As soon as I picked up my cell phone and made a phone call, I suddenly felt as if I didn't know how to chat with others, and I suddenly felt a sense of fear in my mind. My heart beat faster and I was at a loss.
Usually, this kind of person will put it off again and again before calling others, and will not pick up the phone and dial it until it is absolutely necessary; Even at the stage of entering the phone number, I still have to call repeatedly, which makes me nervous and leads to unclear speech.
This is phone phobia, which is essentially a social obstacle.
Our brains evolved into this way for face-to-face communication. It has inherent advantages in dealing with all kinds of information in the environment. When we come into contact with someone, our brain will automatically receive and interpret thousands of messages in real time. And this information will give us some judgments and provide basis and guidance for our next action.
For example, your clothes, your expression, your personal status and so on. , are the sources of information we receive. When these information sources suddenly disappear and our brain can't receive any feedback from them, it will fall into a state of "paralysis" or "short circuit".
When this state is not improved for a long time, it suddenly makes you enter a social environment. Even in a small social environment like phone calls, your brain doesn't know how to find information, use information and process it. People will have fear and anxiety about the unknown, so telephone phobia is born.
Therefore, this fear can be divided into three ways to stimulate.
Human memory is closely related to the emotional circuit of our brain. Thinking of happy things will activate the happy emotional circuit; Thinking of sad things can also activate negative emotional circuits.
If we have tried to get traumatic psychology before and left a bad memory on the mobile phone, then every time you touch the mobile phone, the corresponding neural circuits in your brain will activate the related bad emotions. And this emotion is naturally fear.
In fact, this "psychological trauma" is nothing new. As the saying goes, "Once bitten, twice shy", that's what I said.
Think about it, now that you have phone phobia, is it because traumatic psychology has deepened your "paralysis" of the brain?
After all, you're not sure if you'll get the same blow next time you call.
As I said before, anyone who stands in front of us and starts to speak, our brain immediately receives thousands of messages and then reaches its own interpretation.
But the biggest difference between telephone communication and face-to-face chat is that telephone communication is a kind of "single information transmission" with very few information sources. It is difficult for us to get other information to help us communicate except sound.
However, this sound information source was not obtained by us, but was transmitted to us by others in one direction. I don't know what the other person is in now, especially the unfamiliar person, his personality, personality, speaking habits and so on. We can't synthesize this information to make our own judgment.
When we hear someone else's tone fidgety, we will worry, are we disturbing each other? But in fact, maybe the other party has just dealt with some troubles, and it is only natural that you just called and received the voice message from the other party. However, this kind of sound information will still have an impact on our psychology.
Without other sufficient sources of information, it is difficult for us to rationally grasp the judgment of the communication environment; Therefore, we can't make reasonable chat strategies and behavior choices according to the real situation.
Without a sense of security in the communication environment, we will naturally feel afraid, just like we are in a strange situation. And making a phone call is just a microcosm of this psychology.
People who are timid, shy, inferior and introverted are generally more likely to suffer from phone phobia. For these people, any form of social interaction will put pressure on them. Calling is one of them, and it is natural to be afraid.
People who have social barriers at ordinary times often have a negative mentality and have strong negative psychological hints. This kind of psychological suggestion will in turn aggravate their phone phobia and lead to greater anxiety.
However, people who suffer from phone phobia for this reason will overcome phone phobia more easily than those who are caused by other reasons, once they overcome their personality problems, dare to socialize and boldly walk into the crowd.
If you think you are afraid of making phone calls, maybe you will be afraid of any social form. At this time, don't focus on overcoming phone phobia, but think about how to strengthen your psychological resilience.
No matter what causes you to suffer from social phobia, improving your social skills is king.
Because our brain evolved for face-to-face communication, we must consciously exercise our brain's ability to obtain and use information through calling in order to think about the characteristics of human functions.
Many people don't know what to do in some social situations because they lack a set of rules to deal with these situations. Just like we haven't learned to drive yet, sitting in the driver's seat and starting the car will make us feel nervous. When we know how to do it, we can effectively alleviate this psychological anxiety.
How to do it specifically?
Because when you call someone, you don't know what the other person is saying, so some polite social conventions must be learned.
Many people who do insurance don't know where to find my phone number, and then call me to ask if I want to buy insurance or something. I usually deal with it patiently when circumstances permit. But I tried several times, and all these insurers called me while I was driving. Of course, they didn't know I was driving; And the caller ID didn't tell me that the caller was an insured person, so I had to answer it.
The problem is that as soon as I answered the phone, they began to tell me how affordable and preferential their company's insurance was. At this time, I don't usually listen to what they say. After all, I am driving. I won't hang up directly, after all, it's impolite of me to do so.
When they finish talking and finally start talking to me, I will say, "I'm sorry, I didn't listen to a word you just said, because I'm driving now." I think the sales effect will be better if I can find out if the other party is free when I call next time. "Then he replied to me, I'm sorry to bother you, and I hung up.
I know it's not easy for them to do this job, and they try to be considerate, but it's easy to arouse each other's disgust. Because they ignore some polite social behaviors.
Whether I call a friend or a friend calls me, the first thing we say is, "Are you free now? I want to talk to you about something. Therefore, it is also a polite request to determine the other person's status and get social information to help the conversation.
Whenever you call someone, be sure to ask about their status. Now he can't talk. If the other party is not sure how long you want to talk, you should say "I won't take up your long time, just a few minutes" to ease their defensive mentality and give them a time-saving mentality.
Many people have these problems when chatting with others online. To be polite, they usually say "Are you there" and "Are you free" and then leave. This is a very bad start. Because telephone conversation is instant feedback, it is a way to get information suitable for the current situation of the other party by asking if the other party is free to chat. Chatting online is a kind of delayed feedback to some extent, and others can open the information box later to get your information.
To this end, you should express the purpose of your conversation in more detail than calling. After expressing politeness, you should immediately tell the other party why you are looking for you, so that the other party can know about you as soon as they open the information box.
Otherwise, after answering "I'm here" and "I'm free", you have to wait until you see the reply before you continue to say the next sentence, so that you can understand the purpose of your conversation with him, which will waste the other person's time. After expressing the courtesy you should have, you will get to the point.
Only by learning the correct polite social practices can you get relevant information and create opportunities for conversation. When you can do this, then when you make a phone call, it will be "well known" and you won't step on the other party's minefield; Even if the other person is not satisfied, it is not your problem.
Talk to others when they are free, and make an appointment to talk next time when they are not. Generous and natural, what is there to be afraid of?
Another ability of telephone chat is that you should know how to take corresponding behavior strategies according to the voice information of the other party.
Sometimes when you call a person, although the other person can chat happily with you at this moment, it is very likely that something will suddenly catch his attention at the next moment, perhaps in the other person's life.
At this time, the tone of the other person may not be so smooth, and the chat is not so focused. According to these voice messages, you should know how to adopt corresponding behavior strategies to solve this problem, such as asking the other party if they are busy. If the other party says yes, then end the conversation quickly and talk to you next time.
This is also the polite social practice mentioned above.
Sometimes I feel nervous when chatting with others on the phone, just because I don't know what to do, I can finish this phone conversation well. You will worry, what if you say something bad and do something wrong, causing the other person's unhappiness?
In fact, if you know how to recognize the voice message transmitted by the other party during the chat, and then deal with it according to polite social conventions, you can solve this bad situation in advance.
Therefore, it also requires you to be generous and polite when chatting with each other. If you chat with the other person in a fierce and irritable tone, the other person will definitely not want to continue chatting with you.
If you can skillfully identify these matters needing attention and know how to deal with them with corresponding strategies, then your chat can be targeted and easily dealt with.
Just like you have skilled driving skills, even if you suddenly encounter pedestrians rushing off the road or other vehicles forcing traffic jams and changing lanes at will, you can cope with these unexpected situations calmly.
As the saying goes, "an artist is bold". The reason why you have phone phobia is partly because your phone social skills are not high enough.
Of course, if you want to be "bold", you must have a learning process to master these telephone social skills and overcome social phobia, just like mastering other skills.
Exercise from life is the best way.
The problem is that many people don't have so many opportunities to make phone calls now. How can they exercise this ability? It's simple. Just call the artificial hotline 10086 and ask them questions.
Maybe you have questions about the usage of mobile phone traffic, maybe you want to know the cost of various broadband services, or you want to apply for some telephone packages but don't know what your options are. Call the operator for whatever reason and talk to him. Use this channel to exercise your conversation skills and get familiar with the feeling of making a phone call.
The advantage of calling the telephone operator is that the other party will definitely not have any negative emotions and attitudes towards you. After all, this is their job. In this process, you can not only learn the voice information of the other party, but also try to solve the problem of silence in the conversation.
Even if you are nervous enough to speak haltingly and intermittently, you can strengthen your psychological quality in this way. As long as you consciously exercise yourself from this channel, your phone phobia will be gradually overcome during this period.
Of course, this is just one of the ways to exercise yourself, rather than harassing others and wasting social resources.
So when you have a general understanding and feeling of telephone chat and feel that you can challenge other situations, then at this time, you need to change your exercise style.
But in any case, in essence, you will eventually return to the improvement of social skills. If you don't know how to chat, how to answer the phone and how to deal with silence, calling will only amplify your problems.
On the contrary, if your usual social skills have reached a certain level, then the problems mentioned above can be easily solved, and you can overcome this phone phobia with a little effort.
So, don't neglect to improve your social skills. As you become more proficient in this ability, your fears will certainly decrease. I believe that maybe one day, your phone phobia will disappear unconsciously.