) with anxious feelings, tension in your body or any self-defeating thoughts or images that come to mind. With the mind hooked with your inner sensations, there is little room left to act naturally, think of something to say or deliver a presentation. It s why you feel awkward in social situations. It inhibits your natural selfexpression. Suppose you are trying to have a conversation with someone and you re giving most of your attention to thoughts like this, He thinks I m boring. She will think I am weird.
The more attention you give to those thoughts, the less you are involved in the conversation. And the less you will be able to act naturally and engage with your colleagues, friends or romantic partners. By paying all your attention to these inner experiences they become a selffulfilling prophecy. External Focus of Attention: How You Break Your Self- Consciousness The less self-conscious you become the easier it is to act natural in social situations. A critical skill to learn to help you become less self conscious is how to re-direct your attention externally onto the external environment. So the focus of attention is on the outside not on your inner sensations. Firstly, ask yourself: What can you gain from not dwelling on the unpleasantness that you experience? What are the benefits? By accepting these sensations and giving up the fight against the anxious feelings and having a willingness to experience them. Then turning your attention to the external environment (connection). You then won t be hijacked by anxious feelings. You won t being be dictated to by your thoughts and feelings. You take back the control of your experience. So connection with external environment is a crucial skill to learn to help you take action to defeat social anxiety. Connection to Your External Environment Connection means being fully aware, it means moving out of your mind and connecting with the external environment.
In moving your attention from internal to external, you become less entangled by your thoughts and feelings. So you are won t feel defeated before, during or after a social situation. You will also be able to express yourself more naturally with people. Connection with the here and now happens through the part of our psychology that we touch on a bit later in module 4 the Observing self. The Observing Self It involves bringing our full attention to what is happening here and now without getting distracted or influenced by the inner experiences (thoughts and feelings). The observing self is by nature nonjudgmental. It can t judge your experience, because judgements are thoughts and therefore a product of the thinking self. When you connect with your external environment, your mind will naturally express some form of opinion or judgement to try and distract you (That s what minds do!). When this happens in the later connection exercises just say silently to yourself Thanks mind and come to the here and now experience. Even if it is something positive again just say Thanks mind and come back to the external environment. When you connect with your external experience and are not entangled with your thinking. This is a sense of self that psychologist have labelled the Observing self and the chatter that comes in and disrupts this observing experience is the Thinking self. The observing self doesn t get into a struggle with reality; it sees things as they are, without resisting. It doesn t judge an experience as good or bad it accepts it and observes. Resistance with an experience only happens when we fuse with our judgements from the thinking self, that things are bad, wrong or unfair.
So the thinking self is like a pair of dark goggles that dims and obscures our view of the world and ourselves, disconnecting us from the reality. The good news is that the observing self is always present and available. The key to being able to express yourself naturally in social situations is to engage in the external world with the observing self. When anxious thoughts or feelings turn up just accept them as natural and transient. Then move your attention back to the external environment. This will mean you don t get hooked and hijacked by your thoughts, feelings and sensations. Daily External Connection Exercises In each of the exercises that follow, you ll be asked to connect with some experience, such as the sounds in your environment. When distractions in the form of thoughts and feelings occur: Let those thoughts and feelings come and go and stay connected to your environment When your attention wanders (and it will, I promise), the moment you realise it, acknowledge it. Silently say to yourself, Thanks, Mind! Then bring your attention back to the exercise. Notice Five Things This is a simple exercise to centre yourself and connect with your environment. Practice it a few times a day. 1. Pause for a moment 2. Look around the room you are in and notice five objects you can see. 3. Listen carefully and notice five sounds you can hear. 4. Notice five things that are in contact with your body You can develop this skill further by going for a walk spending the whole time noticing what you can see, hear, smell and physically feel.
Whenever you notice yourself becoming disconnected, refocus back on the external environment. Connecting With Your Morning Routine Pick an activity that s part of your daily morning routine, such as brushing your teeth, combining your hair, or taking a shower. Totally focus on what you are doing, using all five senses. For example in the shower notice the various sounds of the water: as it sprays out of the nozzle, as it hits your body, as it gurgles down the drain. Notice the sensations of the water running down your back and legs. Notice the smell of the soap and the shampoo. When thoughts and feelings arise, acknowledge their presence, let them be and refocus on the shower. For starters, practice connecting with one part of your morning routine each day. Then, as your ability improves, extend it to other parts. Practicing the skills in the modules like defusion, connection and expansion (Module 4) is like building your muscles. The more you practice, the more strength you have to defeat your social anxiety. The aim of learning these skills is to assist you in taking action towards your goals. This is about the practical application of psychological skills for the express purpose of giving you the ability to take action. In the next module we learn how to deal with anxious feelings effectively, so they are no longer a barrier for you building the life you value. Once again if you have any questions, feel free to get in touch with me. Speak soon, Jon www.feelfreehypnosis.com
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