I assume the problem exists only when you are in the presence of or interacting with other people. Your thinking isn't distorted when you're working on some prolbem or thinking about some issue when you are by yourself. Am I right? if so, what you are suffering from is something psychologists call Social Anxiety, which is a direct result of low feelings of self-esteem. Deep (or maybe not-so-deep) down you just don't feel that you or what you think or have to say aren't "good enough." Which is of course untrue, but you learned it ad now you have to unlearn it. In the meantime, you believe you simgply don't deserve other people's acceptance. Read the following and see if it in any way describes you:
ACCEPTANCE is a personality condition in whose pursuit a great many people are compelled to invest enormous amounts of time and effort. Sadly, the need for such efforts is an illusory one, premised on an unconscious conviction — acquired very early in life and thereafter remaining unchanged despite one’s chronological growth, unchanged and highly resistant to dismissal — that we are viewed by others as undeserving of permission simply to be.
Unfortunately, and in many cases tragically, the need for acceptance can be a lifelong struggle. What’s been said about it so far ¾first, its unconscious nature, second, its formation and immobility at the most tender of ages — suggest virtual invulerability to dismissal. Unless it can be dismissed, however, the lives of persons afflicted with it can and too-often are blighted beyond measure, forever to be denied the securitythe unafflicted take for granted.
And why, really, should that be? Why is it even open to question, that without repeated assurance of the good opinion of "others" ¾ and not only significant others ¾ one does not have the right just to be. This has nothing to do with guilt: nothing remotely classifiable as evil or the bringing of harm has been committed. And yet, absent acceptance, a firm sense of worth (necessarily only temporary, needing constantly to be renewed) cannot exist.
Quite the opposite: the harm has been done not by the child but rather to him or her. And, except in the most extreme cases quite unintentionally.
Think about that. It's very common and you're by no means alone. You may, however, have to undergo treatment: COGNITIVE THERAPY, which you can learn about on Google. Over time, it's replaced the lengthy and expensive other forms of psychotherapy and is pretty widely accepted for cases like your own. Don't get caught up thinking about brain tumors, Alzheaimer's and various physical afflictions, whose symptoms occur all the time, not just when interating with people. Check out the name Aaron Beck (University of Pennsylvania) who came up with that treatment years ago. It really does work and is appropriate for just this kind of problem. Good luck!
?
