Just what is social anxiety? Some say it’s just an excuse we make up when we don’t want to do something. Some say just take some pills and you’ll be fine. Some say it’s not even a real thing, just get on with it and stop making a fuss.
Our advice is ‘don’t listen to those people.’
It’s not just an excuse, it can’t be overcome with pills and it most certainly is a real thing.
The NHS website describes social anxiety (also commonly known as ‘social phobia’) as ‘a persistent fear about social situations and being around people.’
To an extent that’s true, but it’s much more than that.
Most of us at one time or another have suffered from social anxiety, whether it be standing up in front of thousands of people making a speech or presentation all the way through to not being able to make a doctor’s appointment on the telephone.
It disrupts normal life, it interferes with your social relationships and it can have a debilitating effect on your performance at work, school or university.
The signs appear to be easier to spot in children or adolescents whereby crying, freezing up, tantrums and a fear of going to school are common, but for adults, it’s far more subtle.
If you do suffer from social anxiety and you fear everyday activities such as meeting new people, going shopping, eating out or even chatting on the telephone, who do you tell? Do you keep it all bottled up?
If you do, you’re not alone. Sufferers of social anxiety often feel like they are being judged, evaluated and critiqued (even though they’re not) which is why it often feels like the easiest thing to do is avoid those situations altogether. Put your metaphorical hand up if you’ve avoided a social situation by feigning a headache, claimed you can’t get a babysitter or ‘double-booked’ yourself by mistake.
Please don’t suffer in silence. There may be lots of reason why you keep your feelings of anxiety to yourself. Regardless, you can talk to me and not only can you talk to me about it, I will do something about it.
Here at Behavioural Freedom, I treat the symptoms of social anxiety using a tried and tested combination of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy and hypnosis known as Cognitive Behavioural Hypnotherapy, or CBH. You can read more about CBH here but essentially, it’s a fully integrated approach to the treatment of stress and anxiety and in a nutshell, these are the benefits to you –
- The addition of hypnotherapy to CBT has been proven to shorten treatment times
- Hypnosis enables you to see things more vividly in your ‘mind’s eye’
- Hypnosis solidifies the relationship and builds rapport between you and your therapist
- You can learn to ‘self-hypnotise’ by inducing a deep state of relaxation
- Under hypnosis, you have an increased opportunity of receiving and understanding the suggestions your therapist makes to free you from unwanted behaviours
Behavioural Freedom is both the name of my business but it’s also a state of mind and my goal is to put you back on the path to behavioural freedom so you can start looking forward to tomorrow and stop dreading it.
Call me on 01727 236 136 or email me using the form on the Contact Me page today.