Start with Self-Awareness: Which Shy Type Are You?

Because each person experiences his or her shyness in a unique way, the place to start when trying to overcome shyness is to gain some understanding of your own shyness. Begin by looking at what situations seem to make you feel shy, and why. For example, do you become shy when meeting new people, interacting at a social gathering, or speaking to someone to whom you find yourself attracted? Try to understand if your shyness manifests itself cognitively (e.g., excessive self-consciousness or self-deprecating statements), affectively (e.g., overriding feelings of anxiety), or behaviorally (e.g., failure to speak to others at social gatherings).

You might also try to understand how these three different aspects of shyness might interact with each other in your experience of shyness. For example, consider the following situation where the affective and cognitive components of shyness interact to produce avoidant behavior: You are at a party and assume others are evaluating you. As a result, you begin to experience feelings of intense anxiety, which makes it difficult for you to think of anything to say to others. Such lack of involvement in the ongoing conversation makes you perceive yourself as socially incompetent and not very interesting. As a consequence, you leave the party. Since leaving the party reduces the feelings of anxiety, such avoidance is negatively reinforced and becomes more likely to occur in the future. Thus, you can begin to overcome your shyness by examining the nature of your shyness.

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