August 30, 2011

An Empowering Way to Look At Social Interactions

I was recently watching Mark Sisson’s talk about The Lost Art of Play. Mark, who is the author of The Primal Blueprint, takes an interesting viewpoint on playing.

He says that play, in any of its forms, entails three key qualities:

  • It’s not directed towards an outcome;
  • It’s in the moment, and;
  • It’s fun.

So if you look at how many of the things you do on a regular basis have these three qualities, you can get a pretty accurate image of how much time you spend playing and how much time you spend being a ‘serious’ adult.

I think that in our society, we have this propensity of turning play into non-play (or if you like, work). We take a regular form of play, let’s say running, we turn it into a severe competition, we make it about performance and winning, and thus we take the unpolluted fun out of it.

Social Interactions as Play

What does this have to do with social interactions?

Well, I believe that social interactions are fundamentally a form of play.

I didn’t always have this perspective. As a pragmatist, I used to think that you should have a goal in a conversation, and ‘work’ during that conversation to achieve it.

I didn’t realize that from a pragmatic perspective, the goal of most social interactions is an intrinsic one. Paradoxically, the goal is to have fun and be in the moment, without any other extrinsic aim.

Looking back now, I guess I was defining social interaction in an approval seeking and superficial way. And I notice that a lot of the people I interact with as a coach define it in a similar way.

They make social interactions about being liked, being accepted, impressing the other person and so on. They attach a lot of meaning to them and consequently, they feel pressured to ‘perform’ well in any interpersonal interaction they have.

I’m not talking about salary negotiations or a speech in front of 500 people. I’m talking about regular, everyday conversations with friends, people they’ve just met, acquaintances, colleagues or neighbors.

Putting Play Back In Your Social Interactions

If you often feel tense during a normal conversation with other people, you can lay a wager on the fact that in your mind, you’re not treating it as play, but as something very grave.

Thus, you stress yourself during social interactions and you do so pointlessly. Well, it’s time to put play back in your interactions with other people. Here are four tips for this.

Tip 1: Start by consciously recognizing that most social interactions you have are not as serious as your mind mechanically makes them out to be. They’re not that big of a deal. You can allow yourself to relax and act in a more aloof manner.

Tip 2: Breathe. When you take something too seriously, you focus so much and you feel so anxious that you forget too breathe. So, consciously focus your breathing; make it slower and more regulated. This will allow you to relax and get more perspective.

Tip 3: Remind yourself that it’s play, not work. During the interaction, you want to constantly bring back in your mind the concept that it’s not that serious; it’s only a form of play. With practice, this will get easier and you’ll need to do it less.

Tip 4: Treat it as a game. How would you treat an interaction if you deeply believed it was only a game? Maybe you would joke more, be more spontaneous, slouch, or take off that silly tie. Well, do any of these things, and as you change your behavior, your feelings will follow.

Becoming a New You in Social Interactions

If conversations often make you anxious, learning to see them as a play and to have fun without seeking approval is not a walk in the park.

I just gave you a few tips. You need to acquire a new way of thinking and a new way of behaving, as well as a method to practice it systematically, until it becomes a part of you.

In less than two weeks, I’m going to release “Conversation Confidence”: a practical audio guide to making authentic, confident and effortless conversation. If you want to become a confident, relaxed conversationalist, and have more fun with it, this is definitely for you.

Conversation Confidence will teach you step by step how to transform your thinking and behavior related to conversations, and become a self-assured conversationalist who enjoys conversations like a 5-year old enjoys hide and seek.

I’m currently fine tuning this guide, and preparing it for the exciting launch. Stay close.

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Filed Under: Attitude, Lifestyle, Relationships Tagged With: , , , , 1 Comment
August 24, 2011

Where Does Social Confidence Really Stem From?

Social confidence is the term I use to describe the type of confidence that concerns social situations and dealing with other persons.

I think most people have a profound misunderstanding of what it takes to develop social confidence. The problem is that they treat social confidence like any other type of confidence, and they believe developing it requires the same approach.

But it doesn’t. And so they end up going on this strenuous and unnecessary journey towards social confidence. Ironically, they often don’t even reach their destination, because they took the wrong road.

Social Confidence vs. Mechanical Confidence

I refer as mechanical confidence to the confidence regarding certain tasks or roles, and how well you can perform them.

Confidence as a singer, as a football player, as a car driver, as a lawyer or as an accountant, these are all forms of mechanical confidence.

Mechanical confidence in a certain area is reliant on the education, experience, results and appraisals that you’ve received in that area.

For instance: if you work as an accountant and you’ve received training at a top tier accounting school, you have over a decade of accounting experience, you have done correctly all sorts of convoluted accounting tasks and your clients habitually praise you for being such a good accountant, it’s reasonable to have ‘accounting confidence’.

And it makes sense, as you’re likely a very good accountant, with first-class accounting skills.

In the realm of mechanical confidence, skills and confidence go hand in hand. The way to develop your mechanical confidence in a specific area is typically to increase your skills in that area.

This doesn’t mean there aren’t excellent accountants who lack confidence as accountants, but still, the fact they have those excellent accounting skills creates a solid foundation to develop that confidence.

Social confidence is different. Although for the most part, people treat it the same as mechanical confidence.

By this I mean that they think social confidence needs to be based on social skills and social likeability, so they try to increase these elements in order to become more socially confident.

Most people I work with as a coach believe they need to learn how to be funny, how to make captivating conversation or how to impress others in order to feel confident in social settings and become more outgoing.

But they’re making a profoundly wrong assumption.

The Truth about Social Confidence

The fact of the matter is this: social confidence is not dependent on social skills. You don’t need to be a master conversationalist and a charismatic person in order to have social confidence.

Sure, these factors can elevate your social confidence and it’s a good idea to develop your social skills, but don’t believe for a second that without good social skills, you can’t have and shouldn’t have social confidence. Because that’s a bunch of bullshit.

Social confidence is something you expand from inside yourself. Its foundation is not in your social skills, but rather in your thinking.

Some of the most socially confident people I know are complete slobs with no goals in life, and little intelligence, creativity or allure to bring out. They have little that other people can passionately like them for, apart from their confidence in and of itself.

Yet they can feel confident in a social setting, not because the people in that setting like them, but because it doesn’t truly matter to them whether these people like them or not. They don’t need other people’s approval.

If you’re trying to develop your social confidence by trying to become a better, more likeable person, you’re pointlessly taking the long wrong.

Really, the best way to go is to just work on your social confidence directly. Focus on weeding out your limiting beliefs, embrace the notion that you don’t need the people around you to approve of you, and your social confidence will rise naturally.

And it’s not that unreliable confidence you have during a conversation when you know the other person is fond of you. It’s a lasting and reliable confidence that comes from your outlook on yourself, others, the world and life.

Once you have this natural social confidence, developing yourself and becoming more socially skilled is just an afterthought.

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Filed Under: Attitude, Inspirational, People Skills Tagged With: , , 3 Comments
July 28, 2011

Feels Like You’re Running Out Of Time?

I think that one of the most dreadful feelings to have is the feeling that you’re running out of time. That life is passing by you and you’re not doing the things you want to do, you’re not living it the way you could be living it.

Really, apart from physical pain, I can’t think of any worse kind of pain than the sadness resulting from the perception of wasting your life. And if like me, you don’t believe in life after death, reincarnation or any of that stuff, and you believe this life is all you have, it only magnifies it.

Where does this very common feeling of sorrow stem from? In my view, there are three major sources.

1. Failing to Achieve Your Goals

The first source has to do with your life not turning up the way you want it to turn out.

Maybe you don’t have that high-level job you’ve always dreamed of, or you don’t make the kind of money you want to make, or you don’t have the relationship you want to have, or you don’t look the way you desire.

Considering that in the society most of us are living in, we are encouraged to set lofty goals for ourselves and build our lives around them, this source of discontent is quite widespread.

However, it’s worth pointing out that not achieving certain goals in and of itself does not lead to unhappiness, unless you attach yourself to your goals. Which takes me to my next point.

2. Attachment to Your Goals

Fortunately for me, I’ve met quite a number of people who are able to enjoy life extensively despite not having achieved their goals. I say fortunately because this kind of people tends to be the exception more than the rule.

Yes, they have goals and they work at achieving them. But not having achieved them doesn’t make them feel sadness and regret. Why? Because they are able to draw satisfaction from life in itself, not just from reaching goals.

Reaching their goals would temporarily increase their happiness, but that doesn’t stop them from having fun each day, doing things they enjoy, being self-amusing and making the best out of life as it is.

Ironically, this attitude of detachment, as most psychological studies suggest, will only increases their chances of success. Happiness breeds success even more than success breeds happiness.

3. Perfectionism

Last but not least, I think one of the central issues that prevent people from being happy is the tendency to aim for inflated ideals and only allow themselves to be happy if they achieve them.

It’s not enough make a good living; you need to be a millionaire. It’s not enough to have a nice house; you need to live in a mansion. It’s enough to have cool friends; you need to hang out with P. Diddy. It’s not enough to have a lot of qualities, you need to be perfect.

This kind of perfectionism creates the staggering situation we see today in developed countries: people have more money and more options than ever, yet the depression rate is sky high.

What gives? It’s only another shred of evidence that it’s not what you have that matters; it’s how you use it.

Stop, Look and Listen

Ultimately, I think in order to truly enjoy life, most people need to make a shift in attitude. They need to stop focusing exclusively on chasing increasingly higher goals and learn to embrace life as it is.

Now, notice I used the word ‘learn’. This is because it’s not something you just do. It’s a way of looking at things, at yourself and at life. It’s a way of living and a way of being. And it requires adequate practice and commitment to assimilate it.

Perhaps it’s time to put some distance between your goals and your happiness, and not let the later be dependent on the former. Aim high, but don’t be a perfectionist. Act to reach your goals and improve your life, never give up on your goals, but don’t let the fact you’re not reaching your destination dismay you.

Focus on enjoying the journey. The destination is secondary.

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Filed Under: Attitude, Inspirational, Lifestyle Tagged With: , , 5 Comments
May 29, 2011

This Article Contains Instances of Strong Language

I don’t believe in good language and bad language. I also don’t believe in good people and bad people. I’m not interested in broad labels and I try not to judge things or people based on them, but on factual results.

Personally, I don’t have any problem with words like ‘fuck’, ‘shit’ and so on (as you can tell). If they serve a purpose, I use them when I write articles, deliver speeches or make conversation. I have internalized all kinds of language, from the scientific to the trivial.

Well, not all persons are like that, and not all persons appreciate my language. For instance, while I get a lot of email from people who say they appreciate my straightforward writing style, I also get email from people who tell me they find my language offensive.

And I have learned to embrace both kinds of reactions. It took me a while, but I’ve realized that the first category of people cannot exist without the second one. I wouldn’t have my fans if I didn’t have my critics, because they all respond to the same personal style but in different ways.

Victims of Labels

This being said, I do find the arguments of individuals who reject the use of strong language amusing. A typical conversation for me with such a person (I’ll call them Bob) goes kind of like this:

Bob: “I don’t like your profane language. It’s unprofessional.”

Me: “Unprofessional. What does that mean specifically?”

Bob: “You know…. Unprofessional! “

Me: “No, I don’t know. It’s a label, but what does it mean?”

Bob: “I suppose it means… incompetence.”

Me: “So you’re saying that my use of profane language is an accurate estimator of how competent I am in my field?”

Bob. “Well, no I guess not. But that kind of language shows disrespect.”

Me: “How?”

Bob: “It just does.”

Me: “I don’t buy that assumption. How precisely is my strong language an indicator of disrespect?”

Bob: “That’s how people see it.”

Me: “What people?”

Bob: “People.”

Me: “You mean ALL people?”

Bob: “No. Yes. I’m not sure.”

This dialogue could go on forever, but Bob eventually finds it nauseating and gives up. Comedy aside, I think you can tell where I’m going. My point is this:

The use of strong language doesn’t mean shit.

Those interpretations we may give to the use of strong language are damn near arbitrary. We just believe they are correct because they’re spinning in our head like a broken disc.

Today, we have top professionals who use the word ‘fuck’ in almost every sentence and amateurs who try to appear competent by the use of ‘proper language’.

Words as Expression

There’s an episode of the TV show Bullshit (yes, that’s the name of the show) where Penn & Teller, the hosts of the show, debunk profanity. You might want to check it out.

I think Penn and Teller are aware of one key trait of language: its ability to convey meaning. Language is a way to express ideas, facts, emotions and ultimately, ourselves.

However, in order for language to do so, we must be willing to use its full range, even if some persons may not like it. Censoring ourselves for the sake of etiquette impairs personal expression. Do that often enough and you have no voice, and no impact.

Personally, I find the whole distinction between good and bad language juvenile and farfetched. But these are only two labels. I’ll tell you one practical lesson I’ve learned though, as a coach and as a person.

You’ll get a lot more out of being authentic in your communication than by trying to follow strict etiquette.

Will you piss some people off? Absolutely. Does it make a difference? No, not really. The only real way to never piss people off is to be invisible. I’ve been there, and trust me: it’s not very enjoyable.

The best way to go is to discover your inner voice, make it heard in a genuine way and make shit happen.

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Filed Under: Attitude, Inspirational, News Tagged With: , , , , , 10 Comments
May 22, 2011

How to Be the Life of the Party

You know those parties you read about in fairytales, that last three days and three nights? I just got back form a kick-ass salsa party that actually lasted that long.

In light of this circumstance, I decided to write about a social life topic I know many people are fascinated with: how to be the life of the party.

I believe that when you know how to be the life of the party, not only that you enjoy festive events more, but you enliven everybody else present as well. You become the core that attention goes to and positive energy flows from.

Here are my top four principles on how to be the life of the party:

1. Make Having Fun Your Main Focus

If your focus is on being charming and impressing others at a party, you’ve hit a dead end. Typically, there is nothing that will get you in your head more than concentrating on obtaining some form of validation from others.

The individuals who are naturally the life of the party, interestingly enough, don’t focus on being the life of the party. They just want to have fun and try to find as many ways to do so as possible.

Their entire attitude at a party stems from this mindframe. Paradoxically, in learning how to be the life of the party, you need to forget about impressing and focus on entertaining and enjoying yourself instead.

2. Talk with Lots of People

If you study the social dynamics at parties, you notice that the person who is seen as the life of the party is the person who behaves in a highly social way. Well, you want to be that kind of a person.

When you’re interacting with just about everybody in the room, you’re meeting people, shaking hands, telling stories, cracking jokes and being outgoing, you boost your mood and you’re spreading it to everybody around you.

Even if you’re somewhat shy, you can still get sociable by making baby steps. Start by talking with the people you already know, then with people you don’t know but seem really friendly, and so on. In no time, you can end up talking with everybody at a party.

3. Dance, Learn To Dance and Dance Some More

In my experience, most good parties tend to involve some music and dancing. The parties that are strictly conversational in nature often end up being quite a bore. Somehow, movement and dancing seems to be an integral part of social fun.

So, it’s time to get your dancing groove on. The most valuable piece of advice I can give you here is: don’t just sit in a corner with your arms crossed and watch others have fun. Rather, be on the dance floor, dancing like it’s 1999.

If you generally feel somewhat self-conscious when you’re dancing, I can totally relate to that. From my perspective, there are two ways out:

  1. Realize that people are not looking at you and making fun of your dancing (it’s a party not a dance contest) and thus, relax;
  2. If you really believe that you’re a terrible dancer and have a hard time getting over it, get some dancing lessons.

4. Do Stupid Stuff

Think of a party as your one chance to do almost anything you want and get away with it. In a party environment, many of the conventional social norms no longer apply and you can get away with doing lots of stupid shit.

So, embrace this opportunity. Don’t be the dreary person who talks about the state of the world all night long. Be the person who sprays champagne on everybody, and jumps in the swimming pool with their clothes on.

Trust me: the more stupid stuff you do at a party, the more you animate that party and draw people towards you. As long as you don’t end up doing something illegal, in my view, just about anything else goes.

Think about it this way: you only have one life to live. You might as well enjoy it and help others enjoy it as well. Having fun is one of the most important things you can do. Therefore, learning how to be the life of the party matters first and foremost because it increases the fun factor all around.

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Filed Under: Attitude, Lifestyle, People Skills Tagged With: , , , 4 Comments
May 13, 2011

Dealing with an Attention Whore

An attention whore can be a pain in the ass. This person (either man or woman), due to their deep-seated need for validation from others, will often try aggressively to takeover any social setting.

Their extraversion, theatricality, verbal skills and desperate desire to woo people often makes an attention whore quite loud, pushy and annoying. You just want to either get them to shut up and chill once in a while, or to hit them with a blunt object.

Unfortunately, most of the impulses we may have when dealing with an attention whore will not yield positive results. There are however, effective strategies to handle an AW. Here are the four that, in my experience, work best.

1. Start with a Reality Check

First off, ask yourself this question: “Is this person’s attitude bothering me because 1) they’re loud and aggressive, or because 2) they’re getting more attention from others than me?”

You see, I frequently notice that shy people have a problem with attention whores due to envy. An attention whore is outgoing and social, which is something they’re not. An AW often grabs attention in group settings, while they’re getting ignored.

If the second answer to the question above applies in your case, then the best strategy is not to try and disarm the attention whore. The best strategy is to focus on becoming more outgoing. The AW may make it hard for you to be social, but they are not truly the issue here. You are.

2. Ignore, Divide and Conquer

I think that one of the worst things you can do is to give or appear to give your full interest to an attention whore. This only feeds their exacerbated sense of entitlement and makes them even more obnoxious.

You want to moderate the AW and you do this by habitually ignoring them. This means that you’ll sometimes phase out while they’re talking, act as if you don’t care very much, even interrupt and start talking over them. Be assertive; don’t get trapped in mindless conversation.

In group settings, one of the best things you can do is to divide and conquer. Let’s say you’re in a set of five people and one of them is an attention whore. While the AW is talking, turn towards one of the people next to you and start a conversation with them. Thus, you’re breaking the group into subgroups and dividing the attention.

3. Tease Them

One strategy I particularly enjoy using with attention whores is to verbally indicate their tendency to take over a conversation and to tease them about it. For example, I’ll say something like: “Wow! You sure like to talk! Have you’ve been talking for like 30 minutes straight?”

This strategy works wonders because it subtly suggests that the other person is an AW, that you know it and that you’re not going to tolerate it. This kind of confident and clever humor is more effective than becoming aggressive, and a lot more effective than simply shutting up.

4. Let Them Go

In the long term, I think the proper thing to do with a true attention whore is to let them out of your life. All the drama and the struggle of dealing with an AW are not worth it. Cut them out of your social circle.

Occasionally, this is harder to do because your social circles overlap, or you’re in the same department at work or something like that. However, even is such cases, you can find smart ways to manage social dynamics and not deal with them too often.

The one thing you don’t want to do is go into a never-ending psychological battle with an attention whore, trying to outsmart them, dominate them, ruin their reputation or steal their attention. You’ll only end up looking really insecure or an attention whore yourself.

My belief is that a fulfilling interpersonal life gravitates around emotionally healthy people. This is the kind of person you want to be and the kind of persons you want to surround yourself with. Any other way simply will not do.

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Filed Under: Attitude, Communication Skills Tagged With: , , 32 Comments
April 11, 2011

‘I Have No Friends’ Help

Some of the people I work with as a social confidence coach have a decent social life and they’re just looking to enhance it, while some will tell me right off the bat: “I have no friends and barely any social life. I need help.”

When you’re in the ‘I have no friends’ category, you’re in a deeper hole than most people and there is a lot more work to be done in order to lift yourself out of it. However, don’t presume that this makes it harder. Rather, it simply makes it longer.

Why Do I Have No Friends?

If the number of friends in your social circle is zero, you are probably wondering: “Why do I have no friends?” This is a key question to answer. One thing I’ve noticed is a recurring set of characteristics that people with no friends share.

If you’re in the “I have no friends’ category, one or more of the following explanations are probably valid for you:

1. Shyness. Almost every individual with zero friends that I’ve coached or met struggled with shyness or social anxiety. This made them uneasy about meeting new people and expressing themselves authentically, which makes friends making almost impossible.

2. Poor conversation skills. It’s also common for individuals who have no friends to lack certain conversation skills. This is usually shyness related. They often have a hard time keeping a conversation going and moving it beyond fluff. Thus, it’s difficult for them to create a connection with others.

3. Being too nice. Contrary to popular belief, being a very nice person who always listens to others and never says a rude word doesn’t make you the popular person everyone respects. In fact, you come off as needy and desperate; not the kind of person one wants to be close friends with.

4. Having a one-dimensional life. Often, people who have no friends whatsoever not only lack a social life, but they have a one-dimensional life altogether. They may only focus on study or on work, so they find it nearly impossible to carry a meaningful conversation on any other topic.

Now that we know what the roots of the problem are, let’s take a look at the solution.

Focus Primarily On Social Confidence

As a person with the “I have no friends. What to do?” dilemma, the single most important step you can take is to overcome your shyness and boost your social confidence.

Commit to making this transformation, as it will have the most resonating impact, in your social life and beyond it. With more social confidence, it’s easier to get involved in social activities, meet people, make conversation, develop and edge and be yourself.

The process of boosting social confidence basically involves two forms of actions:

1. Getting out of your comfort zone. Interestingly enough, you typically don’t gain confidence first and go meet people second; you go meet people despite lacking in confidence and this helps you develop it. Your internal reality follows your external one.

2. Changing your self-image. I’m willing to bet that if you have no friends, you have a pretty screwed up view of yourself. Thus it’s important to improve your self image and self esteem directly, by changing the way you habitually think about yourself.

If you want to learn how to skyrocket your social confidence in just a few weeks, check out this presentation, where I’ll show you my proven method for building social confidence.

Tune-Up Your Conversation Skills

As you regularly push yourself out of your comfort zone and become more outgoing, this creates more opportunities to practice your conversation and people skills. You’re accumulating social experience and you’re training your social muscle. And just like any other muscle, the more you train it the more it grows.

In addition to this, if you want to accelerate your progress, learn and apply specific principles and techniques for improving your conversation and people skills. For example: learn to read body-language better, learn to communicate expressively or to lead a conversation smoothly in any direction.

Get a Life, Not Just a Social Life

Last but not least, keep in mind that the people who find it the easiest to make friends commonly have a rich live overall. They travel, read, meet lots of people, have hobbies and try new things on a regular basis.

When you live this kind of a life, making conversation, being interesting and connecting with others happens effortlessly. On the other hand, when all you can talk about are a rather repetitive job and a tedious TV watching experience, that’s not a lot to go on.

So don’t wonder “Why do I have no friends?” and dwell on this question too much. Instead, get out there, get a life in general and your social life in particular will flourish organically.

I’ve seen people achieve incredible progress in making friends and improving their social life. The overall blueprint is laid out for you. Put it into practice, learn to calibrate the fine details and keep at it. You’ll see some stupefying results.

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Filed Under: Attitude, Inspirational, People Skills Tagged With: , , , 42 Comments
March 27, 2011

If You Are Shy This Is Definitely For You

Many people try to make shyness seem like a cute and innocent trait to have.

Nevertheless, if you are shy and you know firsthand how shyness can disrupt your social life, you probably find it hard to view it that way. And if you have more than shyness, if you have social anxiety, the upheaval it breeds is even worse.

Well, today I’m going to let you know about an excellent ebook for people with shyness or social anxiety that I’ve reviewed and I sincerely recommend.

The Shyness and Social Anxiety System

The ebook is called The Shyness and Social Anxiety System. Its author, Sean Cooper, presents in it effective and little-known psychological techniques to destroy shyness and social anxiety.

You can get the full details about the ebook here.

I had an interesting conversation earlier this week with Sean about the way this book was born. Sean fought with shyness and social anxiety for many years. After loads of research and personal experimentation, he eventually discovered how to overcome shyness and implemented this psychological know-how successfully.

As a former shy, “invisible” guy myself, I find something fascinating in what Sean teaches in this ebook because you can tell he’s been through it, he knows personally what it’s like to have shyness and social anxiety, and he grasped how to beat it.

I think this is something few people who give advice on this topic can say. Many of them don’t really understand what it’s like to be shy; they just know part of the theory. As a consequence, a lot of the advice on how to overcome shyness is insipid and trite: “Just be yourself”, “Just do it”, etc. Yeah right!

I talk in more depth about this and issue and about the real science of social confidence in this free presentation.

My Review of the Ebook

I was pleasantly surprised by The Shyness and Social Anxiety System. It presents a both cognitive and behavioral approach to boosting social confidence, with a bit more focus on the behavioral part.

The ebook is extremely simple to read, to understand and most importantly, to apply. It contains ideas and techniques for beating shyness that you can take immediately and start applying, and you’ll see results.

On top of that, I find these ideas to be highly consistent with the scientific psychological research in this area, which is something I’m big on.

The Shyness and Social Anxiety System got me realizing things I wasn’t aware of about overcoming shyness. This is probably the finest proof I can give of the quality of this ebook, considering that I coach shy people almost on a daily basis and I believe I know a thing or two about overcoming shyness.

To conclude this review, if you struggle with shyness or social anxiety, coaching is out of your financial range and you’re looking for a quality information product to help you make real progress, this ebook is it.

Check out The Shyness and Social Anxiety System here.

Also, check out my Conversation Confidence guide here.

Shyness is a serious psychological issue to deal with and it can be dealt with successfully. But you need to use the best tools available.

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March 22, 2011

Avoidant Personality Disorder

Think of avoidant personality disorder as shyness taken up a notch. It’s a condition that’s present in almost 1% of the general population, and its consequences on ones social life are debilitating.

As a communication coach, I deal with individuals with avoidant personality disorder quite often. The seriousness of their situation makes them keen on finding solutions to become more outgoing. So this article is my comprehensive intro to avoidant personality disorder and its treatment.

What It Is and What It’s Not

According to the forth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV), avoidant personality disorder (AvPD) is a psychological condition characterized by a pervasive pattern of social inhibition, feelings of inadequacy, and hypersensitivity to negative evaluation.

It’s important to note that avoidant personality disorder is not a mental disorder. Also, be aware that if you have AvPD, there is nothing physically wrong with your brain or the way it’s functioning.

Any chemical imbalance that may exist in your brain is not the root cause of avoidant personality disorder, but a mere symptom of it. This is why medication, although it can improve the mood, does little to actually overcome avoidant personality disorder. It addresses the symptoms, not the causes.

AvPD is considered a psychological disorder. I even use this term lightly, because it often reinforces the belief people with avoidant personality disorder have that they are somehow broken, which they are not.

Overall, I think the best mode to look at avoidant personality disorder is as a learned way of thinking, feeling and behaving that doesn’t create results, sometimes based on certain predispositions. And the best news is that anything you’ve learned, you can also unlearn.

Avoidant Personality Disorder Symptoms

You can recognize avoidant personality disorder correctly by understanding its symptoms and taking note of them. The following are the most important symptoms visible in people with AvPD:

  • Avoiding social activities and spending huge amounts of time alone;
  • Having a very small social circle and only carrying brief interactions with the people in it;
  • A major reluctance to meeting new people and a strong feeling of inadequacy when dealing with them;
  • Being generally reserved and quiet when interacting with others, due to fear of saying something improper and being shamed;
  • Being over-preoccupied with how they are seen by others, due to fear of being disliked or rejected;
  • Frequently fantasizing about having social interactions that turn out the way they want them to;
  • Not rising up to their potential in their career, due to running away from opportunities that require them to be social;
  • Seeing themselves as socially unskilled, awkward or inferior to others.

Avoidant Personality Disorder Treatment

Although ‘treatment’ is the conventional word, it may not be the best one. Remember we’re not talking about killing a virus; we’re talking about learning a new way of thinking, feeling and behaving.

I’ll start off with what you probably want to know most: yes, avoidant personality disorder can be ‘treated’. It does take time and perseverance, and it does require using the proper methods, but it is doable and there are hundreds of documented cases that point this out.

Successfully getting rid of AvPD typically involves a three folded process:

1) Challenging and changing dysfunctional thinking. People with avoidant personality disorder tend to have a lot of limiting beliefs, plus an unrealistic view of social standards and of themselves. These need to be corrected by consciously changing the way they think.

2) Gradual exposure. People with avoidant personality disorder need to gradually face those exact situations they’re afraid of and they typically avoid. Systemic exposure, combined with combating unrealistic thinking will set their mind and emotions on the right path.

3) Improving people skills. Since individuals with AvPD avoid social situations as much as they can, their people skills have often atrophied or they’ve never truly developed at all. Thus, training key people skills and learning how to start a conversation, how to keep it going or how to connect with people is crucial.

The methods of intervention that have been proven to work best for overcoming avoidant personality disorder are cognitive-behavioral therapy and coaching. There is a raft of research that confirms the success of these methods. No other methods even come close to the elegance and effectiveness of cognitive-behavioral methods.

If you have avoidant personality disorder, the first essential step is to recognize it without making a big deal out of it.

The second step is to realize that there is hope for you and to fully commit to overcoming this condition. This can be tricky particularly because people with avoidant personality disorder will sometimes tend to avoid the very things that will lead to overcoming their condition.

Using cognitive-behavioral principles and techniques on your own, you will see progress. However, given the seriousness of the condition, initially working one-on-one with a competent coach or a therapist is a good idea.

You will make much faster progress, you’ll successfully get passed those first hurdles and get the wheels spinning in the right direction.

One more thing: If you want to learn more about building social confidence and overcoming your insecurities, then check out this presentation I created, in which I share some of my top advice on this topic. I’m sure you’ll find it very useful.

A rich and fulfilling social life doesn’t have to exist only in your daydreams. Pick the best tools to use, put them into practice and keep moving forward despite the struggles, and you will make it real.

Image courtesy of NicoleAbalde

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