5 Ways to Manage Social Worry

One of the things that I have learned from the anxious people in my life is that sometimes people have thoughts about something and assume those thoughts are facts when they often aren’t. I’m still guilty of this at times, but for the most part I have learned to avoid that kind of overthinking or have ways to help me through it. 

A very common example is thinking that another person is having bad thoughts about you. Take Megan for example. Megan arrived for a job interview at 10 AM, but the interview was supposed to be at 9:45 and she had written the time wrong. After realizing she was late, Megan explained why she arrived when she did, but obsessed over this mistake after the interview. She believed that the interviewer saw her as an unreliable person who would never hire her. In reality, the interviewer understood because they’ve made the same mistake. They had no problem giving grace to Megan for this error and put it out of their mind.  

Just Because You Think It Does Not Make it True

Unless you’re in somebody else’s head, there is no way to know what they are thinking without asking them. Sometimes it’s worth asking because you will learn that the person didn’t give it another thought while you didn’t sleep because of all the mental energy you were devoting to the worry around your false belief.

I dare you to think of mistakes that others have made. Do you remember every time someone was late meeting you? Probably not, because you gave them grace or it just wasn’t worth keeping that irrelevant information in your head.

You may be surprised how little other people are thinking of you and your “mistakes.”

Ren is a 4th grader who had to give a presentation to his class. He was extremely nervous and couldn’t remember what he was going to say. He ended up pronouncing several words incorrectly when he read from his script. After his presentation he was sure that everyone was still focused on his mistakes. As soon as he got home he broke down in tears and had a hard time getting to sleep. However, the other students were so focused on themselves and their presentations that they didn’t think anything of it. In fact, only a few even heard his mistakes because he was so quiet when he spoke!

So what can we do to support ourselves and the children in our lives when social worries dictate what we do and how we react?

Action is the antidote to anxiety!

1. Check the facts and encourage children to do the same. If you don’t have hard evidence that what you were thinking is true then try to let it go. Someone else’s lack of response, body language, or facial expression are not hard evidence! (They may not have responded because they were busy and may have the body language and facial expressions from something else that is on their minds.) Their actions toward you and what they tell you are your evidence.
   

2. Ask! If you’re worried about someone’s thoughts about you, ask them. If that friend hasn’t made a plan with you in several months, it may have nothing to do with you. Maybe they are having the same thought about you or have something going on that has taken up their mental bandwidth and time. We can encourage children to do the same.
   

3. Find a prominent place in your house with the statement, “just because you think it, does not make it true.“ You will probably need this reminder!
   

4. Journal or write letters/emails. Sometimes I haven’t had the energy to have a conversation with someone to resolve my overthinking worries after a tough encounter, or I’ve realized that it’s not worth the effort because I may not even ever see them again. Writing an email, letter, or journal about what you would say if you could can be very therapeutic! You don’t need to send it; in fact, I typically don’t. As therapists we can help children with this by allowing them to tell us what they would say if they could.
   

5. Consider helping children ease some of their anxiety by learning more about some of their other social worries and avoiding some of those or asking for accommodations at school. For example, social worry may go up significantly if children are worried about being called at times when they aren’t raising their hands (so, ask for an accommodation at school so they are only called on if they raise their hand). Or they may use up all of their social energy during the day at school and the soccer team they participate in after school adds even more social pressure (so they may need to skip extracurriculars during the school year, or choose ones with less social pressure, like piano lessons or non-team sports). 

These are effective strategies to help children who worry have difficulty with everyday life because they are worried about what other people think.  

(By the way, “worrying about what other people think of me”  and “being called on when I didn’t raise my hand” are two of the Clue Cards you can give children when you interview them with the Stress Detective: Clue Cards.)