In Honolulu there is a humble space, a safe space for LGBTQ+ teenagers called Spill The Tea Cafe. It's less of a commercial cafe where you're served beverages you pay for, but more of a salon in the European renaissance sense where people gather to exchange ideas and communicate with each other. In this cafe there is a boba station, board games, TV, therapy pods, desks, art supplies, and so many other things the teens can take advantage of.

I've been working with the leadership for this cafe for about a year now, and although I've been visiting Hawai'i every year for the past few years this was the first time I visited. I had just one thing in mind: surveying the site to see how my happiness can be shared with the providers and the teenagers.

We often have the idea that when we go into the intention of helping someone, we become helpful. But a blind trust in my best intentions is what makes colonialism happen. Love without understanding isn't all that different from violence, my Buddhist teacher says.

Why Everyone Wanted "More Events"

Today's writing is about social anxiety. Why? Because I saw a lot of it in my conversations with the teens and the interns. While everybody was happy to be at the cafe, everyone also wanted one common thing: more events. After about the third request, I got curious about why — and the reply was that they would have more opportunities to talk to each other.

Which was confusing to me, because they were literally in the same space right there and then. But after a brief moment it clicked: Ah, I remember when I was socially anxious.

If I recall my desires about socialization as a teenager, they went something like this:

  1. I don't want to start conversations because that's too much pressure. What if they don't want to talk to me? What if I make a fool of myself?
  2. It'd be nice if someone came and talked to me, but I need an exit plan — what if I don't like the conversation?
  3. If there was a forced interaction like a group project, that'd be fine — but what if it's for the entire semester and they don't like me?
  4. When a bunch of people gather and do things, if I could be a fly on the wall and some people would occasionally notice me and talk to me… now that would be nice.

When I remembered this I thought, "if I was in their shoes I would want more events as well." So is the answer more events? We can facilitate that — but as a Buddhist, I'm more interested in the source of why we get socially anxious.

The Buddhist Perspective on Social Anxiety

In my first book The Shame Formula, which is actually a book about social anxiety, I primarily discuss social anxiety as driven by shame. How you negatively look at yourself affects how you view social situations because you don't want further reinforcements and proofs about your self-image. All of those points still stand, but from a Buddhist perspective what can we do about social anxiety?

Key Insight

From a Buddhist perspective we focus on reality and how things actually are, instead of how things are inside our minds. This isn't about dismissing your internal experiences — it's about clearly separating between your inner experience and reality-based actual experience.

I can be afraid of cockroaches because I think they're going to fly into my mouth (a very real fear I had). But has every cockroach I've seen even attempted to fly into my mouth? The total count is zero. So although there is a possibility of them flying into my mouth, it's not a definitive thing that is going to happen.

The important thing here is: if I don't have to be afraid, then I'm choosing fear for a reason. Why am I choosing fear when I don't have to? Not only do these questions give you clarity on your reason for suffering, but you also learn a lot about how you think and how you see things.

5 Common Patterns Behind Social Anxiety

It's worth asking yourself why you have to be afraid of conversations. I'll make your life a bit easier and share some common patterns I see when coaching people through social anxiety:

  1. Fear of making others upset — a fear of saying or doing something wrong.
  2. Hiding parts of yourself — you have parts you feel ashamed about and you don't want people to find out by talking to you.
  3. Fear of unreciprocated attachment — you tend to get attached quickly and are disappointed when they don't reciprocate, so you prevent the disappointment entirely.
  4. Intolerance of awkward silences — you can't stand them.
  5. Performance exhaustion — you feel like you need to present yourself a certain way and it becomes tiring.
There's a common thread underlying all of these patterns: the idea of you is harmful to yourself. You're not anxious of other people — you're anxious of you creating all these occasions to feel bad about yourself.

The Root Question You Actually Need to Ask

Feeling anxious before interviews or in hierarchical contexts like bosses and parents also involve other people. But social anxiety tends to be a lot more general than these specific contexts. If everyone is a reminder of how bad you are, then isn't it natural that you're going to feel anxious around everyone?

The Core Question

Questions and explorations of the anxious feeling are one step late when it comes to finding the root. The core question that needs to be asked around social anxiety is: "What makes me this bad of a person?" — not for verification of your shortcomings, but to find out whether the reasons you come up with are based on reality or personal perception.

I can think I'm a rich person today and a poor person tomorrow. My belief around my richness does nothing to the amount of money in my bank account. I can think my wife loves me today and hates me tomorrow. It does nothing to change my wife.

I am the one in charge of my internal experiences, sure — but if I'm leading myself to internal experiences that cause me to suffer for no reason, is there at least a good reason to do so?