Fear of saying what you think: causes, effects, and how to manage it

What we say and what we think are never the same. Although we are free to think all we want, we are not so free to say it since the rules social and our own way of understanding what is okay to say and what is not so much acts as a filter, applying the self-censorship.

It is true that saying absolutely everything we think can be dangerous, both for ourselves and for the person with the one we are talking about, since there are things said that can be more poignant than the sharpest of the knives.

However, it is true that our concept of what we should not say is too demanding, preventing us from showing ourselves to others as we really are, it is the fear of saying what you think, a fear that we are going to delve into and see what can be done next.

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What is the fear of saying what you think?

What we say and what we think are not the same. Our mind is a place where freedom of opinion prevails, a kind of mental screen on which we project all kinds of thoughts, opinions, feelings, emotions and beliefs about the things that happen to us in our daily life or related to some significant field of our existence. Our mind is free to think what it wants, even if they are harmful and toxic thoughts in relation to other people.

Nevertheless, not everything that is projected in that cinema of our mind goes outside. What we say and what we think can be compared to an iceberg: the tip, above sea level, is what we say, while the whole psychological process behind, all our cogitations, is the part that lies submerged. And thank goodness that it is submerged because, sometimes, there are things that are better to hide.

We all keep quiet about a lot of things we think about. We have grown up in a socio-cultural environment in which the consensus is established that not everything can be said, more than anything because it can be annoying or even offensive to other people, even if what we have said is honestly and innocent. That is why we censor ourselves on more than one occasion, prioritizing preserving our social relationships rather than not letting off steam by saying everything we think.

Nevertheless, this self-censorship can be so strong, so intense that it really causes us a lot of discomfort. This discomfort is caused by fear of speaking your mind, fear of trusting other thoughts and worldviews that you think might. misunderstand yourself, see yourself as information of little use to others, or even fear that others will take offense or consider you less of a person valid.

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Lack of assertiveness

There can be many causes behind the fear of saying what you think, including a lack of self-esteem and a lack of self-confidence. However, the lack of assertiveness is probably the most influential factor in the appearance of this peculiar fear, having a very strong relationship. The more assertive you are, in principle, the less fear you have to express yourself freely.

We cannot talk about this ability without mentioning the pioneering works of the American psychologist Andrew Salter, who is credited with describing assertiveness in the 1940s and 1960. Salter understood it as the ability to express personal opinions and wishes, that is, to make known what that one feels and thinks, but it also implies defending our rights in a respectful, honest and sincere.

According to what he observed in his research, Salter concluded that practically everyone could be assertive, what really happens is that we do not manifest this ability in all situations. This implies that, in addition to having a certain natural ability to be assertive, those who have rather little can put it into practice, even if you are a very shy person and introverted. There is always the possibility to hone our communication and social skills.

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Why are we afraid to say what we think? Frequent causes

There are several explanations that we can find behind the fear of saying what we think. Among the most common we can highlight the following:

1. Fear of rejection

Many times we keep quiet about things for fear of social rejection. This type of fear is fed by different thoughts and unfounded beliefs such as the fear that, if we say something, others will not They will like us and they will stop interacting with us, they will feel offended or because they will take us for people with strange ideas.

It has been found that this fear of rejection could have a physiological explanation. A study from the University of Michigan found that social rejection causes the human body to create the same chemicals as when it suffers a physical blow. In other words, that others reject us hurts us as much as if they had attacked us.

The problem with this fear of rejection is that it can become so intense that we shut up many things, so many that our internal "I" and the "I" that we expose to others will be very different. We will have opinions, perceptions, feelings and emotions that are genuinely ours, but in order to please others we will expose Some totally different, artificial ones, which despite the fact that we believe that they bring us closer to others, will cause us deep unhappiness.

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2. Thinking that our ideas are not worth much

It often happens that many of the things that we think are given a rather low value. They may be things without much sense, ideas and opinions that are projected in our minds and that we believe do not contribute anything interesting to the outside world, and therefore we do not say them. It may also be because we believe that nothing that comes from us can be important, this being a sign of a lack of self-esteem and little self-confidence.

3. To think that we are going to make a fool of ourselves

Another reason for the fear of saying what you think has to do with the fear of making a fool of yourself. Actually, this perception has an adaptive function, since making sure that we do not say something and screw up can mean avoiding a lot of psychological discomfort, in addition to the potential possibility of saying or doing something that others do not like and that causes us to lose support Social.

Nevertheless, this fear of being ridiculous can become so intense that it prevents us from doing practically anything. We don't want to go through the trouble of suffering, but we think that we can suffer for practically anything we Let's say and do and it is at that point that the fear of making a fool of ourselves acquires a clearly pathological and dysfunctional. It prevents us from being genuine, from showing ourselves how we are and, also, restricts our freedom and the experience of enriching experiences.

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How to overcome this fear?

Although it is a very common fear that we have all experienced and that can be lived so intensely that it even gives the impression that it is insurmountable, the truth is that it can be overcome. As we have commented, assertiveness is a skill that has a lot to do with this fear in particular and that, the more worked and developed it is, the freer we will feel to say everything that we think.

One of the best ways to learn to drive and overcome the fear of speaking your mind is by going to psychotherapy., that place where we will learn communication skills and develop a more functional know-how every time we find ourselves in a social situation. However, also mention some strategies that we can introduce in our daily life to reduce this fear of saying what we think:

1. Practice with controlled situations

If the fear of saying what you think can be worked, what better way than to do it first with situations in which you feel safe? We can discuss our problem with those people with whom we have the most confidence, telling them that we have chosen them to practice our assertiveness.

Thanks to the fact that they are people we trust and that we are sure that they will not judge us for what we are going to say, this is a very good strategy to gradually acquire better communication skills, breaking that transparent but very solid crystal that is the fear of rejection and making a fool of yourself.

2. Write down what you think

It often happens that we are at home alone and we begin to say out loud everything we think. At that moment, it seems that all the ideas, opinions, thoughts in general that are stored deep in our mind come to us. Returning to the metaphor of the iceberg, it is as if this piece of ice being alone was exposed in its entirety above sea level.

However, when we have to face a real social situation, with another person of flesh and blood, even if we want to say everything we want to say, it doesn't come to mind. The ideas begin to lose connection, they intermingle, they appear in a chaotic way and it frustrates us a lot.

To avoid this situation that clearly does not play in our favor, it is recommended that in those moments of fluid soliloquies let's write down everything that comes our way, let's make a scheme.

It is true that it sounds as if we were in high school again, making notes on the syllabus, only that the syllabus is the content of our own mind. By writing down what we think, we will create a very useful cheat sheet that will help us remain calm and consistent the next time we want to be honest.

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3. Work on self-esteem

One of the aspects that can be behind the fear of saying what you think is, clearly, the lack of self-esteem. This problem will not only manifest itself when talking with other people, but it will affect all the aspects that make up our life, which is why it is urgent to improve it.

Self-esteem does not come from nowhere, but is built with facts, with positive aspects that make up our way of being. Nobody is perfect, we all have our weaknesses but also strengths such as being a gifted athlete, a a good student, a great worker... Strengths that we can discover by taking time to reflect and doing a SWOT matrix.

Being aware of all the good that makes up our being, we can increase our self-esteem, making that fear of being ridiculous more realistic and not permeating all the social situations that we imagine could go wrong and, in addition, we will gain confidence in ourselves. All this will increase our assertiveness, feeling more secure and free to say what we did not dare to make known to others.