Social Anxiety is defined as, "A chronic mental health condition in which social interactions cause irrational anxiety. For people with social anxiety disorder, everyday social interactions cause irrational anxiety, fear, self-consciousness, and embarrassment" (Mayo Clinic).
It's something that I have struggled with since middle school and still struggle with to this day. It's something that my mom was always confused by because she tried so hard to socialize us as children. But when she would ask me to go do something like ask a random person a question, I immediately froze. I couldn't do it. All I could think was, "What if they laugh at me? What if they think I'm stupid? What if I say it wrong? What if I embarrass myself?" I just couldn't make myself do it. My heart would be racing, and sometimes my body would even start to shake. My mom would get mad at me because I couldn't go ask someone a simple question, but it wasn't that. My body and my brain just wouldn't let me do it.
I think the reason I began to develop social anxiety was not for a lack of trying from my mom's side. I think was from being bullied in middle school. There was this girl that constantly corrected everything I said or did. Anything I did was wrong in some way to her and by god, she was going to let me know it. For an entire year, this girl made my life miserable. She would tell me I wasn't being nice, whatever I was doing was not the right way to do it, that I wasn't pleasing God with my actions. It was engraved in my brain that everything I did was wrong and that I couldn't do anything right.
So, from then on I was always monitoring myself and keeping myself from doing anything that would be wrong or embarrassing because for a year that's all I did. Or that's what it felt like. Because if she corrected me, I felt stupid for doing it in the first place, I felt embarrassed.
Social anxiety is a real thing, and it stems from many other things, whether it's a lack of socializing, a previous trauma, or it just is. It is real and I myself still suffer from it to this day. But how do we fix it?
Unfortunately, the biggest answer I have for that, is by facing it. In order to lessen the effect of social anxiety, you have to put yourself in the social situations, and face your fears. Go up and ask the store clerk a question. Go to the party that you only know one person at. I have found that through going to college and meeting so many people that my social anxiety has diminished and I don't suffer from it near as much. In fact, I find myself enjoying being social even more! Of course, anxiety can be treated with medication when properly addressed, but I find that there are other ways to overcome it. With the proper support and mindset.
People will tell you that it's not real or it's irrational. And it is irrational, that's part of having anxiety. Your brain tricks you into thinking something is going to go wrong when it probably won't. But social anxiety IS real and it can be overcome. I've done it and I think anyone else can too.
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