How to work with your social anxiety

Life Kit

NPR

Health & Fitness, Self-improvement, Kids & Family, Education, Business

4.3 • 3.9K Ratings

🗓️ 18 November 2025

⏱️ 24 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

It's easy to spiral and feel anxious when you're on a first date, at your office holiday party or heading to your high school reunion. The stakes feel high and you want to make a good impression. But social anxiety can get in the way of connection, fun and feeling good. In this episode, we give you tools to survive small talk, practice social courage and embrace the awkward.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	This message is brought to you by Pushkin Industries.
0:03.4	Why is it still so hard for women to find reliable, modern health information about their own bodies?
0:09.4	On the Decoding Women's Health podcast, you'll get expert insights to help you thrive.
0:13.8	Listen wherever you get podcasts.
0:18.1	You're listening to Life Kit from NPR.
0:23.7	Hey, it's Mariel.
0:25.6	I'd love for you to join me on an uncomfortable journey.
0:29.3	We're going to your office holiday party, or your high school reunion,
0:33.0	or that dating mixer that you bought a ticket to, but now that it's getting closer on the calendar,
0:36.8	you'd rather do literally anything else, like I'm talking waiting in line at the DMV or getting
0:41.9	root canal. At least then you wouldn't have to talk to people. The dread creeps up and you find
0:47.6	your heart racing, just thinking about going to this thing. It's kind of like playing a video game
0:52.9	on the hard setting where your mind, it sees more
0:59.0	threats in the environment. But rather than dodging a bunch of fireballs or Pac-Man ghosts,
1:04.4	the imposing threat is failure or embarrassment. Ali Matu is a clinical psychologist, and he says
1:09.9	most of us have experienced this nervous energy during a social event, an energy that can make us think we're mind readers.
1:17.0	Where you start to think you know how people are seeing you, you start to believe that you know how people are thinking about you and they're judging you.
1:29.4	They don't think you're doing a good job.
1:31.6	Because when the stakes are high or the social terrain is unfamiliar, it's easy to spiral.
1:35.5	Where you're starting to imagine what's going to happen and you're imagining things
1:39.3	are going to go badly.
1:40.7	All types of people feel anxious in social settings.
	...

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