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PaperclipPerfector  9mo ago (text post)   1851 thread views

Wellness Wednesday for February 14, 2024

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

  • Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.

  • Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.

  • Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.

  • Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).

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I would keep pushing yourself within the bounds of your tolerance.

I used to be like you until I took an arrow in the knee eventually became less socially anxious over the course of about 5 years. I spent a lot of time deliberately going out for social interaction though. Now I help host my friend's meetup when I'm there helping others who are shy to fit in with the group.

There isn't really a shortcut to getting over social anxiety. The fast chemical route is a crutch (even though I used A LOT of alcohol over the years to tolerate uncomfortable environments). All the training in the world won't help with introversion though. I can't make myself want to stay in high stimulation environments to this day.

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