People who fear going out to eat are more common than you think. Maybe you are one of them. After all, in our society eating in restaurants is considered a basic social activity. Eating together is the glue that holds us together. In some ways, we are no different from the old English kings described in the epic poem Beowulf. By inviting people to eat with us, we show them that we are “allies”. Most of our rules of etiquette concern how we should act when dining with other people. Restaurants can be arenas of competition and judgment, where friendships and business deals are made and broken. Not surprisingly, eating with other people or in a public place can cause some people to panic. The fear of eating out is a common social phobia. Help, however, is out there.
when you might have a problem
How do you know if the discomfort you experience while dining in a restaurant is “normal” social anxiety related, most likely, to the particulars of your social situation, as opposed to a crippling lifelong phobia of eating in public? Here are some possible signs that you have a specific problem with restaurants that needs to be addressed quickly.
When you are in a restaurant or cafe, do you feel that other customers look at you with disapproval from the moment you walk in the door, even though you are dressed appropriately for the restaurant and know you have done nothing wrong? Do you spend hours getting ready before going to social events in restaurants, perhaps taking so long that you missed the event? Are you unable to enjoy your food in restaurants, no matter how exquisitely prepared it is? When you’re sitting in a restaurant, do you find yourself counting down the seconds until you think it’s appropriate for you to leave? These are the signs of a crippling phobia. If you want to function normally in society, it is a phobia that you will need to resolve immediately.
Traditional therapy may not help
Since the time of Sigmund Freud, the standard way of treating anxieties and phobias of all kinds has been through intensive and ongoing therapy sessions. Whether the therapist relies on dream analysis or just talking to you, all of these treatments have one thing in common: they can take years. Traditional therapists hope to treat phobias by uncovering their secret, deep-seated and often unconscious causes over the course of years of conversation. Unfortunately, the causes of “restaurant phobia” are often complicated and multifaceted. There is usually more than one reason why people are afraid of eating in public, and each person’s case is different. Traditional therapies can take years, and that could be too long.
NLP and hypnotherapy work in the present
NLP and hypnotherapy are techniques that are likely to heal or lessen your fears faster than traditional therapy. NLP practitioners don’t care why you can’t be in restaurants. All these trained people do is walk you step by step through your reaction to being in a restaurant in a guided and controlled clinical environment. You will be trained to consciously recognize your mind’s unconscious and overlooked terror reactions. Then, they will train you to make that terror disappear, to turn it into joy, calm and tranquility. With NLP, chances are you’ll never be afraid to eat out again.