Have you ever been tongue tied at the thought of approaching an attractive woman and introducing yourself? What about feeling awkward and out of place at business or social gatherings? How about hesitating to raise your hand in class or pick up the phone to make a sales call?

Before we go any farther. Stop! Think for a moment about the cost of this shyness crap in your life. Seriously. What’s it costing you?

• Imagine what it would be like to be able to approach any woman, any time and engage her in a relaxed funny, sexy, playful conversation that you both enjoy.
• Imagine being able to speak up for your own needs and desires and getting them.
• Imagine walking into a business networking meeting and people glowingly referring you to people who need and want your services.
• Imagine people seeking you out for advice and guidance regarding the product or service you offer…
• Imagine in a meeting or in a class raising your hand with a key question or comment that makes it easier for the trainer or teacher to teach and for the other students to understand…
• Imagine offering an idea that ends up saving your company thousands of dollars…
• Had an idea that you hesitated to share with your boss or colleagues.You might think you’re shy.

All well and good but first… that…. thing that….stops you from… taking the risk….

…Shyness. (It really does suck, doesn’t it?)

How To Stop Being Shy In Four Steps:

1. Realize you created it. Since you created it. You can change it.

Shyness is not a thing. It is something you do. It’s a process. It’s a habit. It’s a learned behavior. It is not a lifetime sentence. It is not genetic. It is not a disease, even though the shrinks love to “diagnose” it and call it “Social Anxiety Disorder”. At some point in your childhood you decided to be shy. You created it because it solved some problems and seemed to keep you out of bad feelings. Again, if you created it (and you really did, didn’t you?) you can change it.

2. Discover Your “Program” – Uncover your Unconscious process of “doing” shyness.

How do you do it? I get my clients to teach me how they do their problem. They don’t realize there are a set pattern of steps they go through to get that certain feeling. What triggers it? What do you do first? What do you do next? What comes after that? We care less about “why” you do it and more about “how”. Keep going through each step until you get to how you end the “program.” At some point you stop it don’t you? Write it out as if you are leaving instructions for your temporary worker to come in and do it for you so you can forget about the problem. What has to happen for you to start to not feel totally comfortable and confident? What’s the first thing? Do you see something or someone? What? Do you say something to yourself? What? Whose voice is it? Do you get a feeling in your body? Where? Does the feeling move? Does it have a shape? Does it have a color, a texture? Density? Write all this down so you can see it in black and white.

3. Jam Your “Program” – At any point if you change a significant element of how you do your “shyness program”, it will cause the program to jam.

For example let’s say in the past you’d see a hot babe and say to yourself. “oh my god she’s so hot… I’ll never be able to get a woman like that” in that sad hopeless wimpy little voice you hear in your head. Next you’d feel a sinking feeling in your stomach that was the size of a grapefruit with the density of a bowling ball.To Jam it you could do this instead: “Oh my gawd she’s so HOT! “ with An exaggerated lip licking smirk and then a playfully predatory “YUUUUUM!” And then shrink down the grapefruit sized feeling to a wiffle ball and push it out 3 feet in front of your body and smack that old crappy feeling with a baseball bat out of the park.Again for the sake of this example, I don’t know what you do specifically. But you know don’t you? Walk yourself through it and write it down. Then mess with it. Play with it. Run it backwards. Scramble it. Do the picture first and then the voice. Try different voices. Mickey Mouse, the Jolly green giant. Some really sexy babe. Repeat as needed.

4. Change your beliefs.

You probably believe you’re shy. How do you know? How do you know you’re not just pretending to be shy in order to get out of having to be successful in all areas of your life? I spend a lot more time on this in my Modern Jedi NLP Training but here’s the least you need to know.

• Beliefs filter our reality. What you believe becomes so. Change the belief. Change your reality. We represent our beliefs to ourselves internally through the pictures, self talk and feelings we run. For example, I hold my “true” beliefs directly in front of me on my mental screen. My old beliefs are down and to my left and slightly behind me. Beliefs I want to be true but don’t quite feel true yet are up and to my left.
• Here’s how to change a belief. When I first stopped being shy. I noticed that the belief that I was shy was right smack in front of me. The belief that I wanted to have, namely that I was the guy with charisma and confidence in any social situation, the guy who could strike up a conversation anywhere at anytime with the most powerful CEO or the most Babe-A-Licious hottie was up and to my left. When I took the shyness belief and slammed it down and left and a bit behind me (to my old beliefs) and powerfully pulled in the desired belief into the very center of my mental screen making it bigger and brighter, I suddenly felt different. Shyness gone. Poof! Holy crap!
• Results you can notice immediately. It totally changed my experience. Ten minutes later I found myself chatting with a gorgeous hottie as we both got our UPS delivery in the lobby of my apartment building. I did have to practice this occasionally. But so what? What was so cool about this was that I wasn’t “forcing” myself to talk with her. It was suddenly the most natural and comfortable thing to do. Want some?When you think of a belief that’s true for you notice where on your internal screen it shows up. Typically your limiting belief “I’m shy” will show up in your “true” spot.
• When you think of a belief about yourself that’s no longer true, (like you are no longer 12) notice where on your mental screen that shows up.
• Think about a belief you would like to have. Notice where that one shows up.
• Now move the  crappy belief about being shy to your old beliefs spot. Slam your desired belief about being charismatic and totally confident and comfortable in social situations into the place you hold your true beliefs.
• How does that feel?

It’s like reprogramming the VCR.

What has shyness prevented you from doing?

About the Author: Mark Shepard, NLPT is a Master Practitioner and Trainer of NLP, Hypnosis & Time Line Therapy. Read his blog: Modernjedi.com