Dancing is my relaxation. Not for the body, but for the mind. When I dance, I don’t think about work or writing or how embarrassed I feel about something I said or did.
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Author: Miriam Drori
Author, editor, attempter of this thing called life. Social anxiety warrior. Re-Connections, a collection of short stories, published with Ocelot Press, 15/10/2025.
It’s easy to be critical. Other people often don’t behave the way you would, so you criticise them. But do you really understand? Do you know all the reasons why they acted as they did? Or the reasons why they didn’t act?
People who suffer from social anxiety worry about what others think of their behaviour. The worry itself causes them to act differently from the way you might expect, or not to act at all. So…
Don’t be quick to criticise others. You don’t always know what lies behind their behaviour.
The comment box is at the top.
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A to Z Challenge: B is for Bullying
Just a question today.
In the dark, distant days of yore when I was at school, teachers didn’t really have the skills to deal with bullying. They hadn’t been taught this, and presumably what seems obvious to me wasn’t obvious to them. For them, as long as violence wasn’t involved, what happened between the children was none of their business.
Nowadays, things are different. Bullying is discussed as part of their syllabus. Schools have bullying policies.
So why is bullying still rampant in schools?
BULLYING
Just a question today.
In the dark, distant days of yore when I was at school, teachers didn’t really have the skills to deal with bullying. They hadn’t been taught this, and presumably what seems obvious to me wasn’t obvious to them. For them, as long as violence wasn’t involved, what happened between the children was none of their business.
Nowadays, things are different. Bullying is discussed as part of their syllabus. Schools have “bullying policies”.
So why is bullying still rampant in schools?
Heh heh, fooled you!
A is for ANXIETY.
What else could it be in a blog that’s devoted to writing and social anxiety?
I’m repeating this, for anyone who hasn’t read it before:
Social anxiety (SA) is a fear of people and especially of what those people think of the sufferer. I’ve seen SA defined as extreme shyness. While this is probably true for most sufferers, it doesn’t apply to everyone.
The origin of SA is a mixture of nature and nurture. Two people can go through the same experiences and only one will get it. Two people can start off with the same characteristics and only one will get it.
I’ll write more about social anxiety during this A to Z month. Do come back and read about that and other things.
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Interwoven Threads
I love it when the two themes of this blog come together, as they do in this flash story by Tania Hershman. Have a read. It’s short and thought-provoking – just as it should be.
And remember I’ll be posting every day in April.
Woopee!
2day is this blog’s 2nd birthday and I’m wearing a 2–2 for the occasion.
Sorry there’s no party 2day, but don’t forget to come back for my April showers, starting on April Fool’s Day.
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I know, I know
I haven’t blogged much recently. Someone even asked if I was OK.
In case you were wondering, yes I’m OK. Sometimes I’m saddened by things I see online – things I would never have seen in the old days. But generally I’m OK and saving up my blogging energy for April when I plan to blog every day as part of the A to Z Challenge.
In the meantime, I suggest you listen to this BBC play, which goes a long way to showing what social anxiety is like. It’s a difficult topic to tackle, as I’ve found in my writing, and I think this play is quite successful.
Hurry up – it’s available for only three days.
(Thank you, Annette, for drawing my attention to the play.)
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April Showers
So during the month of April, I’m going to shower you with posts.
Each day, I’m going to post about a topic that starts with the next letter of the alphabet. Then I’m going to check out the other blogs doing the same thing.
It’s called the A to Z Challenge and I read about it here. Thanks, Karen!
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Don’t know much about
life.
Sorry – there would have been a post before now, but the post I nearly finished writing was triggered by an incident that turned out differently from the way I was expecting.
What do I know of life? I’ve spent too much time avoiding it.
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Two Rivers
A river of stones and a river of tears. Unconnected, or are they?
***
During the month of January, I wrote a small stone every day as part of the River of Stones project. I tried to take notice of details, using all my senses. I think I still have a lot to learn about writing descriptions. Then my mother died and I found it hard to notice the little things amongst all the big things.
I decided my small stones weren’t good enough to submit to the forthcoming anthology and didn’t send any. But then I commented on Cathy Walter’s excellent post about the project and the anthology, and she persuaded me to submit. So Fiona and Kaspa are going to include half of the small stone I posted on 7th January in the anthology. I’m pleased.
Do look at Cathy’s post for more information on the whole project and the anthology in particular.
***
The other river is the one that flowed from my eyes this morning, while I finished reading Sotah by Naomi Ragen. I don’t know if everyone would be so moved by it. It tells the story of a girl trapped in what appears to outsiders as a very oppressive society. It’s a society I don’t know so much about, but one that isn’t completely alien to me.
But really, the novel is about the girl coming to terms with the realisation that the world isn’t perfect, not even the part of the world that she has been taught to believe is perfect.
I think I could find little flaws in this novel if I wanted to. But I don’t want to, because it’s beautiful and I haven’t cried like that for a long time.
***
If there’s a connection between these two rivers, I think it lies in emotions, without which neither would have any significance.
Miriam Drori, Author 