TeenHelp - Social Anxiety?

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Hi everyone!
I'm not sure if this is the right forum to ask this in but feel free to move it if you think it belongs somewhere else :)
Okay, so I'm 15 and finishing my sophomore year of high school. And I think I might have social anxiety, but I'm not really sure. It's weird because when I'm around people I don't know/don't know anything about, I can strike up conversation really easily and make friends. I'm in my school's "Model Congress" which is basically debate team, and we travel to conferences where I meet tons of new people my age and I have no problem talking to them. But when I'm around people in school that I know are "popular" or well liked, or have a school wide, I get really nervous and awkward, talk too fast, etc. Also, I'm frequently told that I look "uncomfortable" or "uneasy" or "nervous" even when I don't feel like that at all. People are constantly telling me to "relax" or "have more confidence" etc. I feel as though my body language is my main problem, and it's keeping me from being the confident, well known, and well liked person that I want to be. One more thing: I have absolutely no problem arguing why we should stop offshore drilling in front of a bunch of people my age that I don't know (Model Congress), but the thought of presenting a PowerPoint in front of my French class gives me a ton of anxiety. If anyone has some advice for me, I would really appreciate it. Thank you so much! <3

Re: Social Anxiety?

Hey Gabby,

First of all, welcome to Teenhelp! :) I can totally relate to this because I am personally the same too where I can strike up conversations with random people that I've never met before but am too scared to talk to people at school. Thinking and encountering this aspect for a long time, its mostly due to our self-consciousness of being judged by our peers. Even though there are people that think the opposite, its easier to talk to others whom we've never met because they don't know us and not likely to judge you as much as a peer you went to school with your entire life.

One of the ways to overcome social anxiety is putting yourself out there and socializing more often with others. As for you, I think debate is a wonderful extracurricular activity in helping you overcome social anxiety. When it comes to class presentations, everyone gets a bit nervous but you just gotta relax and pretend that your audience is random strangers. For me, that personally works really well. Just make yourself comfortable and don't pay too much attention to your audience; have everything you want to say prepared and ready to go when its time.

I hope this helps and wish you all the very best! If you ever need anything, feel free to PM/VM me anytime. :)

Re: Social Anxiety?

Thank you so much for replying! I'm glad to know that I'm not the only one that feels like this. Yeah, I've been trying to put my self out there a little bit more so we'll see how that goes...