What they in teach Shyness Group Seminars/Therapy?

[Outcast]

What do they teach you in Shyness groups seminars/sessions/therapies? I've always been curious if their advices could work.

[gaia]

I've spoken to 'professionals' about shyness/social anxiety before and a lot of what they recommend is some form of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy.

I believe CBT makes a lot of sense and could be helpful.
However the difficult part is definately having the motivation/discipline to 'correct' your thoughts.

One time I was handed a list of the different types of damaging thoughts that almost everybody does at some point.
The idea was to identify which of them you do (you can identify with them all : and so you know in future what to look out for.
*I've typed it out below. Honestly, who doesn't do these things??

[gaia]

Ok - so I typed it out.
This is the info I was given that's to do with CBT (no, I really don't have anything better to do with my time ).

Cognitive Distortions (a.k.a the thinking that's bad for you).

All Or Nothing Thinking: Things are seen as either black or white.
E.g. Total success or total failure.

Overgeneralising: A single negative event is seen as a never ending pattern of defeat.
E.g. Making a cake for the dinner party and it doesn't rise very well is viewed as "I'll never be a good cook".

Mental Filter: A single negative detail is picked out and dwell on it to the exclusion of other information.
E.g. Due to the cake not rising well, 'The whole dinner party is ruined'.

Disqualifying The Positive: You reject positive experiences, these are seen as flukes and don't count.
E.g. If guests stated that they enjoyed the meal 'They are just being polite', so maintaining your belief that the dinner party was ruined.

Jumping To Conclusions: You make a negative interpretation even though there are no facts to support that conclusion. Two ways of doing this...
Mind Reading - You think somebody is reacting negatively to you without checking it out.
Fortune Telling - You anticipate that things will turn out badly, and view this prediction as fact.

Catastrophising: You exaggerate the negative consenquences.
E.g. A headache is interpreted as having a brain tumour.

Emotional Reasoning: You assume your negative emotions necessarily reflect reality.
E.g. I feel it, therefore it must be true.

Should Statements: You try to motivate yourself by 'Should, Ought to and Musts' so that you feel under pressure to do it and if you don't do it, you feel guilty. And if other people don't do things that 'they should' you feel angry and resentful.

Labelling and Mislabelling: Instead of describing your error, you attatch a negative label to yourself.
E.g. 'I didn't answer that question very well' gets labelled as 'I'm an idiot/stupid/moron/failure etc.'

Personalisation: You see yourself as the cause of a negative external event which you were not primarily repsonsible for.
E.g. Your daughter fails an exam.. 'It's my fault, I should have made her study more'.

[Sweet Pea]

as anna said, CBT is the therapy of choice for shyness, SA, etc these days. often therapy groups and support groups are integrated into individual therapy as well. assertiveness training is often recommended and can be very helpful as well.

[Stranger]

Apr 21, 2008 21:45:47 GMT -5 gaia said:

*I've typed it out below. Honestly, who doesn't do these things??

I quite like that list; thanks for sharing.

Sure everyone does these things at times, but it's nice to know what are the precise "damaging" things one thinks, instead of just feeling like crap and not really knowing why. Although of course it won't change anything without the discipline to act on it.

[Sweet Pea]

May 3, 2008 11:24:13 GMT -5 Stranger said:

Apr 21, 2008 21:45:47 GMT -5 gaia said:

*I've typed it out below. Honestly, who doesn't do these things??

I quite like that list; thanks for sharing.

Sure everyone does these things at times, but it's nice to know what are the precise "damaging" things one thinks, instead of just feeling like crap and not really knowing why. Although of course it won't change anything without the discipline to act on it.

yeah, discipline is unfortunately key to any kind of self-improvement. the biggest problem alot of shy people have is prolly the same as any other kinda people have...they're lazy. i know i am. that's why you see alot of posts from people wanting some sort of quick fix on shy sites. if you have to work at something, maybe experience some unpleasantness...nah, i'll just stay home and pick my toenails today. ;D

[Stranger]

May 3, 2008 11:35:49 GMT -5 Sweet Pea said:

yeah, discipline is unfortunately key to any kind of self-improvement. the biggest problem alot of shy people have is prolly the same as any other kinda people have...they're lazy. i know i am. that's why you see alot of posts from people wanting some sort of quick fix on shy sites. if you have to work at something, maybe experience some unpleasantness...nah, i'll just stay home and pick my toenails today. ;D

Heh, yeah, I don't doubt that. Still, it's nice to have clean toenails. ;D

[gaia]

May 3, 2008 12:35:08 GMT -5 Stranger said:

May 3, 2008 11:35:49 GMT -5 Sweet Pea said:

yeah, discipline is unfortunately key to any kind of self-improvement. the biggest problem alot of shy people have is prolly the same as any other kinda people have...they're lazy. i know i am. that's why you see alot of posts from people wanting some sort of quick fix on shy sites. if you have to work at something, maybe experience some unpleasantness...nah, i'll just stay home and pick my toenails today. ;D

Heh, yeah, I don't doubt that. Still, it's nice to have clean toenails. ;D

lol! I agree.

[adion]

Apr 21, 2008 22:04:47 GMT -5 gaia said:

Ok - so I typed it out.
This is the info I was given that's to do with CBT (no, I really don't have anything better to do with my time ).

Cognitive Distortions (a.k.a the thinking that's bad for you).

All Or Nothing Thinking: Things are seen as either black or white.
E.g. Total success or total failure.

Overgeneralising: A single negative event is seen as a never ending pattern of defeat.
E.g. Making a cake for the dinner party and it doesn't rise very well is viewed as "I'll never be a good cook".

Mental Filter: A single negative detail is picked out and dwell on it to the exclusion of other information.
E.g. Due to the cake not rising well, 'The whole dinner party is ruined'.

Disqualifying The Positive: You reject positive experiences, these are seen as flukes and don't count.
E.g. If guests stated that they enjoyed the meal 'They are just being polite', so maintaining your belief that the dinner party was ruined.

Jumping To Conclusions: You make a negative interpretation even though there are no facts to support that conclusion. Two ways of doing this...
Mind Reading - You think somebody is reacting negatively to you without checking it out.
Fortune Telling - You anticipate that things will turn out badly, and view this prediction as fact.

Catastrophising: You exaggerate the negative consenquences.
E.g. A headache is interpreted as having a brain tumour.

Emotional Reasoning: You assume your negative emotions necessarily reflect reality.
E.g. I feel it, therefore it must be true.

Should Statements: You try to motivate yourself by 'Should, Ought to and Musts' so that you feel under pressure to do it and if you don't do it, you feel guilty. And if other people don't do things that 'they should' you feel angry and resentful.

Labelling and Mislabelling: Instead of describing your error, you attatch a negative label to yourself.
E.g. 'I didn't answer that question very well' gets labelled as 'I'm an idiot/stupid/moron/failure etc.'

Personalisation: You see yourself as the cause of a negative external event which you were not primarily repsonsible for.
E.g. Your daughter fails an exam.. 'It's my fault, I should have made her study more'.

This is a good list.

I have always wondered what they go over in support groups and therapy. I have never been to either.