Social anxiety for a long time was something I had long suffered with.
It held me back in so many areas: Socializing, working, going outside, etc.
My social anxiety was very mild at first. When I was younger, I moved schools a lot and always found myself in a new environment with no new friends and no familiar faces. In the beginning I always made an effort to make friends but the more I moved the more withdrawn I became. I learned to just keep to myself and not to bother with making friends. After all, who knew when the last time I would see them would be.
The more withdrawn I became, the more I developed my own little world where I was the center of it.
My biggest fear was someone disrupting this world so oftentimes someone “intruding” would trip me up and make me nervous.
First it was being socially withdrawn then after high school it translated into a fear of big crowds. I became overly obsessive about what people might think of me that it made it hard to even function like a normal person. Who knew though, all along I was the only one judging and no one outside of me was pointing a single finger!
For a while I was unemployed just for the reason that the anxiety grew to the point where I didn’t want to even go outside. I didn’t want the world to see me. I had judged myself. Since I went out of my way not to see people, I quickly became depressed out of a need to be seen. It was a conflict between needing to be seen and not feeling worthy enough.
I had few jobs that required customer service skills and the anxiety was so huge for me that I just quit each time. It wasn’t until much later that I found a job that would crack my shell completely.
Living with social anxiety was a nightmare and a hell for me. I tried everything, forums, online videos, medicine, therapy. Anything for me to be normal again but all it took was for me to step outside of my head for a moment. All those things were in my head. If I had just known how powerful your thoughts can be then everything could have changed for me. Now when I sense those thoughts creeping up I just tell myself it’s my irrational self crying for attention.
And I don’t pay attention to it.
Artistic Apathy 