People with social anxiety disorder are especially susceptible to self-sabotaging their progress. Social anxiety, by its very nature, is your brain’s way of keeping you safe. Venturing away from your usual patterns often causes pushback into “safety zone” – however subconscious this may be. In fact, self-sabotage and just plain old social anxiety might at first glance seem indistinguishable. Is there a difference? And how do people with social anxiety commonly self-sabotage?
What is self-sabotage?
Self-sabotage is defined as “the act or habit of behaving in a way that interferes directly with one’s own goals, well-being, relationships, etc.” According to Psychology Today, common examples include procrastination, self-medication with drugs or alcohol, and comfort eating. Today, we’re going to discuss procrastination in particular and how this relates to social anxiety and goals.
To put it simply, self-sabotage is anything you do or don’t do that leads you away from, instead of toward, your goals. And therein lies the issue – goals.
What is your goal if you have social anxiety?
At first glance, it seems simple. If you don’t have friends, the goal is to make friends. If you don’t have a job, the goal is to get a job. If you don’t have a date, the goal is to get a date.
Or is it? Usually, the goal itself in social anxiety feels unattainable, like a distant image you can’t quite see. Something other people can have, but not you. It feels scary. You want it, but you don’t want it, or don’t think you should have it or that you can have it. Furthermore, anxiety is keeping you from taking steps toward that goal. It’s like you are stuck in the middle of a tug-of-war with yourself. Because moving toward it would make you feel unsafe. Your anxiety is triggered, sometimes with even the very thought of making a move toward your goal. You will do anything to go out of your way to avoid feeling anxious, looking anxious, or possibly being criticized.
Therefore, you avoid the situation. Avoidance is a hallmark of social anxiety. Procrastination isn’t exactly the same thing, but the end result is the same – something that should get done doesn’t get done.
Social anxiety disorder and self-sabotage: procrastination
If we analyze the barriers toward meeting goals in social anxiety, there are two distinct ones.
- Subconscious resistance to achieving the goal itself because the goal doesn’t feel safe. Having friends, a job, or a date does not feel within your capabilities, whatever the reason might be. Maybe you don’t feel worthy enough or don’t feel you have the social capacity to be in the role. Maybe it’s too big or too scary, and it feels like something you just can’t do.
- Anxiety caused by the steps needed to reach the goal. Your voice might give, your hands might shake, someone might yell at you, your mind might go blank – the list goes on. Whatever your particular symptoms, this is what you worry about happening. It doesn’t feel good to be anxious or to be seen as anxious.
And that is the distinct and quite complex nature of social anxiety and how it differs from procrastination in other situations. Although it often takes some digging to sort out the reasons for procrastination, and they are often subconscious, it’s usually one or the other of the above scenarios.
How can you stop self-sabotaging so that you can improve your social anxiety?
The most important first step is to recognize what you are doing as self-sabotage. To do this, ask yourself, “Will this lead me toward or away from my goal?”
But that begs the question – what is the goal?
People with social anxiety need to get clear on what the goal is. The end goal might be too overwhelming for the present time. You might need some help sorting out the inner conflict surrounding the barriers you have to seeing yourself at the end zone. That is why it’s so common to hear “I tried X or Y technique, and it didn’t work”. Which barrier was it addressing? To achieve success, you need to address both.
The importance of identifying the right goal
Let’s say, for example, your goal is to get a job. You might need a smaller short-term goal at first that feels more attainable. Let’s say it is researching common answers to job interview questions. You are simply going to search for common questions and best ways to answer them. Searching on your laptop doesn’t in itself give you anxiety. So that is a good place to start.
Except – you don’t do it. Something more important always comes up. Or you can’t find anyone to rehearse with (AI can help you with this!). You’ll do it tomorrow, you say. Before you know it, weeks go by, and now you feel even further from your goal and more anxious. What is happening here? Since there is no anxiety about actually searching on your laptop, there is probably something a little deeper going on. You could be procrastinating because the thought of actually being in the job, or even the interview, is too anxiety-provoking and overwhelming.
Defining success
That is an essential piece of information to understand. You are self-sabotaging to avoid a threat that is not even there yet. That bigger threat is the underlying issue that needs to be addressed, whether in therapy or your own self-help. But now you have a very solid present-moment short-term goal you can work on. Instead of staking everything on the job interview, you can define your goal, and success toward your goal, with just researching the interview questions. This way the steps needed to reach your goal are attainable – they don’t in themselves cause anxiety.
It doesn’t stop there, of course. And it isn’t easy. That process needs to be repeated for different steps along the way. But it IS attainable. Other people have done it, and so can you.
In fact, statistics are on your side. Studies show that with consistent effort, SAD tends to improve over time.
You can read more insights and practical strategies in my other posts.
You can read my complete story in my book.
