Why Social Anxiety Makes Conversations Feel Exhausting

Added: 2026-05-19

[00:00:00]Social anxiety becomes exhausting when you feel like you have to monitor every word that you say. But, let's try and understand what's actually happening cuz you're not monitoring the conversation, you're actually monitoring yourself. How you sound, how you look, what they are thinking. So, you're running two conversations simultaneously, the one out loud and the one in your head judging it. So, it's no wonder that it's exhausting. You're doing the work twice.

[00:00:20]Socially confident people are not less self-aware, they just have pointed their attention outward, out towards the other person and at the conversation itself, not at their own performance. You think about it logically, curiosity is the off switch for self-conscious. You cannot be genuinely interested in someone and worried about yourself at the same time.

[00:00:38]So, in your next conversation, catch the moment you turn inwards and deliberately redirect it outwards. Ask them something, focus on their answer, not on how you are coming across. The conversation's going to get easier the moment you stop watching it yourself in it. If you'd like to learn some more, follow the link below to my free masterclass.