Where am I With My Anxiety?

I have struggled with social anxiety for the past 20 years of my life. Events that began to unfold when I was 6 led to me first feeling uncomfortable when I was 8. When I was 6, my first grade teacher didn't know how to teach exceptionally smart kids like me and assumed that because I couldn't learn well from her that I must be stupid. They put me into a class for slower kids where that teacher quickly realized that I learned quite a bit faster than the most kids and got bored rather easily.

In 3rd grade I was put back into normal classes, and the teachers couldn't understand why I'd daydream all of the time, yet was still able to do very well on my work. So, they once again figured there was something wrong with me and sent me to the school psychologist for testing. She then sent me to doctors who eventually determined that in reallity, there was nothing wrong with me, other than that I learn faster than most people, and get bored easily.

All of this took its toll on me. Just the fact that everyone assumed that something was wrong with me didn't help my self esteem at all. When you added in name calling, and bullying that all of this caused it was even worse. At least at that point I still had my friends in class with me. In 5th grade, that all changed. My 4th grade teacher, probably one of the best I ever had, knew how to teach me. This led to me doing very well, and I was put classes with the smartest kids in 5th grade. None of my friends were in any of my classes, and because of everything that happened, I was afraid to make new friends. Because I was quiet and submissive, I would get picked on more, and the process continued to propetuate itself until I was a junior in high school.

While I was a junior, I broke out of my shell a little bit but not enough. I became comfortable with people coming to me for help with things I knew about. I was comfortable talking about music. I still wasn't comfortable approaching anyone but my best friends.

As I went through college and began to work I became very comfortable speaking in front of large groups of people about things I knew very well. I could walk into a room of 10 to 100 people without breaking a sweat or stammering for one work. Even still, one on one, I was a wreck. My anxiety has pretty much stayed this way up until a few months ago.

I was nearing the end of a bad relationship, and needed to find a way to bring myself to dump her. I started reading everything I could trying to find a way to get over the fears I had of doing it. While I was doing that, I came acrossed many techniques and methodologies of dealing with fear and anxiety. In the end they did little to help me dump her, but they did start making changes in my life overall.

One thing that I discovered is Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). NLP is a way of making changes to the way you mentally perceive and act on things. I would definitely encourage anyone looking to make changes in their life to study up on it. This is by far one of the quickest methods of making change.

I also read a book called "The Power of Now" by Eckhart Tolle. This is definitely a must read for anyone who hasn't already read it. Once you read it, you will notice change in your life even if you don't totally agree with Mr. Tolle about everything.

The most important thing that I have done is just talk to people. I felt a little wierd doing it at first, but I walked around saying at least "Hi" to everyone I passed in stores or at work. Now I do it without thinking about it, and every once in a while I somehow manage to get into an interesting conversation that way.

That gives you an bit of an overview of what I have done already. I will go deeper into the details and keep everyone up to date on my progress in future posts.