How Not to Use a Bag of Chips

It's not even 5 a.m., and Archie is already awake. He's just one of the estimated 400 million pigeons that exist worldwide, at first glance average, unremarkable. He's about 30 centimeters long, 300 grams heavy, and plump thanks to his species' well-developed pectoral muscles. His plumage is a matt bluish-gray color with two black bars on each of his long wings. His neck is an iridescent mix of green and purple. A pair of bright orange eyes sit in front of his small head, followed by a whitish patch on the ridge of his beak. A long, pointed tail at the back of his body gives him excellent maneuverability in the air. And his skinny short legs with three toes pointing forward and one backward allow him to move around on land effectively. Again, nothing distinguishes Archie from his peers, except for one minor thing: he’s very shy.

He walks the train tracks at this time to avoid contact with the other pigeons. There he is now, moving with his head and eyes fixed in place as his body catches up. Then the head darts forward again, locking onto something new, and his body follows. But that isn't all. When he's at the park, he pretends to be looking for something on the ground or simply stares at anything in the sky, hoping to go unnoticed. And, as for the crumb-rich alley behind the bakery goes, he has chosen to ignore it in favor of the occasional leftovers next to a vending machine he discovered a few kilometers away, all in order to escape from interacting with others. There's a low point in his life that needs to be addressed: the time he purposefully left an empty bag of chips on his head to hide from other pigeons roaming around the dumpster with him.

Of course, there are social circumstances he cannot avoid. This is the case with human weddings, where the abundance of rice makes them particularly difficult to resist for a pigeon attempting to survive in the urban jungle. To avoid drawing attention to himself, Archie is always the first to arrive and the first to leave. When he’s there he often sticks to a "safe pigeon" or ends up playing with the young ones so that the rest don't feel compelled to talk to him. Unfamiliar situations, such as the arrival of new birds to the flock, worsen his shyness because he’s unsure of how to behave, how others will react, or when their attention will be drawn to him.

Archie is in a bit of a predicament, though. He recently learned that the position of Chief Pilot in his flock is up for grabs and wishes to put his name in the hat. He knows he's made for that job: he's quick, actually quicker than the falcons, hawks, and owls that have chased him over the years; he's capable of flying long distances, even to places he's never seen before; he knows how different smells are distributed in the city; he can recognize from above a friendly face from a foe; and most of all, he can guide other pigeons into a tight formation in the air to make it harder for predators to target a single bird. However, being considered for the position requires Archie to draw attention to the value he can provide and ensure that the alpha pigeons recognize it. Not only does he have difficulty identifying his positive characteristics, but he also gets nervous at the possibility of being seen as a braggart.

Shyness is a type of social anxiety. It’s defined by the American Psychological Association as the presence of fearful reactions, excessive self-consciousness, and negative self-evaluation in response to real or imagined social interactions. Studies show that between 30% to 60% of the world's population report experiencing shyness. There’s a distinction between introverts, who don’t fear social interactions, and shy people, who often want to interact with others but are inhibited by their negative self-evaluation and perceived lack of social skills.

Matt Lewis describes in his book Overcome Social Anxiety and Shyness how anxiety can be produced in two different areas of the brain. First, in the amygdala, which reacts to what’s going on in our environment. It’s wired to respond quickly in order to save our lives, so if the amygdala recognizes the information received as dangerous, it acts immediately and activates the emergency arousal system, which includes the fight, flight, or freeze response. The cortex, the second area, produces anxiety based on what we think about. It can exacerbate amygdala anxiety by creating unhelpful and inaccurate reasons for our fearful feelings, or it can initiate unnecessary anxiety on its own, using thoughts and images about potential future scenarios.

Lewis notes that we developed these behaviors early in our evolution as a means of survival. When confronted with strangers in the dangerous environment of the past, our cave ancestors could make one of two mistakes. They could flee, believing others were hostile when they were not, or they could greet them, believing they were friendly when they were not. The first mistake translated into unnecessary anxiety, while the second one resulted in death. In turn, we evolved to make the first type of mistake as often as needed in order to avoid making the second type of mistake only once. Not only that, but we formed a "negativity bias" to keep in mind the risk of making the wrong decision. If we have ten positive social encounters but only one negative one, we will remember the negative more than the positive ones.

This also explains why over millennia, our reservations about other people have pushed us to develop a plethora of anxiety-inducing thinking styles. Martin Antony and Richard Swinson present several ways we have maladapted in The Shyness and Social Anxiety Workbook, of which I highlight five. First, probability overestimation implies a prediction that a person believes is likely to come true despite the fact that the actual likelihood is low ("Everyone at the party will think I'm stupid"). Second, mind reading entails making negative assumptions about what other people are thinking about us ("When people look at me, they think I'm weird"). Third, catastrophic thinking is the tendency to believe that a negative event would be terrible and unmanageable ("It will be a disaster to lose my train of thought during the presentation"). Fourth, personalization is the tendency to take more responsibility for a negative situation than we should, rather than acknowledging all of the different factors that may have contributed to it ("The relationship ended because I'm so boring"). Finally, negative core beliefs are deep, long-held opinions and assumptions that color how we perceive things in different situations ("I'm incompetent").

While it's natural to feel nervous in some social situations, shyness and social anxiety can become serious issues if not addressed. According to the Mayo Clinic, fear, stress, and unease in social anxiety disorder translate into avoidance, which can disrupt our relationships, daily routines, work, school, and other activities. It can manifest as difficulty asserting oneself, negative self-talk, hypersensitivity to criticism, isolation, and substance abuse, among other things. Furthermore, excessive shyness can stifle self-promotion, or the enhancement of oneself by emphasizing our strengths and talents, as well as foster self-deprecation, which reflects being incompetent and insecure. According to the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, shyness is negatively correlated with self-promotion, which means that when one increases, the other decreases. It’s also positively associated with self-deprecation, implying that the two variables move in the same direction.

Sean Cooper writes in The Shyness and Social Anxiety System that shyness and social anxiety are behavioral strategies we've developed to gain approval from others. What we may not realize is that we only care about the approval of people we believe are more valuable or superior to us. The value is entirely in our heads. We only see some people as more valuable than others because we have mental rules that determine whether someone is valuable or not. Along with overvaluing others, we also tend to undervalue ourselves. Again, it's all in our heads; we don't believe we meet other people's standards for being valuable individuals. Constantly striving to meet all of those people's expectations in order for them to accept us makes us reliant on their approval in order to feel good about ourselves.

Cooper emphasizes that we overcome social anxiety by prioritizing our own opinion of ourselves over the opinions of others. We must stop comparing ourselves to "their" standards. "They" are not us, we're unique. He suggests that we first stop forcing ourselves to perform. We don't have to prove ourselves to anyone. We should also stop looking to others to tell us what’s the right way to live. There’s no "right" way other than the one that each individual defines for themselves. Furthermore, we should stop feeling guilty or ashamed about our natural tendencies or desires. Finally, we must stop judging ourselves and others in any way. Nobody is superior or inferior; we are simply who we are.

Assume we've improved our self-esteem and are now ready to face the world. How can we enhance our self-promotion skills so that we can communicate our true worth? The Harvard Business Review and Forbes suggest five key strategies. First, share when asked. Allow the questions to arise naturally and capitalize on opportunities to highlight our successes. Second, prepare an elevator pitch. A brief and powerful description of our key characteristics can have a significant impact on others. Third, strike a balance between emphasizing our desirable and undesirable characteristics. When we point out a minor flaw in an otherwise positive description, others' interest in us grows. Fourth, add value to the lives of others. We should use our expertise to help others while also establishing a notable reputation. Finally, find a promoter. Peers, bosses, and mentors who are willing to speak up on our behalf are perceived as less self-serving and thus provide an aura of objectivity.

Despite the fact that it's not even 5 a.m., Archie is awake once more. This time, however, it's not shyness that has him wandering around the train tracks by himself. Archie, the flock's new Chief Pilot, is preparing to lead his fellow pigeons to safe grounds. He has developed self-confidence by recognizing his uniqueness, understanding that no one is superior or inferior to anyone else, and prioritizing his own opinion of himself. He now avoids trying to control other pigeons' reactions, feeling forced to prove anything to anyone, and being ashamed of his personality. Finally, he speaks openly about the many ways in which he adds value, balances them with an objective view of traits he needs to improve, and interacts with other pigeons that help him build a strong reputation. Long gone are the days when he would hide under a bag of chips. Today, he holds his head up high as he takes off into the sunrise.

Author: Esteban Polidura, CFA. March 11, 2023.

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