Solution to social anxiety?

[SayWhat]

Little update about today

Had to work with her today for 2 hours. And as I said I was feeling not as good as the other days so in my opinion it all went to ****.

We were talking about our plans during the weekend, due to some conversation I just told her I’m shy around girls (after 5 years on this forum and knowing to never tell this, for some reason I just did).

Another thing was telling her I’m hitting the gym very hard (instead of just showing it after a few months).

It’s situations like this I feel hopeless, things will never become like I want them,... I know that I shouldn't say stuff like that, but I think at that moment it's either being silent because of not knowing what to say or just saying that. Sadly I prefer the latter with headbanging frustration afterwards.

Another thing that struck me. In my line of work we need to train new people before being able to do the job. There are new people in training at this moment and apparantly there is one that she's thinking will be "a good and a cool one". As you can imagine, I felt jealous. I figured out I felt jealous because I want to be the best, that she calls me a good one, that she tells me what she thought during my training.

Look the hard part is, I want to hit that, don't get me wrong, but I don't want a relationship with her. I'm just sick and tired of my head working this way, I need so much approval of girls just to feel a little bit better about myself that I'm fed up with it. But I'm not that fed up with it that I don't give a **** anymore. I still give a ****. I drove home from work going through the conversation, thinking about future workdays with her, how to undo it. I care too much about others instead of myself to be able to truly not give a ****.

I'm tired guys. Like I said, I've been on this for over 5 years, why doesn't it change? Why do I keep thinking and acting like this? I've read and reread, tried it all out, but here I am at 1:30 AM on a friday night typing this ****ty post.

 

[Georgepithyou]

Be yourself and stop trying to make EVERYONE like you.

Disregard this horrible advice
Be the best version of your self

Hit the Gym
Start reading up on books about Charisma and Social Skills
Go out and so cold approachs for exposure therapy
Desensitize Yourself to rejection

Eventually after a few months you will be very charismatic and socially calibrated.

 

[rjc149]

Building up status and financial independence in a career tends to make you not give a fvck about things that have no real consequence on your life or what unimportant people think about you, and realize that 95% of people in your life aren’t important. Rich guy swagger. That’s one route.

Developing gratitude and appreciation for life, and realizing it’s finite, and you’re going to die soon, is another way to put things into perspective and not care so much about unimportant things.

Another route is a committed effort to initiate interactions with people that make you feel uncomfortable. There’s a great book out there called Rejection Proof by Jia Jang. It’s at least entertaining if not actually helpful.

Finally you can seek professional counseling and psychotherapy, and get to the root of your anxiety. There is a root cause, it’s not just some genetic imprint that you have no agency over. You can heal it.

All the other advice here is good — live on the edge of your comfort zone and push that edge each day, or week, or however aggressively or gradually you like. Easier said than done, of course.

Avoid trying out ****y/flirty humor on female coworkers. Too risky.