There is no more fun entertainment than schadenfreude, except for the person being laughed at. Being laughed at is not a pleasant experience, and such an experience can cause some people to develop a fear of being laughed at. This fear can become so extreme that you avoid situations similar to the moment you were laughed at. This is very unfortunate because it limits your freedom of movement.
In order to still be able to go, stand and do what you want, in this blog I will discuss the fear of being laughed at and what you can do about it.
The fear of being laughed at can arise at any time in your life. Major international research shows that this fear does not discriminate by age and can affect people of all age groups.
People with autism disordersdo suffer from this fear of being laughed at more often than those without autism spectrum disorders.
It is therefore important to resist fear when it arises as quickly as possible. This is why I will first discuss this fear in children.
Fear of being laughed at in children
As mentioned, this fear does not discriminate by age. The fear of being laughed at can arise in children just like that, with no apparent cause. Where just a few months ago your child was singing along at the top of their lungs with a fun song to entertain you, suddenly your child is at a standstill at the school performance when singing is required.
This is a reaction to fear. Your child may also run away and, in some cases, your child may fight.
If you ask your child what's wrong they may admit that the fear of being laughed at is the cause. Unfortunately, saying that this fear doesn't make sense doesn't immediately help.
Unfortunately, you cannot make an irrational fear go away just by saying it is an irrational fear, even in children.
Therefore, also acknowledge to your child that you understand his/her fear of being laughed at. Ask your child from a scale of 1 to 10 how great the anxiety level is at such a moment.
"How scared are you when you have to perform for school?"
Next, you can ask why he/she is so afraid.
Also, ask your child what they think will happen if they do something wrong and provide alternative scenarios as well.
"If you forget your lines they are not going to laugh at you, someone who does know the lines is going to tell you what to say and you will still be fine. The teacher and your classmates are actually going to help you. If they start laughing afterwards it is precisely because they are happy that everything will still be all right."
Once you've explained that new scenario, next ask your child how scared they are. It's not that the fear is gone immediately, but perhaps the fear has now gone down a grade.
Afterwards, reward your child for this mental work as well. This is something you also do during cognitive behavioral therapy. In addition, cognitive behavioral therapy helps even more when done under hypnosis, and children are often more sensitive to this than adults.
Fear of being laughed at in adults
Even as an adult, you may suffer from the fear of being laughed at. When you hear someone laughing, you may quickly think they are laughing at you. Chuckling at the coffee machine can already make you suspicious.
As an adult, you cannot always avoid these types of situations. In the case of extreme anxiety, this can cause you to prefer working alone, and this can cause you to have difficulty finding a job that is suitable for it. After all, most professions require working with other people.
Also, the fear of being laughed at can limit your social life. You can misinterpret smiling people, causing blossoming friendships to be cut short too early. It is very unfortunate if this leaves you with a small social circle and suffers from feelings of loneliness.
Test your fear of being laughed at
To check for yourself if you suffer greatly from the fear of being laughed at, it is wise to check for yourself if you recognize yourself in these statements.
- When people around me laugh I get suspicious.
- When strange people laugh in front of me I link it to myself.
- When other people make a funny comment about me I feel paralyzed.
- I believe I am accidentally funny to other people.
- If I feel like I was embarrassed somewhere I won't go there again.
- If someone has teased me, I can't talk to that person normally from then on.
- When I dance I feel uncomfortable because I think people watching will think I look weird.
- When I've made a fool of myself I get all stiff and can't act normally.
If these statements seem familiar to you, it may indicate that you suffer greatly from the fear of being laughed at. It is then wise to do something to overcome that fear so that you can take advantage of more opportunities in life to become happy and successful in the things you care about.
Overcoming fear of being laughed at
To overcome the fear of being laughed at, there are several things you can do. First, if you have friends who you know won't laugh at you, you can start by telling your friends that you have this fear. Perhaps your friends do share that fear but are also ashamed of it so they haven't shared it either.
Just sharing your anxiety with other people can give you a tremendous sense of relief, as you are one step closer to being yourself.
In addition, this treatment is about the same as other anxiety treatments. This mainly means confronting your fear.
List anxiety
You won't be immediately pushed onto a stage to give stand-up comedy. It often starts with making a list.
In this list, write down situations for which you fear being laughed at and then put those situations in order from something that gives you little fear to something that gives you a lot of fear. A hypnotherapist can help you make this list.
Visualize the moment
Then you confront those moments, for example by visualizing such a moment. During such a visualization, you also learn from the hypnotherapist what techniques you can use in such a situation to stay calm and not panic.
After all, those anxious feelings cause you to freeze up at some point and find it difficult to act normal.
By keeping that calm, you can actually continue to act normal in those situations, and the smiles that normally make you suspicious will bother you less.
Find out the cause of anxiety
Finding out the cause of anxiety can also make it easier to overcome it. Sometimes something has happened once in our lives, such as being really laughed at, that makes us fear that it will happen again in the future.
Even though past experience is no guarantee of future experience, it is something we often think.
Only we are not now the people we were then, and we must have had all kinds of thoughts about what we could have done to change the situation.
Through regression therapy , it is possible to look at that moment when the fear arose through a different lens, allowing you to come to new insights and allowing you to suffer less from this fear in the future.
Change your beliefs
In addition, you can also change your beliefs through self-hypnosis. Changing your beliefs primarily means strengthening beliefs that reduce your anxiety, weakening beliefs that reduce your fear of being laughed at. You do this by repeating hypnotic suggestions, among other things.
Because everyone has different beliefs, they are not always the same for everyone, but you can try in the meantime by repeating the following beliefs during self-hypnosis.
When people laugh, it is a sign of pleasure, not gloating.
Strange people don't laugh at me, because their lives don't revolve around me.
Even if someone laughs at me, that says more about them than it does about me.
Are these suggestions not working for you? Then see a hypnotherapist who can give you suggestions that address your specific fear.
Want to learn more about the role of hypnosis for overcoming anxiety? Then check out Hypnosis Institute Netherlands' training courses or come to a seminar or workshop.
Sources:
https://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/20503/how-to-deal-with-young-childs-apparent-fear-of-embarrassment
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20661767
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fulfillment-any-age/201306/afraid-being-laughed-you-re-far-alone
