This is self-work and I'm Dr. Margaret Rutherford.

At self-work, we'll discuss psychological and emotional issues common in today's world

and what to do about them.

I'm Dr. Margaret and self-work is a podcast dedicated to you taking just a few minutes today for your own self-work.

Hi and welcome to self-work. I'm Dr. Margaret Rutherford. I'm a clinical psychologist out of

Fayetteville, Arkansas. I've been in practice for 25 years and I started

podcasting to extend the walls of my practice not only to people who might have been

in therapy or considering therapy but to people who might never walk through the door

of a therapist but are a little curious about what someone like me would have to say.

So welcome if you're any or all of the above.

Today we're going to be talking about social anxiety.

You know, performance anxiety is actually the number one kind of anxiety in the United States

when you struggle to get up in front of people and give a speech or something. But social anxiety affects

15 million of us and so it's roaring up to second in line. And what I've noticed

about our culture is that we seem to becoming a bit commitment phobic as well.

I've laughed and said are we losing our manners or is it really social anxiety?

Maybe manners is an outdated thing, I don't know, but I hope not in many ways.

So we'll talk a little bit about how social anxiety and commitment or avoidance of commitment

may go hand in hand.

I'm going to offer an exercise with specific questions to help you address your anxiety

and specific things you can do to try to approach a social situation with less anxiety.

And then our email from a listener today is a thank you, which is of course always nice,

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