Social anxiety thoughts II

In any outdoor/social situation I automatically have a belief that the other person has right. In anything. Over anything. That I must follow, obey, and I have no rights for anything (to think, say, observe, contradict). It goes automatically, without me being aware. Which is connected to another behaviour I've seen in social situation, that might not be connected exclusively to social anxiety: it's like when people say something they want, desire and need which resort to some strain, dull moments, expensive, or takes any resource which the other side might not agree - that people usually take that as the absolute order and not as something that might be negotiated or even dismissed. It's like most people take final decision to go along with proposed plan or on the extreme side to leave that person without checking what will happen if they contradict. I should be aware of this automatic behaviour and stop it. It is connected to self esteem and fear of making mistakes, and toxic shame that someone will ashame us.

What I can actively do regarding social anxiety is to notice how I talk to myself. What is my attitude and correct it when necessary. It is fighting for mental sanity. I also can fix my posture whenever I duck my shoulders, I can remember to raise my back. Posture will then follow the attitude. Also very important, is to stop complaining. It does not help, it is exhausting and energy draining and it brings on more misery, invite more pain already present.

Seems like knowing what to expect keeps anxiety away, gets me prepared and calmer. Like knowing that I dislike changes. But what does that really mean. It means if I meet someone new, it's most likely I will not like that person. I'll need time to adjust. If I don't expect that phenomena, I will shy away, walk away, I will make decision in front this person is no good without knowing anything to base that avoidant decision. So the lesson is - give time to new people, new settings even though I have strong urge to run away.

Social Anxiety thoughts

People who are insulting, they are manipulating people with insults. For someone with social anxiety it may seem like they confirm my guilt, shame and wrongness, but they are unable to know me, so instead feeling guilty I should be alert they are trying to modulate me to be their slave and subordinate to their desires and wishes to serve them.

In social settings (anywhere outside, anywhere with less known people around myself) be alert that I will automatically get strong sense that I am in the way, that I bother others, that I disturb them so therefor I mustn't be there, I should not be outside, I am not allowed. This belief is so strong that this is actually mental illness without realizing because the belief is so ingrained, it appears too real. If I am not aware, I make choices based on it and - I stay out, I cripple myself with my own decisions and it feels safe, good and normal to do so. The thought is so pervasive, that even if I go with CBT, Exposure and ACT methods the beliefs still lingers in any second being somewhere outside comfort zone even though I am aware how ridiculous this thought is. It's as if my mind is programmed to behave in certain way, as if I am an actor in movie that is already taped and I cannot change it no matter what.

This leads to the next belief, that it is important for me not get into conflict with someone, to argue and that I should obey automatically. Usually, if I do argue, people will insult me. Since I never argue, I agree with insults and people manipulate me and take advantage of me easily. Which I solve by self isolating myself, go into comfort zone and never go outside. If I do, I have strong sense I don't belong there even if I don't make a step outside, the feeling of not belonging is already inside.

Of course, due to chores and errands, I can't be locked inside. So I do go outside. This makes me feel as if I am walking on egg-shelves, as if I walk on needles. So I react to those needles, notice them and becoming very aware of them. I cover as much as I can automatically, without thinking about what I am doing, I have strong desire to hide no matter how ridiculous it is, since in most cases there are not even people in near proximity to myself. When I am aware of this ridiculous thoughts, I usually stop with one thing to hide, yet I usually then find myself yet again feeling unquenched feeling that there is something wrong with me, how I look, how I act, how I walk, what I am wearing, what am I looking, anything and everything being wrong about me and that someone will pop out of somewhere and thinking about me and tell me making fun of me, mocking me or even attack me since I am so wrong, guilty and disgusting. So I make more and more choices and decisions not to bother anyone, do my stuff as fast as I can without taking a moment to think or go through list if I need something to do more. With time on occasions I stop this shame cycle and I convince myself that who cares, I will make fool of myself, that no matter what I do I will always do something stupid or strange, and in conversation with people no matter what I do, no matter how much I try I will always say something stupid or do something stupid. But that does not last long. Few days, some incident, and I am back on the shyness track again.

I try to be happy and careless but almost always anxiety kicks in. Sometimes it feels as if I am punished to be carefree and deciding not to care what people think anyway. This is another problem - the depression and feeling guilty and ashamed for imaginary and real incidents. The beliefs and thoughts are so strong and real that this is also mental illness and I am aware this is crossing boundary of psychosis (state of mind where something imaginary appears absolutely real to me). For example someone yelling at me or when someone is rude to me. I can tell myself who cares, but the feeling of wrongness and shame is way too strong.

The is a hack quick and easy - when I am not alone, if I am with someone I know and feel trust with one or more person, I don't feel social anxiety in such level as when I am alone. I feel I can do more and I care less what someone known or unknown will think about me.

This hack works only outside when there is imaginary threat. If someone's reaction is wrong and negative I feel weak and want to hide, I take it too seriously, even if it is a small thing. I'll be overthinking about it. I get invaded by useless memories, as in all other cases, Pure OCD is running wild in my mind when faced with negative reaction by others, imaginary or real. Discovering Pure OCD underneath it all helped a lot, since there are ERP, ACT methods that help in dealing with it.

It is as if I have a script in my head, a program that tells me that everyone is connected, that I must be friendly with everyone. So I must obey whatever someone might like and do according to what everyone thinks how I should be. Even though people pleasing is not realistic and even though I am aware how ludicrous it is, I believe in it automatically. I forget realistic thoughts, like they are not my mom, they are strangers, so who cares, we are not connected, we have no obligations to care or to do according to what someone might want, think or desire. As one one side psychopaths and sociopaths have a chronic lack of empathy, I have it in so much excess that it is hurting me in so much that it is actually drowning me.

With such skewed views about people, for most of my life I had unrealistic expectations from people and without realizing it, when I observe other people I had totally wrong impression how people are connected. How they form friendships is in my head totally wrong. In my mind it's too intense where in real life it is relaxed. Where in real life is bond, in my head I imagine it very loose. To me, friendships looked very much connected, people who knew each other, seemed to me like they are extremely close which in real life it ain't so. I see threat if someone is reacting with shouting when someone might push them, when it's in reality comically slapstick situation. Being pushover and people-pleaser means attracting toxic people which doesn't help at all to my already skewed views of connecting with people.

Fear of making mistakes found a good ground on this kind of thinking. Being afraid what someone thinks, being afraid how someone will respond and react naturally leads to over reaction towards mistakes. And once you are afraid of making mistakes, you sabotage yourself voluntarily. It's about being afraid someone might react violently, aggressively. And it seems to me that most people usually do react aggressively, since they don't care at all what others around them might think, feel & possibly hurt inside and thus they don't stop and think how others might feel since in their opinion the other person made a mistake - and they feel that person must be punished for mistake by an act of aggression. It is easy to focus your train of thoughts of all the bad people in our lives who are inconsiderate and it is easy for us to connect with them since I might appear in other people's mind as arrogant, strong and someone who can handle their wave of aggression. Yet I am very easy to be threatened by aggressive people since I don't produce any resistance at all. I am easy target for psychopaths. In that way I attract negative people even more. Which then seems to me that in general, all people are negative and bad.

I know I must stay away from toxic people. I know I must respond and alert the other person when they cross the boundaries - and leave if they don't change. I know I must do what I plan to do no matter what, even on force. Logically, if my social anxiety started with people leaving me and mocking me, I know this is now my main fear in social settings. I know I have to flow by this feeling and stop making me sabotage myself by refusing to go out there. I know that being beaten up in the streets make me feel afraid of violent people, that I have to gain physical strength and knowledge about such rare occurrences. I know that when I get automatic memories of past traumas and bad experiences, that these are intrusive thoughts and should be dealt with as Pure OCD even though they might seem like alerts or something I need to observe and take notice and think about it over and over. Because those thoughts carry the hurt along with them, that I must be prepared in the future for similar bad experiences. I know I must slow down&take my time when outside when voices tell me to rush and run&hide. I know I will respond better when I am totally calmed down and cool about everything, I will make better decisions and better arguments. I know when my shame tells me to stop doing something, that I should do it over and over again. I know when I make mistake and I am ashamed by others, I should do it over and over again. I am aware that my social anxiety shame thoughts are mixed in with regular thoughts so that makes it hard to do the right thing and ignore hiding and make it easy to smuggle running away decisions. Which would be great to have all the rules in general - such as, don't run away, don't hide even if it feels like I must and it would feel good to run&hide because I would convince myself that I am under stress. If someone is insulting me, instead of subordination which would be social anxiety call to respond, I know I should put such people under toxic people category and ignore them and their demands. I know I need to be genuine, which means having conflict and people will respect me more even though it doesn't seem that right in that moment.I am aware since I am extremely sensitive that I will pick up everything at much deeper level and it will hurt me just by an act of observing.

Also I am aware of importance of positive thinking. I am aware that thinking about past hurt doesn't bring anything good but negative atmosphere. It is like creating good memories right now, living in the moment. Despite sadness to force myself somehow out of rut. I am aware of distorted thinking and its many facets. Because of depression and lethargy it is lose - lose situation with social anxiety. Since if you are not aware and if you don't pay attention to your thoughts, you keep doing the wrong things and deepen the wrong way to live. However if you are aware and alert and mindful, you are creating bad mood since you are now more aware of past mistakes and everything that is wrong inside.

Denzel - Katie comment thread

YT:

The Denzel Washington Interview That Left Katie Couric Shaken

LINK

Before May 1st, I fell asleep in the afternoon, been tired lately even thought I get enough of sleep. I had a nightmare - a situation on my job 16 years ago. It was about how I keep quiet, how people are rude, they take advantage of quiet people. That whatever you do or say to those aggressive people it would not stop them in their rant. How it is easy not to care for people's feelings. It is easy to yell. And you can't do nothing about it if you are to face unemployment if you decide to leave. As I woken up, there was a news about Denzel and Katie - she asked him some questions and he started suddenly turned it in his head as an attack and refused to talk normally. So I went to comment thread to check what was going on. I was surprised that people attacked Katie as if she is the bad person in such situation. Which irritated me more, since I was also in situations where a group of people have no idea what is going on, they pick their side to attack in groups and their arguments make no valid explanation - in this case it started like this:

1) Many people are Denzel's fan base, they will "protect" him no matter what. They don't even care what happened and why it happened, they just spread their poison and aggression to hurt anyone who appears as a threat. Also, it is a race issue, since they use colour of the skin as explanation that Katie is behind some kind of corporate organization against the black minority. None of them actually read her words and what she actually said. They explained Katie as pretend victim wanna-be. At first I was angry at insensitive people like Denzel, but this realization made me calmer, since the mob lynch gang didn't seem personal anymore. They were not psychopaths who don't care for people just because, they had a cause behind it. Even though it seems like organized cold blood sociopath group, it is more like a group that see threat where there is none. For some reason, that calmed me down.

2) The more I delve into discussion I realized that the core problem was Denzel's inarticulate way how he explained his point of view. He is against Hollywood label and Katie's question were a provocation for him. In the same time, he didn't explained himself clearly, he just snubbed Katie - he ignored her and he pouted as a 5 year old child behaving angrily towards his parents, unknown to them why their baby is angry. This realization calmed me down, I didn't feel angry anymore.

3) The more I interacted on the comment thread, I had many realizations. The most important is that being angry and spreading vulgar words doesn't pay back in the long run. I should not censor myself and I will express inconvenient truth & being authentic, so if I am vulgar myself, my arguments may get tainted and thus illegible. Even though it feels good to answer back to angry and vulgar people like that the same way as they are behaving - it doesn't help to explain my point of view. Also, if I am calmer and more calmer, the way I interact is much smoother and I recall better way to fight back and to explain my point of view. Also, one important realization is that I've known before - is that if I want to say something I need to say it. I always have inner critic voice that tells me that I am stupid and it doesn't worth much to explain and tell the truth - but it does, it makes the difference. I also realized that in comment thread it is OK to repeat my arguments, since there are too many threads and many of them will not search and read all my words. I realized I should not be righteous and I need to explain people that I am not clever, better than others, because when I have strong arguments, I appear pompous. That means acknowledge their point of views and agree with things we see the same. In that way I found out that Katie is not angel herself (there is some book by her co-workers).

I know from before - if you have psychosis you tend to view your world skewed, like in a tunnel. So if you make a claim - have the proof. Ask for solid proof.

4) Since Katie is probably like me people pleaser, pushover, tends to not to hurt other people feelings, she will fall in a victim trap when faced with angry people. The trap is that you shut up and don't express what you feel and don't explain to them because you think it will hurt their feeling, or you imagine the reasons why they are rude, for example that they had some tragedy just before, and if you ask them anything you will annoy them so it is best to shut up and not to rock the boat. That is not authentic and in most cases it doesn't help the situation. In fact it makes things worse. Denzel is rude to other people, it is not personally being rude to Katie exclusively. She asked questions because it is her job, sent by her network to ask questions, for nationwide TV magazine called Dateline. It was not her whim to ask questions. She asked about Hollywood and that triggered Denzel to rant. People are sometimes rude because the truth hurts. It hurts to accept money and Oscar from Hollywood while in the same time to pretend you are not part of that Hollywood, so you get angry at people who expose that are - in Katie's example by accident. Since rude people are avoided in general, once Denzel is avoided by media, he and his fans will explain this avoidance as racial or personal attack against Denzel - even though he is the one being aggressive. If you are rude to people - most of people will avoid you. That is a fact. No other reason that being rude.

Also, I learned people who were pro Denzel side, after they get explanation, they still resist to admit they were wrong because they are afraid there will be some punishment for wrong behaviour they supported. They are convinced they are afraid there will be penalty for breaking the rules. I guess this goes for any argument, when people won't admit they were wrong. Worth remembering to notice them everything's ok.

As for argument that Denzel detest Hollywood:

Morgan Freeman Roasts Denzel Washington | AFI 2019 | TNT

LINK

comment excerpts

most bashing people here are defending Denzel's behaviour just because they are their fans, it has nothing to do with the ramifications with Katie at all.

When someone is rude to me in the future without any reason at  all, I have to alert them that I don't understand them and apologize for the wrong impression they might receive from me.

 I am just being genuine and spontaneous. Communication tip: That is better way to be taken seriously than grammar check-spell.

With the lack of true and strong arguments, you tell more about yourself than about others.

"same as what gail king tried" Journalists ask tough and annoying questions. It is their job to do that. You can't get the truth without constant seeking it. It will not fall on your lap.

Your detection equipment is malfunctioning.

America is free country, when you give interview, it is not directed or instructed by someone. But let's say you are right - she didn't had chance to ask, since he broke interview off, there was no time for those questions. Also, that is not problem at all - Katie didn't know why he got angry and refuse to talk. Denzel's words were garbled up, mashed, scrambled. He did not use clear way to express his thoughts. If he said it in recognizable way, Katie would not objected his request. Why would she? She is not conflicting and unreasonable person with VIPs, if she was, who would want to talk to her ever? It's in her interest to be nice and agreeable.

You can't generalize and enforce the same pattern onto every single situation you dislike and you encounter as you go along in your life. Yeah, life would be easy it this could work like that, but in reality you create more hate, turn off potential new friends and spread atmosphere of intolerance - and how that makes you any different than those white privilege psychopaths?

"You make absolutely no sense." Too much brain power needed to calculate my words in the right order?


"I learned that if you don’t like the people you’re working with everyday, do something else" Yep, that is the problem, you find yourself that you can't go, at least i couldn't and i had to endure Denzels in my life. He was rude to Katie. Katie didn't deserve his treatment. She was not evil, her questions were not ill intended. She was doing her job and he abused her.


"I will say nothing more on this topic" No, you misunderstood me. When I asked you to stop, I meant for you to stop assuming people are attacking, when there is no attack. For example, if you curse someone, if you have a knife in your hand and you go psycho, if you are behaving aggressive - that could be labelled as an attack.
In this specific case, if you read the transcript and her body language, and you know Katie as TV personality from before - in honesty - there is no attack.
And even more so, if you google Denzel's name, you see that he is difficult person to talk to. It is not just this Katie incident. I'm sorry, you are probably Denzel's fan, but nobody is perfect. We all have some areas that are undone, wrong and full of mistakes - that we need to work on.


 "she purposely talked down to him" It's all in your head. You are delusional.

"disrespect" what part?

Katie is a reporter, she asks questions. This is her job, it is her task to ask questions. Sometimes people hide stuff about themselves (for example being a fake Hollywood Crusader) and those questions reveal more and more of their sin. Denzel created fuss and drama out of his bruised ego and exposing him as fake person. If you hate Hollywood so much, then you refuse Oscar awards. If you hate Hollywood so much, then don't make money out of it. If you do, you are hypocrite.


 "monopoly" Let's stick to the subject here, please.
Who are you to judge her anyway? She is human being, prone to make mistakes. Maybe someone gave her bad advice, we will never know. Why do you bother so much about her life choices? How exactly that affects your life? I don't care.
What I care here is in this instance, Denzel made mistake, he behaved unjustified and her line of questions were benign.. while you see her as a Devil impersonated?


Well we all have our daemons we fight we. All of us. As I have seen people who are suddenly aggressive without any real evidence to sustain their anger usually have some serious psychological unresolved issues. So yeah, I think Denzel has some problems in that area.


""And what are you?" Think of me someone who creates order in the world. It's shame you denounce Oprah, Gayle, Katie obviously. They are all good, nice people and it is easy for bullies to target them because nice people are easy targets. Tell me more about you, so you just jump in bashing bang gang wagon. It doesn't matter what Denzel did,, you automatically support him. He could kill her and you'd still defend him and tell it is Katie's fault. Do you know how dangerous that is? Hitler came to power with that mentality. I'm sorry, but your hero Denzel is fraud and fake, and that was the reason why he reacted hostile, because he pretends to be Hollywood Crusader.


"victim" she never stated that she is victim. This victim label is invention of Denzel fan base.


"he earns his rewards for acting he doesn't have to be associated with the Hollywood lifestyle" Yeah, you are touching the sore spot of this incident. His manic behaviour started when 'Hollywood' was mentioned by Katie, This was the trigger. She unintentionally lightened his painful area. Because the truth is, he is Hollywood actor, he hangs with Hollywood people, he gets Hollywood $$$, his house, car, clothes, lifestyle are derived from Hollywood - and for some reason he feels ashamed because of it. He may have strong message, he may play famous black historic great roles - but that is all coming from Hollywood and that hurts him. He could express it in a different way. He could say: "Katie, I am sorry, this Hollywood topic is something I'd rather avoid now. Please, let's focus on my movie per se. Not the Hollywood meta discusion. Thank you my dear."
He could also say "I love you so much". "I feel so much love for you". "I care about you".
It wouldn't hurt him nor his butt wouldn't fall off if he expressed a little bit of love and not just righteous yak all the freakin' time.


As I said in earlier comments: 1) interview is free style talk. It is not derived before by 'interviewee' (DW). Katie is professional journalist doing her job, she knows what questions are, her show, her personality, her job - not yours decision to make what kind of questions there will be offered 2) She was shocked, she didn't get chance to change the subject because he brushed her off. Interview was cancelled and this was never broadcasted. 3) "How was he unprofessional?" If you agree to make interview, then you come to talk, not to actually *refuse to talk*. If you are irritated, annoyed - you tell it in a kind way - especially to a person who is kind to you. She was not rude to him. He was rude to her. It is unprofessional, adult people do not behave like that. Adults are not rude, children are. Adolescents are. Adult people know there are boundaries between people. Adult people know better than behaving like a little spoiled brat! With the note: Adult = Professional.


well, sensitive people care. when someone is rude, a normal human beings experience feelings. and if someone is rude out of blue, you get especially hurt. after a while, when you look back in your life, sensitive people assess when they experience something that shook them up, and this was her moment...

 Please Cycle, read it again. There is so much dense information so if you skip some bits you get the wrong picture of what I am saying. I said, maybe he had a bad day, but if we go and look a broader picture, we can see that he has often bad days, this is not one isolated incident. Imagine if someone google your name and surname and there are results from different people and different sources telling that you are difficult person to talk to. What does that say about you?

It's great that you talk with me, please if you or anyone else has some things you don't understand what I am talking about or if it doesn't make sense, let's talk! Let's clear it out! That is the point of this you tube comment part, not to attack or mock each other. We are all adults here, not adolescents.

This communication and mis-communication is not problem of Denzel only. You are here because part of you identifies about the stuf we are talking here, it is not really about Katie and Denzel. We all have that problem and we misunderstand each other all the time even though we share the same language.
This is very complex thing and people can have various emotions about it. If you have urge to yell and curse me, let it out, I will not mind, I am not angry any more, I see the big picture here... People hide their emotions for 16 years, imagine how much energy there is wasted on holding on to hurt - we all do this. We were not thought how to release it, we were not thought how to prevent it. Nobody told us, we didn't get manual when we were born.

 

" Bad way to start an interview" I repeat, she is interviewee, that's her job, she is professional, that is her show, her choice. Who are you to meddle into her job and decide what to talk about in interview. Perhaps that was the best possible way to start an interview because she probably had great follow-up questions which would carry his strong messages - but he never allowed that. He snubbed her. He cut her off. And he done that in very inconsiderable way. We must no treat each other like that. You never know what burden the other person is carrying inside, people don't wear their cross on their back, it is inside them and it hurts, it is heavy. It doesn't help if someone puts more pressure to the existing one, doesn't it? Yeah, he could also say - "Oh Katie, sorry for interruption right in the start, but if I may I'd like to step into your role and actually change the course of interview. Hollywood subject is very sensitive to me, as conservative family man, I would like to divert from this subject, I'm not comfortable talking about it at this moment, please forgive me. Let's talk about my movie, but not Hollywood per se, please. Perhaps when I am old enough, we could reflect on Hollywood and discuss more, I'm simply not ready yet. Thank you so much my dear. I love you so much, you are American sweetheart". That being said, it would make a huge difference, wouldn't it? Did he get his desire and did he not hurt her? She would not hold onto hurt for the next 16 years if he just re-phrase it like that. Denzel's fans says he is not fake, that he speaks truth - but I am sorry, in dealing with Katie - he was not honest, he put mask and he did not speak truth -he hide the truth actually. 

 

CONCLUSION:

"She s mad Denzel shut her down" Denzel could be kinder. His words did not make any sense. His way of communication and displaying feelings is wrong, not functional. He will hurt other people, while in fact he loves people a lot, he don't want to hurt them. I think he feels very ashamed now in the way he acted towards Katie. But Katie is the one who must alert Denzels. Katie did not communicate back to him. So Katie is also the one with communication problem, as well. It's not Denzel's fault 100%. 

 ----

Nope. They both don't know how to communicate. They both need to brush communication skills. Denzel needs to learn how to stop when he feels something very emotional about. And Katie needs to learn how to be more explosive in correct way to express her shock and crossing her boundaries, to alert him in correct way - to talk it out in the right way: Denzel, I am sorry, I feel like I touched an area you don't want to talk about right now. Let's make coffee break and continue with your new film. What do you say about that? 

UPDATE 9.10.2020
I've come to quote by Malcom X: I am human foremost.. so Denzel was quoting a role during the interview.
Malcom X quote: I'm a human being first and foremost, and as such I'm for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.
Denzel to Katie: " "I'm a human being. My job is acting.""

UPDATE 3.10.2021
10 Actors Who Somehow Haven’t Got An IMDb Top 250 Movie by WhatCulture September 21, 2021 - Link
1. Denzel Washington