How to be yourself I

Part 2: Looking inside your head

0. be mindful
1. Specify, specify, specify the reason that causes your anxiety
2. ask yourself these 3 questions:

• how bad would that really be?
• what are the odds?
• how could I cope?

3. embrace yourself to show yourself some compassion.

• soothe, encourage and support
• show appreciation for your efforts

Part 3: Heading out into the world

1. get started and your confidence will catch up

• We don't have to wait until we feel like doing something before we do it. We start doing it, and the feeling will catch up. 
• Put action before confidence. Fake it till you make it. 
• Do it many many times, so your imagination has nowhere to go. Social-anxious people's brains are wired to jump to the worst-case scenario. but with experience, we learn it's not probable and we can handle it. 

2.  structure and role play

• Assign yourself some goals and think of a structure for the conversation. for example: before talking to a stranger, assign yourself a goal"find out something interesting about him or her and tell them something interesting about you"
• imagine yourself playing a role with the purpose to help others.
• Arrange yourself in a powerful, confident posture, sitting or standing in a way you imagine someone open and confident would present. not only does emotion affect the body, but the body also affects emotion. 
• Take the initiative to say hello. Talk to someone alone in the party for a moment to help them feel at ease.

3. facing your fear

• pick a few things that scare you. Facing your fears is called exposure, it's just a fancy name for the practice
• ask yourself 
• "what would I be doing if I felt confident?"
• what would you be doing if anxiety weren't standing in your way
• what do you want to do without over-thinking
• make a challenge list. make the list as concrete as possible. 
• The most important is "you did it". the success of your task is independent of the outcome. The only bar: did you do it? 
• letting go of your life reserver: try not to do the behavior making you FEEL safe. exe:
• drink a couple of drinks when you walk into a party
• cling to your close friends
• look at the floor
• hover on the edge of groups
• checking your phone in the party
• avoid eye contact
• let go of your "safe behaviors", pretend to be confident, arrange yourself in the confident posture, do what you want to do genuinely. 

Summary: 

1. make your challenge list, from the easiest to the most challenging
2. talk your way through with replace and embrace:
• how bad would it really be?
• what are the odds
• how could I cope
3. give yourself some structure or play a role
4. tell yourself: act and the confidence will catch on.
5. arrange yourself the confident posture
6. leave your life preservers at home
7. be brave for the time it takes to get over the summit

You don't gain confidence in a vacuum and the go off and conquer the world. Instead, you learn to be confident, to have courage, to get over anxiety, to live your life authentically, by doing challenging things. and an authentic life includes some rejection, some awkwardness, and some embarrassment. It also includes deep satisfaction in your accomplishments, even when they don't turn out exactly as you pictured them. By practicing, you'll learn even if bad stuff happens, you can keep moving forward, keep being brave. You can handle it.