social anxiety – The Work of Byron Katie with Grace

June 24, 2018

When you get nervous on your way to an event with (gasp) people

I met this friend yesterday on my adventure in Yosemite. I didn’t have the thought this tree could judge me. I love imagining having the very same thought about all people.

Have you ever felt nervous when you’re going to a social gathering because you don’t know many of the people who will be there?

A dinner, a big party, a birthday, a memorial service, a shared meal of any kind, a book club discussion, a dance, a workshop or retreat, a training program.

Fluttery nerves descend just thinking about it. What if you don’t enjoy yourself? What if HE is there? What if SHE is there? You could make a fool of yourself possibly. They might not be your people. Maybe you shouldn’t go after all?

Several days ago I boarded a plane to fly to Yosemite to attend the memorial service of my cousin’s husband. While I’m a Bell and part of the family, I knew there would be many people I’d never met. Extended family of the beautiful man who passed away, and many friends of the couple.

I was excited and always had an immediate “yes” within from the moment I heard about what was planned. I wanted to honor these kind, generous people and my cousin.

If you’ve ever had anticipatory nervousness about an event though, it can be sweet to sit down and look more closely at the thoughts and beliefs running in the background, and inquire.

What are you really nervous about? What images do you see that would lead you to believe you won’t enjoy it?

They’re looking at me and judging me
I’ll get stuck talking to someone annoying or scary
They won’t like me
The conversation or activity will be something I don’t understand
I’ll do or say something that will cause them to dislike me; say no, leave, talk too much, talk too little, stay too long, ask stupid questions, ask nothing at all

I notice most of these thoughts have to do with feeling separate from others and most importantly, not being OK with that.

In other words, it’s natural to feel separate from others from time to time–a group wants to stay up late talking, but we’re tired so we go to bed. Without a thought about this being a problem….there isn’t one.

Let’s do The Work.

Is it true that people could judge you, or talk “too much”, or not like you, or do things you don’t really get, or even things that freak you out?

Yes.

Can you absolutely know it’s true?

Well…er…yes. People judge. That’s what we do.

But is it true that it’s stressful and would cause separation?

Oh. Wow. No.

How do you react when you believe your contact with other human beings could result in unpleasant feelings, or separation (at any upcoming event)?

I don’t go! Or I get nervous beforehand. Or if one little thing seems “off” when I arrive, I might say “I knew I shouldn’t have come!”

I don’t have an open mind. I don’t approach the event like it’s a new adventure, with joyful excitement. I’m not so curious. Perhaps I feel protective. My guard is up.

But who would you be without the thought that something unpleasant might happen, or other people could cause you upset, or you might get “stuck” in a conversation, or that people won’t like you and you won’t like people?

I’d have so much fun coming and going, into and out of, the company of others.

I’d feel curious about the adventure of connecting with people, or equally curious about connecting with myself. I’d enjoy crowds, or special occasions, or total silence with only me. It wouldn’t really matter if I was with bunches of people, or alone.

I’d be loving my thoughts, wherever I was–with anyone.

When I need to leave, I do. When I love to stay, I do. When I’m all alone, it’s good. When I’m with others, it’s equally as good.

This is a never-ending development, and thrilling process.

I once was so introverted, my preference was to be entirely alone. Except not really–because I didn’t even like my own company a lot of the time. I suppose my preference was to not be wherever I was. LOL. It was misery.

Then, as I grew more comfortable with others, I grew more comfortable with myself. As I learned to take care of my own needs completely (I’m not saying I’m perfect at this) then my sense of trust for myself grew and I knew I couldn’t get “stuck” talking to anyone. I could come and go as truly needed, without fear of others’ opinions.

The strange thing is, when I feel really free to come and go without caring what anyone thinks or does or says or feels….I love going to gatherings with other people more and more. (And also, now that I think about it, loving silence more).

What do I really love more?

Wow. What I love more are my thoughts about what’s happening in my environment, with or without other people.

I see it could be just as true or truer that:

They’re looking at me and loving me
I’ll get free talking to someone annoying or scary
They will like me
The conversation or activity will be something I don’t understand! Yippee! Learning!
I won’t do or say anything that could cause them to dislike me

“Who would you be in people’s presence without, for example, the story that anyone should care about you, ever? You would be love itself. When you believe the myth that people should care, you’re too needy to care about people or about yourself. The experience of love can’t come from anyone else: it can come only from inside you.” ~ Byron Katie in 1000 Names For Joy pg. 71

If you’d like to question your thoughts about other people of any kind (or ANY stressful thinking at all), join me in Summer Camp for The Mind. Summer Camp is a program of daily inquiry sessions, live, from July 6th – August 17th. We come together online to do this work by identifying and then questioning what’s true.

I used to want to do The Work alone only, or with just one partner….but to gather with others has been one of the greatest gifts.

And even if you don’t do anything formal with others, you could find one partner to facilitate you, or trade with, in looking closely at beliefs about people, about life, about reality.

Social anxiety, obstacles to love, and being with Byron Katie

I’m amazed at the frequency of doing The Work in my life as summer approaches and is about to become “official” the same day as the Breitenbush retreat begins (3 spots still available, by the way–love to have you). We will offer 24 CEs for Institute for The Work candidates as well as 26 CEUs for mental health professionals.

And then, another bright light of the summer….starting on Saturday, July 8th, we gather for Being With Byron Katie. I had fun sharing about it at New Spirit Journal here. (Read on for more).

Speaking of gathering together with others….I’ve been thinking recently about social anxiety.

Someone wrote to me about a month ago saying he wanted to attend a retreat, but had too much social anxiety and felt very worried.

Isn’t it funny how we like the idea of gathering to receive support, learning, insight or some kind of transformational shift….but the very gathering itself is a bit frightening.

I have to travel, greet others, speak about what’s going on for me, share or show my feelings. Ugh. Maybe I’ll stay home.

I’ve felt the very same way.

When I was in my twenties, I knew I needed to address my great anxiety about talking with other people, telling the truth, answering questions more honestly (it seemed like I never did, and always tried to be polite rather than clear). I knew I wanted less fear and more relaxation with HUMANS….yet intentionally moving to spend several days with them was daunting. The opposite of my normal strategy.

Go on a retreat? Um. No way.

Someone suggested I see a therapist who specialized in group therapy. I thought “I’ll go see her, but I’ll NEVER go to the group.”

Nine months later, fortunately for me, I was in the group.

And this was finally the beginning of the end of my extreme social anxiety.

But it wasn’t easy at first.

When I joined the group, I was familiar and trusting of my therapist. She was the group co-leader along with another male therapist, and she’s the one person I knew.

However, one person who felt safe and trustworthy did not make me comfortable in the group.

I was dumb struck. Literally. I said absolutely nothing, unless addressed, and then made it as short and simple and sweet as possible.

This went on week after week. I watched the others ask for time and attention in my group. I sized up the members. I assessed them and drew conclusions.

“She’s one of those needy types” or “Ah, he’s a Microsoft millionaire with intimacy problems” or “she’s so creative I don’t even know what she’s doing here” and on and on.

Then, one day SIX MONTHS LATER (my therapist was very patient and had given me lots of opportunity to warm up, which I never did) at the beginning of the group, my therapist said:

“Everyone, before we get started today, I have something I need to bring up. It’s about Grace.”

Gulp.

My heart started pounding. No! I hate the attention! Please don’t look at me!

I wanted to run out of the room, but felt also frozen solid at the same time, like a trapped animal.

This wonderful woman, who cared very much about me, then proceeded to say that I was withholding myself from the group. No one could know me if I didn’t speak. And, to add to this, it was quite controlling of me to NOT speak. I could remain unchanged, unchallenged, and not get into anything messy or have direct conversation with anyone. I was remaining in my little castle.

Gasp, quick in-breath.

She was right.

I actually did not want to remain in a private world or tower all by myself, but I had no idea how to get out of my anxious perspective of other people.

My social anxiety stemmed from believing I needed to protect myself, to never disturb anyone else, to be polite, relaxed, graceful (my name even said so), kind, and nice. And self-less, by the way. I needed to have no needs whatsoever, since this also might disturb someone.

Whew, it was a terribly difficult castle to hold up. There was no freedom, everything felt restrained, and no wonder I stuffed myself with food when the tension built up strong. I would eat all alone, by myself, not letting anyone else see me.

The therapist asked me to share something about myself, and to talk about what I was most afraid of, if I spoke out loud.

Shaking all over, and at the point of tears, I spoke some about my feelings of anxiety and worry about being accepted, and I answered her questions (which are now a fog, but they felt OK to answer, I do remember that).

It was nothing more than this. The therapy group went on, and other people brought up their own issues and discussions that had nothing to do with me. I survived the confrontation.

But it was never the same again.

It was better.

I felt truly seen, and invited to step forward and be seen, and like the group even wanted me to show up, instead of fading into the background all the time and sitting there in silence, just listening.

If you saw me a year later, and then two years later when I was ready to leave the group…you would have seen a bubbly, passionate, talkative, powerful young woman.

Over the course of those several years in the group therapy, I screamed, cried, re-enacted drama therapy scenes that were important to me from childhood, learned to confront people in the group honestly.

At one point, I was given an assignment based on sharing my concerns about receiving support, to call people in my group in between sessions during the week. When I first did it, I could barely dial the phone, I felt so shy. I had to call THREE people in my group every week and actually speak to them. It took awhile to get comfortable.

During that period of time, I stopped binge-eating and vomiting.

Was my social anxiety and eating related? You bet. And healing the anxiety with others began to heal my eating patterns as well.

During those years, for the very first time I attended a retreat with all the people in groups like mine. We spent entire weekends together, with everyone sleeping on the floor in sleeping bags in the same room! I was SHOCKED the first time our therapist pointed to the room where we’d be sleeping. All together in one room? What? Isn’t that a little too close?

It was actually heavenly. I was safe, surrounded by honest, caring people, and finding out that my story of humanity being mean and judgmental and rejecting…just was not true.

I’m still finding this out all the time, creating groups and retreats intentionally as a part of my joy and passion in the world.

And here’s a little secret. I still get nervous/anxious/excited before every single retreat or gathering, whether I’m the leader or the one attending. I even wear a shirt for the first day that won’t show armpit sweat. I sometimes might even say in jest to my husband “Why did I schedule this retreat? What was I thinking?” And we laugh.

Here’s the thing that’s entirely different: I can’t believe what I’m thinking is really true. My body might be reacting, I’m excited, I have heightened attention, I feel thrilled and curious, you could even call it nervous, but it doesn’t feel like I therefore shouldn’t do it.

I know I don’t have to believe my thoughts. I know they don’t hold up.

“I noticed that things happen with or without me, people approve of me or they don’t. It has nothing to do with me. This is really good news, since it leaves me responsible for my own happiness. It leaves me to do nothing but live my life as kindly and intelligently as I can.” ~ Byron Katie in I Need Your Love–Is That True?

Now, one of my favorite events of the summer is Being With Byron Katie Pacific Northwest. I mention it now, because it’s such a good event for freedom from any need to dialogue with others and yet be hanging out with lovely people.

Why?

Because we hold silence, while we’re in our group together. We listen to Katie via live streaming (she’s in Switzerland) and we watch together, but in between the 3-hour sessions with Katie, we remain in silence. We eat, get ready for bed, go out to walk, journal, read, wake up in silence.

For some people, it’s the first time they’ve ever stayed in silence all day, without speaking, but being near and around others.

Yet, what liberation to not speak, or be compelled to share, or need to make any conversation.

And oh the power of listening to Katie work with people, and their beautiful questions and concerns, and her answers and her sharing what she’s experienced. I especially love how Katie is not interested in delivering lessons or teaching to anyone. All she’s really interested in is asking questions, and being with people who want to question their suffering.

We get to participate just by listening. I often feel moved, and in awe, that what is offered on the screen from the retreat in Switzerland is brilliant, inspiring and transformative. People in our group are taking notes wildly, deeply affected, and the learning is palpable in the room. We get to write emails to the people in Switzerland, too, and Katie might respond to someone’s question right from our living room group.

I’m so grateful we can attend a retreat together that would normally cost thousands for travel, lodging, food, tuition. Thanks to technology, we’re there anyway.

And through our community together we’re able to maintain the same silence the people are keeping in Switzerland. If I were watching by myself at home, I simply wouldn’t.

I’ve tried it before. Something about being alone, I start emailing, working on projects, answering the phone, responding to my family. I don’t take the silence part seriously. I don’t let myself be with me and my own mind. But in this group, I do.

If you’d like to join this powerful event and spend four days (or you can come to the weekend only if you really can’t take off time from work) then I’d love to have you. We have a modest house in a fantastic location (Roanoke Park, Seattle) so your silent walks and exploring in between sessions can be done with magnificent views.

There are four bedrooms available for sleeping, email me if you want to reserve one (yes, you can share and split the cost with someone else).

To find out more, and to see the bedroom choices and fees, visit HERE.

And if you can relate to having social anxiety….perhaps spending time in this retreat full of inquiry about the stresses of the human condition will bring you to the turnaround:

Social comfort.

The joy of inhabiting space and time connected to other people.

“The only obstacle to loving other people is believing what you think, and you’ll come to see that that’s also the only obstacle to loving yourself.” ~ Byron Katie

Much love,

Grace

November 10, 2014

Strangers Are Scary

Mini Retreat: Seattle 12/6 1:30-5:30 pm, full session in The Work from start to finish. Everyone will get to investigate at least one stressful situation from their lives, past or present.

Click here to read more and register to come. Limited to 12. 4 CEUs for mental health professionals.

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*Who would you be without your beliefs about Other People?*

The other night I ventured out to a party at an old friend’s house, someone I’ve known since high school days.

Taking off for an event at someone’s house alone….a party, a gathering, a dinner….a social event of some kind….

….isn’t the easiest thing in the world for some people.

Well, I should speak for myself.

I once felt very anxious almost every time I approached the scene of a party.

The voices are coming out of the windows, there are cars parked up and down the street squeezed nose to fender, music wafting into the night air, bright lights from inside.

Lots-of-people sounds.

If you’re like I once was (and I still have ideas waft through like this for sure) you may notice you get nervous at that moment. People are going to look at you when you go inside! They might talk with you, too!

Twenty-five years ago I was in a therapy group.

Those scary, scary humans, OMG!

(It was one of the best things I ever did in my healing process, by the way).

I had been in this marvelous group for over a year.

I shared with everyone during the little beginning check-in whats-going-on start of group that I was invited to a big huge party….but I didn’t really do so well at parties so I wasn’t going to go. Sometimes I drank too much alcohol. Staying in was better. Going out was risky.

One of the therapists stopped me.

“You know, there’s another option besides Not Going. You can go to a party and be completely honest.”

Gulp. What does she mean by that?

She went on:

“For example, you could walk in, look around, go stand near someone and say to them that you feel kind of nervous going to parties and you’re a super-extreme introvert.”

She said I could practice relaxing, not needing to “do” anything, see if a question comes to ask someone I encounter.

Oh.

Seriously?

With this other vision offered to me….it suddenly occurred to me that I had been locked into one story about large quantities of people all together in one place and what you were supposed to be like to be “successful” in that situation.

You were supposed to like attention, love talking with people, love asking and answering questions, and be entertaining, fun, pleasing and likable. You were supposed to be nice, friendly and polite.

But honest? About what you really thought and felt?

Woah. That had never ever occurred to me before.

Who would you be without your story that you are being watched by people with a critical eye, or they need to feel good around you, or you have to fake that you’re interested, or you’re going to “have” to talk to people and be nice?

Without that thought, I’d be totally free to take it all in, move in or out of conversations, or the rooms, connect with the human race, risk being perceived as weird, or quiet, or rude.

Sharing that I was nervous around big groups of people, with people, began a turnaround inside me, even though I didn’t know about Byron Katie yet.

I began practicing genuine honesty, and self-care, in large groups.

Sometimes I bumbled, it didn’t go so well, I screwed up, I got scared.

But then even though I felt shy, I’d try again.

The other night…I had such gratitude about humanity at that party.

The host who opened up his home and baked bread and chicken for guests, the band who played fabulous music, the old friends who I unexpectedly got to see after years and years, the new friends I met for fascinating conversations, the room, the lights, the chairs, the floor.

Even though there were tons of new faces and I had a little of that background of alarm when encountering the new and strange when I first walked in, I had the best time.

Keep questioning your beliefs that groups of people are scary, if you notice they are. Or boring, or irritating, or strange…whatever.

Maybe everyone you encounter is a friend, open, interested in sharing and connecting, curious, accepting, loving, kind, even if they’re also anxious. Maybe you belong everywhere.

Including this party.

Doesn’t that sound more fun, a bit lighter?

“There is only one nature, and it is friendly. If I am perceiving you as not friendly, it is THIS unfriendly mechanism [Katie points to head] that is perceiving the unfriendly….the only thing in that situation that needs to change is ME….Identify what you’re thinking and believing, wake yourself up, you’re in a dream!” ~ Byron Katie

Much love, Grace