i used to to do that constantly,in elementary school,middle school and high school while zoning out in class my mind would come up with extensive mental scenarios, about stuff like: what if i did this and then these people thought this and that made this other person think this and on and on and on, or on the flip side of things i would have these mental scenarios where i would be almost certain that these people think this about me and that means that they know this about me, which means that this girl or something would never like me sorta crap. That to me was a big part of my social anxiety: i would make the mistake of automatically assuming that what i thought other people thought of me IS what other people thought of me.
Hahaaaa, oh yes. That last line especially. The difference between imagining something could be true, one among many possibilities, and believing something to be true as the
only possibility can be as thin as a sheet of paper. And then you begin to interpret current events and relationships and reinterpret things in the past in terms of these imaginings. I certainly used to do this, imagine myself into other people's heads and try to see myself through their eyes. What I saw when I did that was always negative, it was a wholly distorted image of myself. I guess it could only be distorted but the more I did this the more distorted my own self-image became, and the more anxious, self-conscious and introverted I got. It was almost a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Something similar to this, or following on from this would be the constant second guessing of myself. Re-dist, I don't know if this is part of what you're driving at but in conversational groups I would feel myself about to say something but would catch it always, starting down a train of thought along the lines of if I say this how might someone interpret it, what might their comeback be, how might I respond to that, what then could happen, how will I look, what will they end up thinking of me, yadda, yadda, ya. This train of thought might last only a fraction of or couple of seconds but it was enough to kill all spontaneity, I was always lagging a little behind, and by the time I did pipe up often it would be just too late, the moment for it had gone. That kinda leads to these tumble-weed moments where there is a pause, the dynamic interrupted, and then things would pick-up again as though I'd not spoken sometimes. Or so it felt to me, though I suspect this again was more in my own head than in actual reality. Nevertheless, after a time I just stopped piping up unless I was on very safe ground with people I was most comfortable with. Some would describe me as a people-watcher, or a good listener, things like that, but in reality it was me keeping silent for fear of making myself look a twat. I don't do this nearly so much anymore. I don't recall making any conscious effort to fix this all that much, maybe I just grew out of it, who knows?
I usually try to take at least 5 to 10 minutes a day to at least *try* to meditate and focus only on my breath and it does seem to help me stay in the present a little bit more and think about the things that really matter rather than the little life that's playing itself out in my head. Other times I just go with the thoughts if they aren't bad ones and can sometimes learn something new about me that I never would have thought of otherwise if I didn't just go with it.
![:\](https://bluelight.org/xf/BL_Images/Orig_Emoji/wrygrin.gif "wry grin :\")
