A thread in one of the many email lists I belong to is about improving social confidence. Here is my response (with the attributions removed from quoted material, see the original posts if you need them).

Ok, I’ve been doing some of the relaxation techniques to increases calmness, but what are some ways to increase social confidence.

Relaxation exercises are excellent . . . not just because they are very helpful as stress reducers but also because through them we can step onto other exercises for confidence building or others (albeit, there are plenty of other ways to handle what you’re after).

I realize that there are two kinds of confidence, the relaxed kind, and forced confidence, where one forces himself to do it, in spite of whatever fears he had.

The latter is not confidence, it’s just kicking yourself in the ass to get the job done because you have to. Confidence is an easy feeling of knowing that you are competent and knowledgeable enough to do the job and do it right and do it well. For confidence to be effective, it needs to be based upon competence. Confidence and competence are congruent. Of course, you probably know plenty of folks who bluster and blather who have confidence without competence, but that’s bravado, not really confidence. They tend to fall on their faces when they actually get called on to do the job. I am assuming you’re more interested in actual confidence based upon a true competence than in bluffing or bullshitting. That is, walking the walk rather than just talking the talk.

I had to read some papers aloud in class in high school, and went through a forced confidence state, very uncomfortable actually.

Now, am I to assume that your primary interest here is in decreasing your communication apprehension (fear of public and private speaking) as those are the examples you’ve given?

If this is the case, then never fear! You’ve already done a lot of good ground work just with learning to relax. I mean really relax.

I first worked with communication apprehension programs back when I was in my first graduate program over twenty years ago. We used a program called autogenic training and desensitization. Now, that’s basically a simple process of teaching folks how to relax. Once you’ve learned to relax, just start imagining times when you would normally be tense socially or in terms of communication and as soon as any uncomfortable feeling starts, just kick in with your relaxation triggers. If you want some simple deep relaxation trigger response conditioning recordings you can play with, I have a number of them at http://www.briandavidphillips.com (if you get a download error or the like, just try again later as my server is one of the worst on the internet . . . we’re hopefully going to have the new one up next month . . . don’t play the files streaming as that ruins the traffic load). I’ve done a lot of study on communication apprehension levels for folks with pre-tests and post-tests learning to relax and via classic desensitization and the results are consistently reliable. The http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HypnosisTechniqueExchange discussion list has some other resources on this as well as other approaches which you may or may not find helpful.

Personally, I like using visualization and appropriate guided imagery as well . . . partly as there’s a lot of strong data showing they are effective for communication apprehension and related issues and partly just because I enjoy them as they’re fun and playful.

Should I force the ball a few times, and after a few times, my comfort levels might increase, or is there another method?

Of course, the more you do a task, the more familiar it is to you and so the less likely you will feel uncomfortable doing it. Familiarity breeds competence and comfort. For most tasks.

If this is not happening, then you may simply not be aware of just how competent or confident you are. Some folks short circuit this process of confidence married to competence. Check and make sure you realize just how much you’ve improved at speaking with others.

If you haven’t taken a good public speaking course, then do so . . . one that includes speechmaking, debate with critical thought, and group discussion as well as interpersonal communication (if you can’t find all of that in one nice neat ball then go for the public speaking and interpersonal theory and practice). If you’re not near a university or college extension program, then read some good textbooks (real textbooks, not fluf pieces that pretend to give you tricks to get by with – you’re not out to get by, you want to truly master this stuff and have true competence without getting a university degree in it).

Also, if I just keep up on the relaxation techniques, will conversation become comfortable over time?

You can do this the slow way or just go ahead and do the changework in one fell swoop.

Here are some other approaches you might want to look at that have worked very very well for a lot of people . . . and I mean a LOT.

Hypnoanalysis . . . if you are near a competent qualified hypnotherapist with some good strong background in regression or parts therapy, then take advantage of it and do it.

Six step reframe . . . yes, it’s old, yes, it’s old hat NLP but it’s an excellent process and works wonderfully for the issues you’re asking about. Through it, find what the secondary gain is for being nervous or lacking confidence and find some creative alternative behaviors that reach the same positive goal without messing up your chances to be social and happy. Basically, this is based upon parts therapy without the need to break things down or use deep trance.

3D Mind . . . Tom Vizzini and Kim McFarland’s excellent process is quick, easy, and painless. Learn it and do it. Don’t over analyze it, just do it. It is a wakeful process which is actually rather playful and fun and rather effective. In addition to as it is written, I’ve used it as a hypnotic process as well for issues similar to what you’re asking about here and it’s worked beautifully.

Anchors and Trigger Responses . . . make it simple or complicated, it’s up to you . . . close your eyes, since you already know how to relax, go ahead and do that and really let yourself go deep . . . now think of a time you were confident and don’t give me any line about never feeling that way as we all have at one time, perhaps when you’ve been talking to friends about something you love and really wanted them to get it, now really feel the feelings as you think about it and touch one of your fingers onto the back of one of your hands or anywhere else you want to touch and tell yourself that as you do that the feeling increases and really make those feelings increase . . . now open your eyes and break the connection . . . close your eyes, stay relaxed, and do the whole thing again but while imagining a different time you’ve been really confident and this time double all the effects . . . repeat five to six or as many times you like but really feel the connection between the confidence and the touch. Finish that all up and test the anchor. I don’t know . . . imagine walking outside starkers naked with a bunch of women standing around looking at you and touch off the anchor and see what happens. Go talk to a stranger and ask for directions and use the anchor and see what happens. Know that each time you use it, the more powerful the effect becomes.

Questions like that.

Remember a couple key things about public speaking . . . it’s NOT a performance act, it’s a communication act. Your job is NOT to “do well” by impressing us on your performance but to do well by communicating the ideas. You communicate comfortably all the time, you talk to your friends, your mates, your family. Every single day, at one time or another, you dispense information. You’re not nervous talking to your mother or telling a friend how to do some simple task so why should you be when speaking in “public” . . . the folks in the audience are not there to judge you or to be entertained, they are there to get information. You have the goods. They need information and you have it. That’s all. Concentrate on the act of communicating what you know to a group of people who want you to share that information with them. Public speakers should put their dancing shoes away before getting on stage, it’s not an act it’s a communication.

I know this hasn’t answered everything you’re asking about . . . only scratched the surface of what I’ve written anyway . . . but it is at least a start. Be a bit more forthcoming about what exactly you’re trying to do and then others may offer up alternatives that will help you.

There are many different takes on this sort of thing and strategies folks can map out for you. The real trick is to choose something and DO it. You don’t change without doing something. If you find something works well, then keep doing it. If it doesn’t then stop doing that and do something ANYTHING else. That’s an old adage for changework and it’s still very very true.

I hope this has been helpful. Please let us know your positive results very soon.