The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish path to romance. Download chapter one for free at Drkenner.com and amazon.com

I suppose we could share a table. There's a couple of seats available there. Oh, good lord, you can't sit with strange women. Why not? Really, I'm not in the mood, you know. Just try to relax.

I wouldn't know what to say. Nice, please. Hello, ladies, excuse me, would you mind terribly if we joined you until another table opens up? Oh, please do. Thank you. Oh, look, no, the tables opened up. Oh, no, no, don't stay well, yes, and I’ll go get us some coffee.

You know, I’ll help. I knew you’d panic. Well, I'm sorry, this is still a little new for me, and besides, those two are coming on to us. You know, they are very attractive. Niles, maybe we should ask them out on a date. We just met. Good point. Niles, perhaps we should go out with a few more times before we ask them on a date.

And that's our topic for today, dating. I love dating, but that doesn't mean I wasn't anxious sometimes going out on a date. And my husband loved dating too, and my guess is there were times when he was anxious too, but for some people, it totally terrifies them, as we heard with Fraser from the Fraser show, with Fraser and Niles. What can you do if you feel a little anxious or very anxious about dating, and yet you want a romantic partner? Dr. Steve Orma specializes in just this type of situation. He's a clinical psychologist, and he's a coach in the San Francisco Bay Area, and he specializes in helping adults overcome anxiety and stress-related issues.

Welcome Dr. Orma, thank you for having me.

Let's talk about social anxiety in the dating scene. What is social anxiety? Yeah, well, social anxiety is the feeling of being anxious in a social or performance situation, such as dating, which is sometimes both, and the anxiety is usually caused by the fear of being judged negatively or doing something embarrassing in that situation.

So, what if they don't like me? What if I...? What are some of the thoughts that people have when they're feeling really anxious to, you know, say, I'm about to date someone, or you're about to date someone, and we're both feeling very anxious. What are some thoughts that might go through our minds? Yeah, very common thoughts would be, What if I say something stupid? What if they say no when I ask them out, or I'm just not that interesting a person, so they're going to find me boring. It would be a disaster if I get rejected. So it's usually a lot of these 'what if' type of questions where there's a negative, you know, negative twist to it, where the person's anxiety gets ramped up because they're thinking these bad things are going to happen.

So it sounds like, partly, it's judging: What if they're judging me? What if they see in me what I don't like in myself, or what if they're like my parents, and they're critical of me? And I can't stand that, I can't stand that feeling, or I can't stand to feel rejected. And it's also judging the other person: What if I pick another jerk, or what if I get trapped in another lousy relationship, or what if I pick another loser? So it's all these negative ideas about ourselves and others, or even about dating itself, right? Yeah, exactly. I mean, there's a lot of trepidation that people have about dating, you know, going out and, you know, I'm going to meet a creep, or I'm going to get hurt. I'm going to, you know, meet that same person I was just dating and have it be a disaster. And what happens is, when we say these things to ourselves, we're setting off an alarm bell in our body that creates the anxiety, and that creates the feeling. And the thing is, many times the things we're saying to ourselves are either untrue or they're exaggerated in some way, but our body really doesn't know the difference. If we're saying it to ourselves, we have the reaction of anxiety, and then that can cause us to act in certain ways and inhibit us.

So we paint a picture in our minds that's very, very negative about the dating scene, whether it's ourselves, the dating situation, or the other person, or all of the above, and we paint that picture, and that's our invitation to say, 'Come Honey, let's go out on a date.' And it's really hard to do that with yourself if you've painted an ugly picture of dating. Exactly, and I think picture is a good example too, because we not only say things to ourselves, but we create images in our mind, you know, we picture ourselves, you know, tripping over our words, or maybe actually tripping, or picturing somebody turning us down, and that just creates this fear that's built up before we even approach the person.

So, if I'm that highly anxious person, and I've got all of these negative thoughts going on in my head, what would I typically do? Would I go out on a date? Would I not? What do people typically do when they are just swimming in those types of negative thoughts? Yeah, I think it depends on how intense the anxiety is, and there are certainly different levels of anxiety that people can experience. If they're on a lower end, they might still go out and date, and they might still try to flirt and meet people, but they're going to be feeling really uncomfortable and maybe a little inhibited. On the other end, if someone is really anxious, they might avoid dating altogether. They may not even attempt to ask somebody out or walk up to them, or make eye contact; they shrink up in their shell and don’t even give themselves the chance to have that opportunity.

Right? So they create a self-fulfilling prophecy. They'll never find anybody, and dating is too hard, and everything would go wrong if I did date. But I really want to meet someone, but I'll never meet someone, and then they never go out on a date, and they avoid the situations where they could meet someone, and they end up alone. Exactly, and the avoidance perpetuates the anxiety. Because, you know, the anxiety is uncomfortable, so they're going to avoid it, but the more they avoid it, it builds up the anxiety and the fear even more in their mind, and it keeps them stuck in this place of not reaching out and connecting with other people, right?

And if I do go out, let's say I'm the anxious person, and I do go out on a date, and I'm very shy and very anxious, you're going to take a look at me and think what? I'm going to think, you know, what's the matter with this person? If you're not talking very much, or you're not making eye contact with me, I might think you're not interested, that you're bored, that you're not really having a good time, that you don't have anything much interesting to say, right? Or that I'm arrogant and I'm judging you negatively. Exactly, so by not talking, you're sending these messages that might have nothing to do with who you really are.

So let's get right to what could I do? I'm a person that's afraid to go out dating, and I come to you. You're my therapist. What would you advise me to do? I'm highly anxious. What are some tips you could give me? I think the first thing I would do is normalize the anxiety, that most people feel some anxiety when they're going out on a date. So to feel some anxiety is normal, okay. But beyond that, if it's getting in the way of you reaching out, I would say a couple of things. Number one, you want to identify what you're saying to yourself. So some of those thoughts we discussed earlier, 'I'm going to get rejected,' 'This is going to be a disaster,' or 'I'm going to say something stupid,' are to identify and evaluate those thoughts. How true is that? When you’ve walked up to somebody and said hi, did they reject you, or did it go okay? If you have been rejected or turned down, was it such a disaster? Did you survive?

Yes, I survived. So what would you do next? In addition to looking at and challenging thoughts, really take action by putting yourself in the situations you're afraid of because avoidance perpetuates anxiety. If you're afraid to go up and talk to somebody, you need to go up and talk to somebody. You can start out with things that make you less anxious, like making eye contact or saying hi to people you find attractive, and as that gets more comfortable, you might actually start a conversation.

So, you would gradually get me comfortable. And how can people get in touch with you if they want to contact you? How could they do that, Steve? The best way to get in touch with me is through my website, Drorma.com, that's D-R-O-R-M-A.com. I’m a stress management and anxiety specialist, and I offer services to help people manage those problems.

Okay, thank you so much for joining us today, Dr. Orma. Thank you very much for having me.

For more Dr. Kenner podcasts, go to Drkenner.com. And here’s an excerpt from The Selfish Path to Romance, a serious romance guidebook by Drs. Kenner and Locke.

We believe that many, if not most, 'sex problems' are not at root sex problems, but rather relationship problems. Typically, couples who enter therapy with 'sexual problems' soon discover that underlying the tension or breakdown in the sexual relationship are a multitude of unresolved and often unidentified conflicts or resentments. Also, partners rarely know how to develop a couple style of intimacy, a style of sexuality that is mutually satisfying. Partners develop a couple style when they have clearly communicated what is arousing and pleasing, and together, they come up with a variety of methods of sexual pleasuring that integrate both partners' needs and are not off-putting to either one. As partners learn each other's intimacy preferences, they come up with their own style.

Download chapter one for free at Drkenner.com and amazon.com.