In The Beginning
As far back as I can remember, I've had stage fright. I always feared what people thought of me as I stood up in front of them and tried to speak. I came very close to fainting once during a school speech - a speech which my partners gave as I squeaked out only a few words. This fear of "the stage" was a bit of a problem since I was an aspiring musician.
Eventually, after joining a band, I began playing gigs and forcing myself to get over my fear. I was nervous through the entirety of the first few shows. In later shows, I was only nervous before our performance, and further down the road I found myself taking each gig with absolute ease. The moment we arrived at the venue, I was transformed. I would visualize myself as confident and outgoing, and somehow this worked for me. Not only did I fool the crowd; I fooled myself, and as a result my performances were almost always astounding.
Shift Back to Present-Day
Recently, I've become involved with a new business which requires me to be social. Go figure. Throughout the years I've acquired quite a range of anxieties, one of them being social anxiety. In fact, I'm pretty sure it's my worst one. Making phone calls, to anyone, is especially hard for me. Perhaps this is my chance to cure the anxiety once and for all. It is just one of the many lessons I will learn on this new journey.
My contemplation of the topic at hand has led me to think about the various roles we play in our lives. While on stage, I am a confident, energetic rock star. When I'm working at the grocery store, I have no problem being socially involved with strangers - whether in person or through the telephone. But place me back into my house, and the underlying issues arise again. Basically, I have learned to adapt in certain environments but not in others. I have become comfortable being the confident, outgoing person when placed in the "correct" scenarios.
In truth, I have always been a shy introvert. I've spent about ten years trying to get away from it. Breaking out of that shell requires some bit of acting. But I don't want to be an actress in all aspects of my life. Nor do I want to be an actress forever. How does one get from acting to being?
Then again, maybe I'm not always acting.
A Solution
As though it was meant to be, I was tuned into an article on wholeliving.com which said something I needed to hear (and which also relates to this post.)
"How long does it take to write a two-line email to someone who might help to grow your business? Typically people hold this to be a huge task because anxiety wells up in them when they think about putting themselves “out there.” But the reality is that the email itself takes hardly a minute or two to write. If you learn to calm yourself, center yourself, and not magnify the risk involved, you could make significant headway every time you found a few minutes at your disposal."
Wow! My social anxiety really is linked to my fear of putting myself "out there." While my anxiety never creeps up over emails, the advice offered above can come in handy when I have phone calls to make. I already calm myself at times when I must talk to people face-to-face. So, cultivating that ability with phone calls should be relatively easy. I'll give it a shot and see how it goes.
As a side note: The new business I've gotten myself involved in has been taking a bit of my free time. I've also been diving deeply into my studies. So, please bear with me while my posts are few and far between. I'm hoping to pick up the pace again soon.
If you would like to read the article I quoted above, you can do so here: Using Small Intervals of Time for Creative Work
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