Anxious Living

Online Transparency

August 16th, 2006 by Aaron

Since writing my last post, I’ve been thinking even more about the role of transparency in my struggles with social anxiety. One of the first places that I have been able to bring a little more transparency to my life is online. I was grateful for Ryan’s post on using the online world to help cope with social anxiety when I first read it and lately I have been thinking about it even more.

I started a personal blog with no real idea where it was going to go. In time I found myself repeating a particular pattern. I would write a post and then find that I couldn’t bare the thought of publicly admitting to such thoughts. Then I would wait a week or two and go back and publish it. It became a way of forcing myself to talk about things I’ve often wanted to talk about but didn’t because of the fear of how I would come across. It let me see that revealing many of my thoughts is nowhere near as dangerous as I tell myself it is.

It didn’t happen with every post and it took some time before I realized what I was doing, but it was instrumental in allowing me to start talking about myself and eventually to talking openly about social anxiety. It certainly helps that most people reading my blog have no idea who I am.

Often at social events I feel like some kind of lurker. I’m alone, hiding in a corner, trying to figure out what kinds of conversations are going on and debating with myself whether there is a way to comfortably become a part of any of them. Online this process is invisible. It is also common and accepted. I was on Zaadz for months before ever really participating.

You can safely lurk on site, getting a feel for how people are talking, how the site works, what the comments tend to feel like. Then when you work up the nerve to join in you’ve got the group history and dynamics down and it’s a much less stressful moment then trying to join a live discussion. It can help to overcome the fear of embarrassment that so hinders transparency.

If you’re dealing with SAD and having trouble opening up I think starting online can be a very important beginning.

On another note. If you have the time, definitely check out Bill of IOC’s post on the book The Highly Sensitive Person. It’s an interesting topic and I think his comparison of HSP to SAD is rich material.

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