Painful Shyness
In Children And Adults

How Loved Ones, Friends and Mentors Can Help

Maintain Appropriate Expectations

• Maintain appropriate expectations while communicating empathy for the shy person's painful emotions.
• Encourage them to tell you about their daily experiences and how they feel about them.
• Acknowledge the conflict between needs to belong and fears of rejection.
• Role play challenging situations with the shy person.
• Help the shy individual set specific, manageable behavioral goals, and agreed upon reasonable means to attain them.
• Help challenge the frequent negative thoughts about the self and others, and help them develop constructive alternatives.
• Avoid negative labels and intense pressures for social performance.
• Remember that shyness and social anxiety are common and universal experiences at all ages for most people.

Next page: A Psychologist Can Help

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