Dear Dr. Norquist:
I wonder if you can give me some advice on how to feel more comfortable socializing with others. I’ve always been a little shy. When I was a child I was extremely shy. Now that I’m older, and have kids of my own I find its not as difficult as it used to be, but I’d like to feel more comfortable talking with the other mother’s I meet at the park and around town. I admire how easy it is for some of them. I’d like them to think well of me and to like me, but, I never know quite what to say. Could you give me some advice?
Dr. Norquist responds:
It seems that you think it is bad to be shy. This world is made up of people at all points on the continuum of "shyness." In fact, in the last 5 years or so, researchers have pinpointed a gene for shyness. Its OK to be shy. I do hear what you saying, however, regarding your desire to feel more comfortable relating with others, and I think it is an important question to address. I also come from a history of extreme shyness, so I can empathize with your experience.
Let me give you an inner game that you can practice to help yourself feel more at ease with others. First, recall the inner experience you have when relating with someone that you are extremely comfortable with – family or close friends. Now, practice conjuring up this feeling whenever you are around others. See your daily world as full of others who you know very well. This allows you to be at ease with yourself when you are relating with others – which helps others to relax and be comfortable around you. The more you open up inside yourself, the more you will easily enjoy the company of others.
We all have a tendency to be more self-conscious around those we don’t know well. This manifests in many ways – being more attentive to how we look, what we say, and what impression we are making. Once we do this, we become someone we are not, and start relating to others self consciously, through a certain persona, or "false self" we have created. This makes it very hard for others to feel at ease with us, or for us to feel at ease relating with others. Trying to please others or trying to make a good impression on others robs us of our inner power. I’ve heard it said that the impressions that ultimately affect us are not those we make on others, but rather, the impressions we allow inside ourselves as a result of our habitual feelings and beliefs about ourselves and the world.
Practice accepting yourself as you are, without judgement. This will make it much easier for you to feel at ease with others. Be real, direct and sincere in your interactions. The best way to relate with others is to accept and respect them as they are, and to treat them as someone you know very well. Others are not there to determine your worth, they are there to share life in this world we share in common. My advice is to practice the inner game I mentioned earlier, and to try the approach of enjoying each other’s company.
Dear Dr. Norquist:
My husband gets mad at me if I want to spend time with a friend. He says I don’t have enough time for him. If I do spend time with a friend, he complains that every one else is more important than he is because if I have enough time to spend with them, I must have time to spend with him. I am only asking for one night out a month. We work together and spend every night together – is this asking too much? My husband has no social life outside of me. If I don’t want to spend all my time with my husband, does this mean I don’t love him? He thinks so. What should I do? I’m starting to get claustrophobic.
Dr. Norquist responds:
Not wanting to spend all your time with your husband doesn’t mean you don’t love him. However, his neediness may be creating a desire in you for more space, more separateness. When we try to "fill-up", so to speak, on our partner, to get our needs for love and security met, our partner eventually feels drained, and wants to pull away. Ideally, love should be a freeing feeling. Your husband’s insecurity will create what he most fears – your need to pull away. You seem to be struggling with guilt about engaging in a normal and healthy human activity – spending time with friends. Try not to allow yourself to own these guilt feelings. You have the right to see your friends. It is not unloving of you to want to do so. Don’t allow your life to be shut down because of your husband’s insecurities. It will not serve either of you for you to do this.
Your husband needs to recognize that the security and love that he is looking for is within himself, not in you. He needs to accept his innate loveableness and self-worth, and recognize that the fulfillment he is searching for is within. Being dependent on others for our sense of worth leaves us forever vulnerable to insecurities – as outside conditions and relationships are always changing. By becoming more centered in himself, and connecting with his inner richness, he will be more able to love you in a way that feels freeing to you. Then he may also spontaneously start developing a social life that is not totally dependent on you.
(Dr. Sallie Norquist is a licensed clinical psychologist in private practice and is director of Chaitanya Counseling and Stress Management Center, a center for upliftment and enlivenment, in Hoboken.)
Dr. Norquist and the staff of Chaitanya invite you to write them at Chaitanya Counseling and Stress Management Center, 51 Newark St., Suite 202, Hoboken, NJ 07030 or www.chaitanya.com or by e-mail at drnorquist@chaitanya.com, or by fax at (201) 656-4700. Questions can address various topics, including relationships, life’s stresses, difficulties, mysteries and dilemmas, as well as questions related to managing stress or alternative ways of understanding and treating physical symptoms and health-related concerns. Practitioners of the following techniques are available to answer your questions: psychology, acupuncture, therapeutic and neuromuscular massage, yoga, meditation, spiritual & transpersonal psychology, Reiki, Cranial Sacral Therapy, and Alexander Technique Ó 2002 Chaitanya Counseling and Stress Management Center.