Overcoming Fear of Disapproval

Fear of disapproval or negative evaluation by others underlies much social anxiety or reluctance to speak up. It is a condition that delimits initiative and exacts a heavy cost for quality of life. Perhaps the worst result is that it leads to self abdication or the surrendering of important needs and wants for the sake of safety and hiding out.

People with social anxiety have a chronic fear of being judged by others and this fear may interfere with work, school or other activities.

One of the main treatments now in vogue is cognitive-behavioral therapy. This approach has two components. The cognitive element helps people change thinking patterns that prevent them from overcoming their fears. One common belief, for example, is that others are harshly judgmental towards one’s behavior; this belief must be changed in order for fruitful relationships to be established.

The second behavioral element seeks to help people become more at ease in frightening situations. To do this, progressive desensitization techniques are used to bring about a gradual diminution of anxiety and better coping skills.

I am especially impressed with the approach that focuses on building up self trust as an antidote to fear of disapproval. (See Susan Jeffers, http://www.susanjeffers.com/home/index.cfm.) Self trust can be gained by caring for one’s body, ideas and relationships. And this is achieved in turn by accomplishing personal goals, obeying one’s own moral rules and living up to one’s ideals.
Akrasia is the name Aristotle gave to his challenge, now more familiarly known as procrastination.  It is that condition of character where one knows what should be done but is unable to do it. It is also known as lack of willpower or weakness.

The problem with akrasia is that it is irremediable. As  Alfred Mele said in his book, Irrationality: An Essye On Akrasia, Self Deception and Self Control, New York, Oxford University Press, 1987:

“Few writers have been able to tackle it. That which we cannot cure, we do not tackle. We must simply face the fact that weakness of the will is a member of that huge class of contradictions, hesitations, vacillations, incoherence’s, and absurdities of very kind which composes a large part of our practical life

     We may aspire to moral dominion over ourselves but our being human and not saintly, corporeal and not angelic, naturally flawed and not naturally perfect damns us to the ever present possibility of that unbridgeable gap  between our ability to deliberate and discover or calculate and conclude what we ought to do and what we actually do.”

Assuming one has the wherewithal to overcome one’s own disinclinations, the self-strengthening that result from these practices does wonders for reducing fears of how one is perceived by others.