When you feel anxious, your mind is besieged with constant worry and you have the overriding belief that you’re not good enough to handle the situation or event you are faced with. Imagine a pair of old-fashioned scales with the balance firmly weighed against you. 

Social anxiety can be a powerful inhibitor. Before an event, you imagine the worst-case scenarios and convince yourself that it will be a disaster. During the event, you imagine all the negative judgments that are being made about you, and afterwards you ruminate about how terrible you were. Then you start worrying about a future event. This is a dreadful downward spiral to be caught up in. Anxiousness can lead to panic attacks that make you feel helpless and scared.

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These are some of the symptoms you may experience because of anxiety :

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• You feel tense, your muscles are constantly contracted

• You believe that everyone else is better than you

• You lack confidence and feel anxious in social situations

• Your sleep is affected - you find it difficult to get to sleep or you wake up at night and can’t get back to sleep

• Your mind goes blank at key moments and you find it difficult to concentrate

• You feel overwhelmed and find it difficult to cope

• You engage in negative, self-critical  thinking and believe that people are judging you

• Your heart races, you can feel your breathing is shallow and short

• You have panic attacks leaving you frightened and helpless