How to Stop Excessive Sweating Due to Social Anxiety?

 

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How to Stop Nervous Sweating (Caused by Social Anxiety)

If you’re here reading this page, then you’ve probably got a problem.

A pretty embarrassing problem. Something you try to hide from the world. Something you wish you could stop instantly.

Nervous sweating.

I’m about to show you what to do if you sweat all the time because of social anxiety or nervousness. And here’s why I’m qualified to talk about this…

A few years ago, my armpits would be absolutely drenched in sweat in almost any public place. I would sweat inside class or walking around outside. Even standing in line at the grocery store made my shirt damp and sticky under the armpits because of nervousness. I would even sweat when the temperature was cold, which made my shirt both wet AND cold – talk about an uncomfortable sensation!

So I know this problem can be very frustrating. It’s something you want to get rid of quickly.

I remember buying stronger deodorants and changing my shirt in the middle of the day. I also remember using the hand dryers in the school bathrooms to dry my shirt armpits so I could feel a bit more comfortable and to get rid of the stains. (Hoping nobody walked in while I was doing it!)

Other common areas for nervous sweating are the palms, face, etc. Sweating on the palms/hands can cause big difficulties because it makes most regular jobs very difficult, even shaking someone’s hand.

First let’s get something straight:

Is Your Sweating Caused by Nervousness Or Hyperhidrosis?

What is hyperhydrosis? It’s when someone’s sweat glands are overactive — they produce too much sweat when a person doesn’t need it. Hyperhidrosis is a physical problem with someone’s body — and people often go to surgery to fix it.

However, if you’re reading this article, then there’s a good chance that you do not have hyperhidrosis.

The question you need to ask yourself is: “When do I sweat?”

My answer to that would have been: “Only when I’m around people. Especially in more high pressure situations like talking in front of groups of people.” So my sweating was caused by my social anxiety or feeling nervous inside. When I was sitting at home alone I would not sweat, my armpits were usually dry as a bone. But stepping out of the house I would usually start to sweat.

So if you sweat a lot even when you’re alone and feeling relaxed, then you may have hyperhydrosis. A physical problem with how your sweat glands work. But if you basically only sweat when you’re feeling nervous or anxious, like inside or just before a social situation, then your sweating has a different mental cause.

Now let’s move on to what you really want to know — how to stop the sweating!

Are You Attacking the Symptoms or The Cause?

Buying stronger deodorants, changing your shirt multiple times a day and keeping your arms tightly pressed to your sides. All these are ways of attacking the symptoms of sweating.

However, the real way to stop nervous sweating is by fixing the root cause of your sweating. Since your sweating is only triggered in some situations, the root cause is mental.

You’re not sweating because of the heat. You’re also not sweating because your sweat glands are broken. You’re sweating because the “fight or flight response” in your brain has been triggered. 

The fact is, whenever you feel anxious, nervous, stressed, etc… it means the “fight or flight” survival part of your brain has been triggered. This is the part of your brain that makes your heart beat faster or hands tremble when you’re nervous. And it’s also what causes nervous sweating.

What Triggers Your Fight or Flight Response?

If you have social anxiety, then the simplest answer I can give you is: When you think you’re about to be rejected. Another way of looking at it: When you think something shameful about you is about to be exposed.

And this is why sweating is a vicious cycle for most people, including myself for many years.

You think if people notice you sweating, they would instantly look down on you. They would judge you to be not confident or weird or even gross. That’s why you desperately want the sweat to dry up and stop… and you desperately want to hide it from everyone.

You believe sweating is a shameful flaw that needs to be hidden. So what happens is that whenever you start sweating a little, you start to worry about it. This makes you feel more nervous, which makes you sweat more. So you get more nervous, sweat more. And on and on… a downward spiral.

Therefore, I’m about to make a weird statement, which I feel is 100% true for people who have social anxiety:

Overcome Shame, And You Overcome Sweating

I remember listening to Dr. David D. Burns tell a story of how he treated a man who had a nervous sweating problem in just one evening. (In case you don’t know, Dr. Burns wrote what may be THE most popular book, which can be available on Amazon, called Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy of all time about cognitive behavioural therapy.)

Here’s what happened…

The man came in to Dr. Burn’s therapy office, saying that he really hated how much he sweat from nervousness, especially when talking to attractive women.

And Dr. Burns told him: “I can promise you I can get rid of the problem permanently in just one evening. But it won’t be easy. If you promise to do exactly what I tell you, then I can fix this problem. But you have to follow my directions exactly.” (I’m paraphrasing what I remember here.)

The man agreed, because he wanted to get rid of his nervous sweating no matter what. So Dr. Burns told the man to come back to his office next Thursday so they could get to work.

Dr. David D. Burns Shows a Nervous Sweaty Man His “Shame Attacking” Exercise

When the man came back to the office next week, he found Dr. Burns dressed very casually in a t shirt and jeans. And he was holding a water bottle. To the man’s surprise, Dr. Burns told him that they would be going for a walk instead of sitting in the therapy office.

As they walked outside, Dr. Burns reminded the man how he had promised to do exactly what he said to cure the nervous sweating. The man agreed again.

Soon they came to a busy convenience store. Dr. Burns opened the water bottle and started splashing water onto his armpits.

“What are you doing!?!” the man exclaimed.

“Here, put some water on your armpits too,” said the therapist, acting like this was totally normal.

The man reluctantly did it too. Now they both looked like they had just been running in a marathon, all sweaty.

“Now I want you to go inside this convenience store, point at your armpits and loudly tell everyone how sweaty they are,” the doctor told him.

“I can’t do that!” the man cried. He was busy trying to HIDE his wet armpits from the people walking into the store.

“Okay, if I do it first, then will you promise to do it after me?” asked the doctor. The nervous man couldn’t believe his well-educated therapist would do this, and he agreed.

Sure enough, Dr. Burns walked into the convenience store. He lifted up one of his arms to reveal a big wet stain, and loudly said “Hey look how much I’m sweating today! Wow it sure is hot outside!”

The man looked from the outside amazed. A couple minutes later, Dr. Burns walked back outside and the man knew it was his turn. He copied what he has saw the doctor doing, lifting his arm and pointing out how sweaty he was to everyone in the busy convenience store, including the attractive woman working behind the counter.

Most people ignored him. Two or three people looked up before going back to their shopping or conversations. And 2 minutes later the man walked back outside, feeling exhilarated from doing something so far outside his comfort zone.

Dr. Burns and the man went to a couple more stores, repeating this exercise. And when Dr. Burns followed up with the man a few weeks, then a few months later… the man told him that his sweating problem was fixed.

Why Did the Man’s Nervous Sweating Stop?

So why did that extreme exercise work for the man? Because it attacked the root cause of his sweating – shame. In fact, Dr. Burns even calls it a “shame attacking exercise.”

“If you put shame in a petri dish, it needs three ingredients to grow exponentially: secrecy, silence, and judgment. If you put the same amount of shame in the petri dish and douse it with empathy, it can’t survive.” – Brene Brown

By exposing the shameful thing for all to see instead of keeping it a secret, the shame fades away.

For more tips to stop excessive sweating due to social anxiety, watch this video – How to Overcome Nervous Sweating (and other Social Anxiety Symptoms)

Of course, there are less extreme ways to get over shame about your nervous sweating. One of the approaches I personally teach to my students is unconditional self-acceptance. It takes a bit more time to work than one evening, but I think it’s easier for most people with social anxiety than the very difficult exercise I told in this story.

Just remember that the more you feel ashamed of something and try to hide it, the more nervous it will make you. This is why nervous sweating turns into a vicious cycle for many people. In this article I’ve given you a BIG hint about how to fix the problem.

Overcome the shame, and you overcome the sweating. I still remember the first time I was listening to stand-up comedian Louis CK talk about how sweaty he was on stage. I was amazed at how someone could sweat, but not be ashamed about it. That was my first hint, and now I very rarely sweat from nervousness.

By Sean W Cooper, the author of The Shyness and Social Anxiety System, is an ex-sufferer from social anxiety and shyness. This program is a compilation of his research and effort in overcoming shyness and anxiety.

Sean W Cooper’s Shyness and Anxiety system is a step by step audio course broken down into modules that are easy to access. It teaches you ways to start overcoming your social anxiety and self-doubt. The system utilises cognitive behavioural therapy which explores how feelings and thoughts can drive behaviour. 

The Shyness and Social Anxiety system is endorsed by professionals and praised by psychologists due to the way it provides the relevant skills to manage issues of shyness and social anxiety.

To find out more, click on How to Stop Excessive Sweating Due to Social Anxiety?

How do I Overcome Social Anxiety and Shyness?

 

CLICK HERE to Find Out How to Overcome Your Social Phobia

Can You Overcome Social Anxiety by Yourself?

Is it possible to cure your social anxiety on your own? Without seeing a therapist or a doctor?

The answer is: yes and no.

Yes, people have overcome their social anxiety on their own (like myself).

However, it’s not always the right solution. In this article, I’m going to explain the pros and cons of trying to tackle social anxiety by yourself. I’ll show you when it’s okay to do, and when you should really seek professional help.

The Danger of Asking This Question

Let me ask you something…

WHY do you want to overcome your social anxiety on your own to begin with?

• Is it because you’re afraid of picking up the phone to set an appointment?

• Are you afraid to share your deepest problems, shortcomings and secrets with a stranger?

• Are you scared of how anxious going to see a professional about your problem will make you?

If the answer to these questions is yes, then you’re already heading in the wrong direction.

Now, I can understand your fear.

Back when I had really bad social anxiety, even getting a haircut where I had to make small talk with the hairdresser for 15 minutes was excruciatingly painful and awkward. I couldn’t even imagine talking to someone about my feelings, insecurities and social anxiety for an hour or more.

So I know how scary the IDEA of talking to someone about your social anxiety is. That’s the craziest part of this problem: your social anxiety itself makes it extremely hard to get help for it!

But here is a reality check:

You Will Not Overcome Your Social Anxiety Without Other People

An important part of the process of overcoming SA is doing things you are uncomfortable about. By talking to people and sharing more of yourself over time, you will slowly unwire the “fight or flight” response in your brain. And over time you will feel less anxious around people. You’ll sweat, shake, tremble or blush less.

One thing’s for sure: you can’t do exposure for social anxiety without other people. You will have to get out of your house and interact with those other talking monkeys you see out the window.

Can you talk to other people on your own? Yes, absolutely.

However, a therapist can offer a structured environment to get started with this process more easily. A therapist can also help you stay motivated in facing your fears — you’ll probably take more action than you would on your own to avoid disappointing your therapist. Also, if you take group therapy for social anxiety, then you are getting exposure and practice talking in a more high pressure environment with many people listening.

However, having said all this about exposure, let me add…

You Will Also Not Overcome Your Social Anxiety ONLY Through Exposure

I went to elementary school, high school and university in Canada for years, and my social anxiety only seemed to get worse and worse with time. Even though I was surrounded by people:

My conversation skills didn’t get better (if anything I just became more quiet and awkward),

I had no friends or social life,

My self-esteem just got worse, and I even had periods of depression to add to my SA.

So this much is clear:

Just being around people will not make your social anxiety go away on its own.

You also have to change the way your mind works from the inside out. That’s what finally cured my extreme shyness, quietness and nervousness around people.

How can you do this?

Well, if you go see a therapist, they will teach you the standard “cognitive behavioral therapy” approach to changing your thinking. This usually involves writing down your thoughts when you’re feeling anxious. Then you analyze your thoughts to see which ones are unrealistic by comparing them to common thinking errors. (Like black and white thinking, catastrophizing, etc.)

To be honest, that “standard” approach never really appealed or worked well for me.

Now, don’t get me wrong…

I’m sure it’s 1000% better than doing nothing about your socially anxious mind… but most people (therapists included) only recommend it because they don’t know of any other options. This is the tool they learned in school, and when all they have is a hammer then every problem looks like a nail… including depression, anxiety, sleeping difficulties and alcohol addiction.

Let me save you a few months of dry, boring and repetitive thought journaling in one paragraph:

Social anxiety starts with a negative and distorted self-image. You think there’s something wrong, bad or inferior about you, that you need to hide from other people.

The root fear in social anxiety is a fear of self-exposure. You are afraid that other people will notice the secret thing about you which is unattractive… so you do everything possible to shrink away from the spotlight or avoid people altogether.

Your secret thing could be your ugliness, your lack of friends, your boring and awkward conversation skills, etc.

So the cure to social anxiety really is about fixing your negative and distorted self-image. And I’ve found that people who have social anxiety only have a few main sources of this negative self-image, which can be fixed with a few new insights.

My insight-based approach to helping others overcome social anxiety really gets to the root cause of social anxiety, which is why I receive so much great feedback from my readers every week.

If you believed in your deepest core that who you are is valuable and worthwhile to other people… then your anxiety and fear about getting other people’s acceptance and approval will go away. Imagine it this way: if you were the most good looking, popular, charismatic, well respected and richest person in the world… would you have social anxiety?

“One’s destination is never a place, but rather a new way of seeing things.” -Henry Miller

Conclusion

Is it possible to overcome social anxiety on your own?

Absolutely.

However, seeing a professional who can offer you a structured environment, unconditional acceptance and motivation to face your fears can speed the process up a lot.

Be warned though: many of these professionals will just give you the “standard” approach to changing your socially anxious mind… which sometimes works… But it isn’t nearly as effective as it should be because it’s usually not customized to your unique problems, unique challenges and unique root cause of your social anxiety.

Watch this video – How to Overcome Social Anxiety and Shyness?

I hope you now understand the benefits and downsides to attempting to cure social anxiety on your own. I recommend you check out my site here  if you are looking for the best self-help advice to overcoming this problem.

Even if you do choose to overcome social anxiety without seeing a therapist or doctor in-person, you will still need some type of guidance on your journey to help you change the way your socially anxious mind works.

By Sean W Cooper, the author of The Shyness and Social Anxiety System, is an ex-sufferer from social anxiety and shyness. This program is a compilation of his research and effort in overcoming shyness and anxiety.

Sean W Cooper’s Shyness and Anxiety system is a step by step audio course broken down into modules that are easy to access. It teaches you ways to start overcoming your social anxiety and self-doubt. The system utilises cognitive behavioural therapy which explores how feelings and thoughts can drive behaviour. 

The Shyness and Social Anxiety system is endorsed by professionals and praised by psychologists due to the way it provides the relevant skills to manage issues of shyness and social anxiety.

To find out more, click on How do I Overcome Social Anxiety and Shyness?

Why am I Shy and How to Stop Being Shy and Quiet?

 

CLICK HERE to Find Out How to Overcome Your Social Phobia

Why Am I Shy? The 3 Surprising Reasons…

Here are the 3 biggest reasons:

1. You NEED something from the other person, usually acceptance/approval.

Here’s an easy question: Who is more nervous usually — a job interviewer or the interviewee?

The person being interviewed is much more nervous usually.

Why?

Well, if they feel like they need the job, then they will be trying to create a good impression on the other person to get it. This naturally creates a type of performance anxiety which is why most people are nervous before job interviews.

Similarly, shy people have such a strong need for the acceptance, approval and validation of other people that they often feel like a person being interviewed for a job. In social situations they may sweat nervously, try to only say very interesting things that will impress the other person, and they are relieved to get away.

Let’s go back to the job interview example…

When a person doesn’t NEED the job, they will usually not feel so nervous. For example, if the job is easy to replace like a minimum wage fast food job. Or if the person already has a job that is almost as good as the one he’s being interviewed for.

Or if he’s very well qualified for this type of job and has 12 similar interviews scheduled already. The person still WANTS the job, but they don’t desperately NEED it.

Shy people become tense, censor what they say and are afraid to speak up… because they have a desperate NEED to be liked, accepted and validated by other people. This is usually called “caring too much what other people think.”

When you don’t NEED people to like you, then you will naturally be more relaxed, open and at ease with them. Ironically, this increases the chances that they will actually like you.

So what causes this hole of neediness for the approval of other people?

There’s many possible causes that I don’t have time to explain now, but here’s one example:

A confident kid switches schools and they suddenly find themselves in a new environment without any of their old friends. Suddenly they feel needy to make people like them so they can make some new friends. This leads to shyness that sometimes sticks into adulthood. I hear this story surprisingly often.

Or perhaps a kid is bullied by people at their school, which makes them feel alone and friendless. This also leads to being needy for the acceptance of others which manifests as shy behavior.

“Other people teach us who we are. Their attitudes to us are the mirror in which we learn to see ourselves, but the mirror is distorted. We are, perhaps, rather dimly aware of the immense power of our social environment.” – Alan Watts

Now onto the 2nd reason…

2. You believe the other person is higher value than you.

In my popular article about overcoming shyness around girls, I mentioned something I call “Fat Girl Syndrome”…

Basically, that means that most guys who feel extremely shy, nervous and unsure what to say to a cute girl… will often find it 100x easier to talk normally to a woman they are not attracted to because she is ugly, fat, old, etc.

This is because the shy guy VALUES the really cute girl more because of her looks. (Yes, I know this is not “politically correct,” but it’s how human psychology works.)

So… What makes you see someone as valuable?

The answer isn’t as easy as you might believe. I’ve come to realize that everyone has a hidden inner system of valuing people. This is often based on the other person’s attractiveness, popularity, confidence, dominance, authority, etc.

If you feel like someone else is “higher value” than you, then you will start to shy, quiet, nervous or awkward around them. For example, if you’re a guy this may happen around very attractive women. If you’re a girl, it may happen around guys you like or have a crush on. It’s likely to happen around authority figures like a boss, teacher, etc.

Now think about the people who you feel little or no shyness around. Maybe they’re unattractive or weird. Maybe they’re even more shy or insecure than you. Maybe they’re even less popular. Maybe they’re younger than you or very old. These are the people that you secretly feel are equal or “lower value” than you. Around them you probably act a lot more confident and expressive, and you don’t feel nearly as self-conscious or unsure of what to say.

So pay attention around WHO you act more shy around to see who you secretly value. Your actions will reveal your unconscious belief system to you.

Usually a high value person can GIVE you something. Maybe it’s your boss who can give you his approval or a raise. Maybe it’s someone you find attractive who could possibly give you a relationship or sex. Maybe it’s a popular or well-connected person who could increase your social circle or reputation or “coolness.”

A low value person can’t really “give” you much, which is why you don’t feel as shy with them.

The only 2 real solutions to this problem are:

• Increase how much you value yourself. (I call this your self-esteem.)

• Or knock other people off the pedestal. (Most shy people feel inferior and assume that everyone else has a much more interesting, cool and active life than the average person actually does.)

Now the 3rd cause of shyness…

3. You feel uncomfortable with yourself.

Shyness and insecurity, the two seem to always go together. Feeling insecure about yourself will make you avoid attention & connection because you don’t want people to see the thing you are insecure or uncomfortable about.

For years I was extremely insecure about my slightly crooked front teeth. Many shy people have insecurities about their physical appearance and believe they are ugly. (Usually they pick one small bad thing about their appearance and then obsess over it non-stop as if this is the ONE thing everybody else will notice and remember about them.)

Let me tell you, I’ve been there. It’s a miserable place to be, insecurity eats away at your confidence until you have none left. But there are also other types of insecurities:

Some shy people feel like they are simply dull, boring and uninteresting.

Or they feel stupid because of their awkward conversation skills.

Or they are losers with no friends and an unattractive lifestyle.

These can all make you feel like other people wouldn’t accept you if they TRULY knew you. So you hide your true self. Maybe you try to be the type of person you think others want you to be. Maybe you never share your REAL thoughts, interests, passions or hobbies with people.

Being uncomfortable with yourself makes you scared to share yourself with people or form deeper connections. And telling someone to “be yourself” or “just be happy with who you are” is easier said than done.

“Being lonely is hard, but what’s harder is when you’re surrounded by people and still feel lonely.” -Unknown

Conclusion

Shyness can stop you from living life fully. Whether you want a girlfriend, a better social life, more confidence at work, etc… shyness can freeze you.

The biggest thing you need to remember from this article is that shyness is NOT a permanent personality trait. YOU are not shy, you just become shy in some situations depending on where you are and who you’re with.

So WHY do you become shy sometimes?

It may happen when you NEED the other person’s acceptance or approval, similar to how a job interviewee becomes nervous when they NEED the job.

Or it may have to do with how much you value the other person compared to yourself. If you value the other person a lot (maybe because they’re very attractive)… or you don’t value yourself much (low self-esteem)… then you will become shy, quiet or awkward.

The last reason is when you feel uncomfortable with yourself. When you feel insecure about your appearance, personality or lifestyle… then you will shy away from attention because you don’t want other people to notice the secret thing you feel ashamed about.

Watch this video – How to Stop Being Shy (Communicate with Confidence)

I hope this article has given you some insight into how your shyness works. 

If you’d like to learn my BEST tips,

CLICK HERE to Find Out How to Overcome Your Social Phobia

By Sean W Cooper, the author of The Shyness and Social Anxiety System, is an ex-sufferer from social anxiety and shyness. This program is a compilation of his research and effort in overcoming shyness and anxiety.

Sean W Cooper’s Shyness and Anxiety system is a step by step audio course broken down into modules that are easy to access. It teaches you ways to start overcoming your social anxiety and self-doubt. The system utilises cognitive behavioural therapy which explores how feelings and thoughts can drive behaviour. 

The Shyness and Social Anxiety system is endorsed by professionals and praised by psychologists due to the way it provides the relevant skills to manage issues of shyness and social anxiety.To find out more, click on Overcome Social Anxiety – How to Stop Being Shy?

How to Let Go of the Past and Move Forward?

 

CLICK HERE to Find Out How to Overcome Your Social Phobia

How to Stop Thinking About Past Mistakes & Awkward Moments?

In this post I’m going to show you how to STOP these negative memories from dominating your head. How to ESCAPE from the torture of your mind replaying the same thing again and again. How to DROP the mental baggage?

The first step is to understand the problem…

1. Understand WHY You Keep Replaying These Moments in Your Head

Most of us believe that WE are the ones in control of our minds. You believe that you control what you think about and how you feel. That’s not really true.

Here’s an insight that will blow you away if you really understand it:

Your mind is NOT a modern invention.

Your mind has been designed over millions of years of evolution to help you do 2 primary things: survive and reproduce. Your mind exists to improve your chances of either surviving or having babies so you can pass on your genes to future generations.

Here’s why this is important…

Many negative emotions like fear, anxiety, anger and jealousy come from these 2 big unconscious drives: Survival and reproduction.

• When you feel afraid when a big dog suddenly barks at you, that fear is meant to help you fight the predator or run away to safety. Survival.

• When you feel jealous about your romantic partner spending lots of time with someone else, that jealousy is meant to help you improve your chances of reproducing.

• When you feel anxious about walking down a dark empty street alone, that anxiety is meant to help you remain alert for any strange dangers in a new environment.

Now, it’s easy to see how an emotion like fear is related to survival. It’s a little harder to understand why your mind’s habit of replaying embarrassing or awkward moments is related to survival. But it is.

The key here is SOCIAL REPUTATION.

Back when humans lived in tribes on the African savannah, the most effective strategy for survival was to avoid getting kicked out of the tribe. One caveman would not survive on his own in that harsh wilderness. This meant keeping a good social reputation. (Nowadays the tribe just means all the people you know: family, friends, co-workers, classmates, etc.)

And the most effective strategy for mating was to have a high social status in the tribe. This allowed a caveman to attract the best mates… and still works the same way today! (Have you ever noticed, for example, how the most popular guys back in your high school usually had the easiest time getting girlfriends? And how rock stars and celebrities are always considered the sexiest people? That is social status at work.)

And that’s why your mind has been designed to be obsessed with your social reputation. So when you say or do something that DAMAGES your reputation or status, your mind goes nuts.

• When you say something that accidentally offends someone, especially someone important…

• When you create an awkward moment that “ruins your chance” with the girl or guy you like…

• When you feel very uncomfortable about sitting alone while you eat, scared about who might see you alone and judge you…

In all these situations, your mind believes you have damaged your social reputation or social status somehow. So it remembers the situation over and over again because it does not want you to repeat the same mistake again. It wants you to become better at preserving and enhancing your social status.

(The irony of this is that the MORE you obsess over your past mistakes, the LESS confident and LESS socially skilled you will be in future social situations. It erodes your self-esteem and belief in your own abilities.)

Key Takeaway:

Your mind keeps you thinking about your past social mistakes and awkward moments because it wants you to learn how to avoid making the same mistakes in the future. It wants you to avoid lowering or damaging your social status, because a good social reputation means better chances of survival or mating.

Makes sense?

Now that you understand the true cause of your problem better… how can you fix it?

Many people try to force themselves to suppress or “push down” the memory. This approach doesn’t work for 99% of people. I tried that myself for years, but still my mind kept returning to those embarrassing memories. So clearly that doesn’t work.

Here is what DOES work:

2. Escape Your Thinking Mind Altogether

A few weeks ago I was listening to an interview of a great writer I admire.

Someone asked him: “How can I get over a romantic breakup? I keep obsessing over my ex-girlfriend.” And the writer’s advice was profound. He said:

“The best thing I know of is get out of your house and exercise. Go for a run or go to the gym. You need to get out of your mind and into your body.”

The last part is most important:

Get out of your mind and into your body. This is amazing advice right here.

I believe that exercise is a good TEMPORARY way to “get out of your mind.” It quickly puts you in touch with your physical body. When you are running or lifting weights with a lot of focus and intensity, it does take you out of your mind. Out of all your mental problems, worries and stresses. That’s a big reason why some people love fitness or sports so much.

The only problem is that you can’t exercise all the time. So a better solution is to use techniques you can do anywhere and anytime that will get you “out of your head.” The good news is that we don’t have to invent anything new because…

This is already the basis for many therapy and meditation techniques.

For example…

1. Gestalt Therapy

This is a very unique form of therapy. Here’s why:

“Most therapies encourage intellectualizing: talking about the irrationality of patient beliefs, talking about the behavior changes the therapist believes that the patient should make, and so forth.

More than any other therapy, Gestalt therapy emphasizes that whatever exists is here and now, and that experience is more reliable than interpretation. The patient is taught the difference between talking about what occurred five minutes ago (or last night or 20 years ago) and experiencing what is now.”

– Gary Yontef, Ph.D.

Gestalt therapy is all about giving LESS attention to your symbolic thinking: your mental interpretations and your explanations for the past… and MORE attention to what is being felt or perceived right now.

The focus is on what is being done, thought and felt at this moment rather than on what was, might be, could be, or should be.

Watch this video – Role Play : Gesalt Therapy

Another example…

2. Vipassana Meditation

About one year ago, I went to a 10-day silent meditation retreat which taught me the technique of Vipassana meditation. For 10 days, I couldn’t talk to anybody or even look at anybody in the eyes. No communication allowed. No cell phones or computers allowed. No books allowed. Just hours and hours of meditation practice every day. Day after day. From 6AM until night, with breaks for eating light vegetarian food.

So I do have a little experience with this…

Watch these 2 videos –

Mindfulness, Step by Step: An Introduction to Vipassana Meditation by Achan Sobin Namto

Vipassana Meditation and Body Sensation: Eilona Ariel at TEDxJaffa 2013

Vipassana meditation has nothing to do with belief in the Buddha or some god. It is just a technique to observe yourself.

On that 10-day retreat, I started out observing my breath. Watching it going in, going out. Hour after hour. Then we were taught to scan our bodies from head to toe. This means literally “scanning” your attention throughout your body, and noticing what sensations you feel everywhere.

Very simple techniques.

But very effective at getting you in touch with your living and breathing body/organism… instead of living in the abstract world of your mind which includes your social reputation/identity.

(I hope what I’m saying is clear to you, but you really have to actually DO the technique yourself to truly understand why it is so powerful and why it has survived thousands of years.)

Both Gestalt Therapy and Vipassana Meditation are two different methods of…

3. Getting into The Present Moment

The best thing you can do to stop obsessing about past mistakes or embarrassing moments is redirect your focus/attention. Where and how do you redirect it?

You take a moment to notice something happening in the physical world right here and now.

For example, right now feel your fingers on your keyboard. Pay attention to that sensation at your fingertips for a few seconds.

Or you can pay attention to your breath going in and out. You don’t need to suddenly breathe differently, just become aware right now to how you breathe normally.

Or if you’re walking somewhere, pay attention to your movements. Can you make every movement of your arms or legs conscious instead of automatic?

Or redirect your focus to the sensations on the bottom of your feet. What can you feel? (This is a good one you can use in any social situation. You can even do this while talking to people.)

By redirecting your focus in any of these simple ways, you become more in touch with your physical existence. You become aware of what you are sensing and feeling right now. Redirecting your focus to physical sensations and feelings brings you into the present moment, instead of uncontrollably remembering the past.

The past is the past. You cannot change something that’s already happened. You can only control your state of mind right now. And instead of being constantly terrorized by memories that make you feel bad or ashamed of yourself right now… you can redirect your focus into the physical world and reality.

Think about it: Will your awkward mistake matter 5 years from today? Then why should it now?

This is just a VERY quick overview of these types of techniques. I highly encourage you to check out the book “The Power of Now” (which you can get on Amazon) if you want to learn how to really make these techniques a part of your daily life. 

By Sean W Cooper, the author of The Shyness and Social Anxiety System, is an ex-sufferer from social anxiety and shyness. This program is a compilation of his research and effort in overcoming shyness and anxiety.

Sean W Cooper’s Shyness and Anxiety system is a step by step audio course broken down into modules that are easy to access. It teaches you ways to start overcoming your social anxiety and self-doubt. The system utilises cognitive behavioural therapy which explores how feelings and thoughts can drive behaviour. 

The Shyness and Social Anxiety system is endorsed by professionals and praised by psychologists due to the way it provides the relevant skills to manage issues of shyness and social anxiety.

To find out more, click on Overcome Social Anxiety – How to How to Let Go of the Past and Move Forward?