On Writing and Social Anxiety
On navigating the shyness that makes the business side of writing intimidating
On Black Friday a few years ago, my editors sent me to a Tesla showroom to interview people interested in buying the then newly-released Cybertruck. I didn’t cover Tesla, but I happened to be in San Diego for Thanksgiving and the mall nearby was one of few places that had a model of the truck on view.
I asked my boyfriend, Luke, to come along for moral support, unsure of what to expect from a room full of Elon Musk fans. After we stared in awe at the colossal vehicle before us—I asked Luke if he was sure it would be allowed on the road—I walked to the far wall of the room to take a few deep breaths. This kind of man-on-the street reporting makes my hands clammy and my heart race.
While I stood in the corner, trying to work up the courage to talk to someone, I watched Luke smoothly initiate conversations with about five people. Twenty minutes later, I finally approached a friendly-looking middle aged white man in a puffer vest and, sounding meek, asked him what he thought about the truck.
“I’m on the waitlist,” he told me. “I have two other Tesla’s at home in the Bay Area, and we’re hoping to add a third.”
I’d hit the reporting jackpot. Without trying very hard, I had the material I needed for the story. But as Luke and I sat in our Uber back from the mall—an electric blue Tesla Model S no less—my hands remained shaky from nervousness and I couldn’t stop wondering whether I was cut out for that kind of reporting. I never felt the rush my colleagues described when finding the perfect source for a story, perhaps because the stress of approaching strangers overcame any other emotion.
For as long as I can remember, shyness has dictated how I exist in the world. I didn’t answer the home phone until age twelve, and I probably wouldn’t have ordered food for myself at a restaurant until high school if my parents hadn’t pushed me to. At networking events and cocktail hours, I wait in the corner until I can work up the courage to start a conversation with other shy people who appear to be alone. While I can be the chattiest person in a room full of people I know, I retreat among unfamiliar faces.
Maybe these qualities are what attracted me to writing from such a young age; I find it easier to communicate with strangers across the screen or the page. But I’ve learned over the years that no matter what kind of writing I do—journalism, personal essay, copywriting—I won’t succeed unless I force myself out of my comfort zone. As a freelancer, that’s more true than ever. I regularly cold email editors and writers, pitch very personal essays to people I’ve never met before, and interview sources for stories.
I can’t totally erase my social anxiety. Instead, I’m learning to lean into things that are on the edge of my comfort zone but not so anxiety-inducing that I lose sleep. I get a little nervous, for example, when I reach out to writers to interview for this newsletter, but talking to them energizes me, too. Showing up to a “networking” event at a bar full of dozens of people I don’t know, on the other hand, isn’t usually worth my time because I spend so much of the night fighting my anxiety. And while I’m happy to interview new people about topics I care about deeply, I’ll pass on any future Tesla assignments.
Good Content
Talk Easy has long been my favorite podcast. The recent episode with Jelani Cobb spoke to my journalism brain, while the one with Ocean Vuong had me thinking about the kinds of stories—fiction and nonfiction—that need telling.
I picked up Ann Patchett’s Truth and Beauty from the library last month and devoured it within three days. It’s about Patchett’s friendship with the poet Lucy Grealy, who wrote Autobiography of a Face. It’s about female friendship, beauty, grief, and the rigor involved in becoming a published writer. Can’t recommend it enough.
If you’re looking for a central resource for finding literary events around NYC, Reading the City is where it’s at. Gone are the days of individually checking individual bookstore websites to find which authors are coming to town next.
Thank you for reading! I’ll be back in a few weeks with an exciting guest for Writing Practice.