I'm with you. In my 20's, I was crippled with anxiety when trying to talk to any female I was interested in. After two marriages (very happy in my second), I feel like I could go out do pretty well if I were single. I wish I had my present personality/confidence w/ my better-looking younger self (i'm almost 52 now).
I'm 42 now and I wish I could go back to my 20s with my current wisdom, confidence, etc. I was such an idiot and made so many mistakes in pretty much all areas of my life.
Please share your wisdom. I am 25 with horrible anxiety. I have been working a job I don't like for over a year because I can't get an offer. I either look way too anxious in the interviews or don't even show up due to fear.
Easier said than done, but I think the key is learning to (selectively!) not give a shit. It's crudely put, but is the gist of what a lot of self-help stuff is, including fancy-pants stuff like Stoicism.
The blocks are purely in your head. Bad interview? It'll be forgotten by everyone but you in a week or two, if even that long, unless we're talking something outlandishly catastrophic ("... and then his tie caught on fire!"). Awkward when talking to a stranger? They'll forget you existed by the morning.
One helpful exercise can be to think through the actual harm—not how you'll feel about it, but all external-to-you harm—from a worst-likely-case scenario. Interview when you already have a job? The harm approaches zero. Talking to a stranger? Ditto. The harm of those is almost entirely something you do to yourself.
One simple way to practice social skills is to play little games when things are extremely low-stakes. Like, "today I'm going to compliment a stranger on something", or (a tad more advanced) "today I'm going to find out what a stranger's favorite sports team is", or whatever. Really little efforts are all it (usually) takes to reduce social anxiety quite a bit, it's just that lots of people never even try that much.
As for interviews specifically, the usual advice is "do practice interviews until no longer anxious".
I suffered from anxiety too in my 20s. Between 14 to 29 years were the worst years of my life (so far). Since then, life has been getting better.
Something that caused me a lot of suffering was a feeling that I was running out of time. I see that now, but back then I couldn't even describe this anxiety. I couldn't even realize the anxiety in me. It's like there was no life after 30. This made me make a lot of mistakes and waste a lot of time because I was obsessed with achieving results instead of focusing on the process.
I've been thinking a lot about 20 year old me lately. To the point that I'm even considering writing a book, a newsletter, or something.
I'm 41. Things that consistently reduce my anxiety:
- Slow breathing. Count to four for each step: inhale, pause, exhale, pause.
- Cardio exercise
- Talking with my partner about anything.
- Physical intimacy
- Five full cycles of sleep every night. You have to measure this with a device.
- Being in nature
- Spending time with friends
- Acetylcysteine (NAC) 14mg/kg per day. I started taking this a week ago. It feels like somebody turned down my emotions from 11 to 3. I still feel the same emotions, but their intensity is reduced.
- Vipassana meditation. I took the free 10-day "Goenka" course and learned the skill. Then I worked through some things, which was a lot of work. The payoff is in reducing the time and energy I spend ruminating. The meditation skill is also useful for dealing with stress.
- Therapy
- Having money in the bank
Things that increase my anxiety:
- Caffeine. Caffeine's effect is cumulative for me, building up to a maximum over about a week. If you suffer from anxiety and you use caffeine, stop immediately and completely forever. Quitting caffeine and feeling better takes about a month.
- Alcohol
- Noise. Vehicles with fake mufflers.
- Sudden loud noises. Vehicle horns and revving engines with fake mufflers. Sudden loud ring tones when using headphones. Sudden alarms. Set your phone's alarm to start quietly and slowly increase in volume.
I feel for you. I can tell you issues like this seem to diminish with age, but that doesn't help your situation now. Your anxiety is so bad that it's having an incredibly negative effect on your life. Can you get professional help?
