The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com

Here is a question I received from someone who is socially anxious.

Hi, Dr. Kenner. I am 25 and have become very socially anxious. It's holding back my ability to keep friends and to move forward in life. I have not always been this anxious. It's gotten to the point where going to get groceries is an anxious, anxiety-ridden experience. I was raised very religious, and my parents were never really there for me emotionally. They found out that I was an atheist during my senior year of high school, and they took everything away from me and made me attend a Christian school while reading the Bible daily and never leaving their sight while I was out of school. This furthered my anxiety. I am intelligent and well-read. I forced myself to get a college degree, even though school was a psychological hell. I see so much potential in life, but can do so little because of my social anxiety. I need help, but I don't know where to start or what to focus on. Correcting any advice will be welcome, Matt.

Matt, so where do you start? Well, the first thing that jumps out at me is your statement, "I see so much potential in life," because I want you to continue seeing that and, very gently, become your own best friend. You're still young. You're 25 years old. I don’t think I went back to grad school fairly late. I had been out of school for 10 years. I didn’t know what the heck I wanted to do with the rest of my life. So you don't want to beat up on yourself thinking, "My life is over and I'm already 25 and other people have jobs." You want to be very supportive of yourself, and you want to recognize that you have been through trauma. What your parents did, monitoring your every move and not giving you autonomy or helping you develop your own independence or respect your independent judgment, is not good parenting. It’s not nurturing you. So you need to nurture yourself. You actually need to do what I call re-parent yourself.

So you want to have a lot of empathy for yourself, but empathy without pity. You don’t want to get into victim mode. One of the books that I've recommended to clients who have had this difficulty of having been through trauma, maybe not the same trauma but some trauma in their past with their parents, is the book How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk. And you might think I'm nuts. Why would I recommend a parenting book? Because it gives you a rational standard by which you can reevaluate your own relationship with your parents and see what they did right, see what they did wrong, and help you stand firm in your determination to deal with yourself much better internally. You don’t want to hear Mom’s or Dad’s voice; you want to have your own voice.

So what does it mean to value yourself?

Hey, I got to interrupt this because we've got to pay some bills. 30 seconds, that’s it. A very quick ad, and then Alan will be back.

Romance. I wish I knew more about what girls want from a relationship. Well, I wish I knew more about what I want. Where’s that ad I saw? Here it is, The Selfish Path to Romance, a serious romance guidebook. Download chapter one for free at SelfishRomance.com and buy it at Amazon.com. Huh? This Selfish Path to Romance, that is interesting.

So what does it mean to value yourself? It means to value your own mind, and it means to really give some thought to "What are my values and interests?" When you say, "I have so much potential in life," in career—what? What is your potential? What would you love to do? I don't mean what should you do. What friends do you have that you think are true friends, or could be true friends? If you've isolated yourself, you may not have that many friends. What hobbies? What interests do you have? You say you read a lot. So I would focus on one area, and then consider, like, for example, if it's friendships, "What are the best experiences I’ve had?" Or if it’s career, "When have I had more courage?" Or if it’s going to the grocery—the market, even—"When have I gone to the market and been comfortable?" Count your successes. What went right?

I'm going to give you some tips, some books that you can turn to, and you could also get some supportive therapy, maybe from a cognitive therapist. I think that would be wonderful. One is for friendships. If you’re dealing with friendships and you have a lot of anxiety, there are a lot of good tips in a book called The Loneliness Workbook: A Guide to Developing and Maintaining Lasting Connections by Mary Ellen Copeland. She’s got some ideas I don't agree with, but she's got so many good tips that if you don’t agree with something, you want to use your own judgment in reading any of these books. Another book is When Panic Attacks by Dr. David Burns. He has many tips for how to deal with social anxiety or anxiety in general. One of the things that you learn to do is to identify what you say to yourself. You know, if you're beating up on yourself, "I can’t go to the grocery store; I’ll be too anxious," you want to catch what you say to yourself, especially catching the good.

And the best book for that that I have found is Mind Over Mood by Christine Padesky and Dennis Greenberger. That's just a phenomenal book to learn how to introspect and challenge old baggage, old premises. And you want to be so supportive of yourself. When I say "premises," I mean your premises about yourself: "I’m unworthy," or "I’m no good," or "I’m unlovable," or "I’m not able to succeed in life." That’s your view of the world at large, or "Others will stand in my way," which certainly would be some baggage from your past. You want to challenge that.

And then one of the tips that I love is avoid avoidance. This is a harder one, but after you do some of the work, you want to, for example, if you had an elevator phobia, get in that elevator and ride it 20 times if you want to get over that phobia quickly. I had a needle phobia, and I decided I wanted to get over it. So I just watched doctors draw blood. When I had to have blood drawn, or when I had to get a flu shot, I’d watch them giving me a flu shot. And, man, I got over that phobia. That’s way in my past now.

So I want you to listen to all the positive self-talk that you have, increase that, and enjoy liberating yourself with some of the books and some of the resources. And be aware, you can't read all these books at once. So if you want, I would start maybe with Mind Over Mood. I think that's an excellent book. Or, you can choose your own book. That’s what you’re building: your own confidence in going after challenging goals.

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Here’s an excerpt from The Selfish Path to Romance, the serious romance guidebook by clinical psychologist Dr. Ellen Kenner and co-author Dr. Edwin Locke, who's world-famous for his theories in goal setting.

Another emotion that is important to understand and to detect, both in yourself and any potential romantic partner, is envy. Envy involves resentment of and/or the desire for objects or qualities possessed by another. Jealousy is similar in meaning. In the best sense of these terms, they refer simply to wishing that one had what another has. In the worst sense, they refer to wanting the destruction of another person's values, including virtues of character—virtues and values which one lacks. "If I can't have X, then nobody should have it."

You can download chapter one for free by going to DrKenner.com, and you can buy The Selfish Path to Romance at Amazon.com.