A short transcript of Dr. Aziz leading a live workshop about deliberately embracing embarrassment to gain social freedom. He describes having participants perform silly or embarrassing acts on purpose to reduce sensitivity to embarrassment, arguing that this practice expands conversational freedom and reduces self‑restriction.
What if it was very hard to feel embarrassed in interactions? I'm here at a live event that I'm teaching and we're having the people practice doing silly things and being embarrassed on purpose. Now, that might sound like a terrifying and terrible thing to do. Why would you want to do that? But actually you want to make it hard for yourself to be embarrassed. It's too many people are so easily embarrassed. I'm embarrassed if I say the wrong thing. I'm embarrassed if I ask a question you don't want to answer. I'm embarrassed if I make a joke and nobody laughs. And what that does, it leads you to be really restricted in your conversations. I don't want to say the wrong thing. I don't want to get embarrassed. And the freedom lies in embracing embarrassment, seeking embarrassment out, and actually going out to be embarrassed on purpose, like we're going to have people do here at this workshop. And guess what? It's uncomfortable. They dread it. But on the other side of it, they are laughing and they're more free than ever before. They can talk to anybody, and it doesn't matter if you make a mistake or say the wrong thing. You can just be you and you can be free.
