In this monologue, Dr. Aziz describes a personal experiment in practicing boldness at a house party after months of deliberate training. He deliberately adopts an “opposite” strategy to his usual shy behavior: he engages the host (Siri) instead of clinging to his friend (Chris), immediately seeks out a group in the kitchen, and boldly offers a shot to three women. Contrary to his expectations of rejection, the women respond with wide smiles, providing a powerful, positive reinforcement. Aziz reflects that this moment confirmed his belief that boldness—especially when it counters social anxiety—can yield immediate social rewards and long‑term benefits, a lesson he continues to teach.
Chapters
I've been training boldness like a mecha maniac for 3 or 4 months. And I get to this house party. And I'm like, I'm going to just do this very differently than I've ever done it. This is very much like opposite George from Seinfeld. It was like, what would I normally do? I'd want— first of all, I went with one friend. He was friends with the guy who was hosting the party. His name was Siri. And Siri was Iranian guy, like really nice features and skin and facial shape, muscular, confident, rode a motorcycle. Come on, dude. No chance am I in the same league as this guy. I don't belong in his house. And sure enough, at his party, there's all these beautiful people, right? So I get to go to Siri's house only because Chris is friends with him. And I get there. And normally I would cling to Chris like a, like a life vest in the ocean. Like, oh my God. Don't leave me. But I get there and we walk in and Siri greets us. And I like interact with Siri and I'm like, hey, thanks for having us at your house. And I chat with him for a minute instead of being all quiet to the side. That was opposite disease number 1. And then opposite disease number 2, and I still teach this to this day, is when you first get into a social gathering, you want to immediately go interact with people. Because what you want to avoid is that paralyzing moment where you walk into the room, you're running a threat scan and saying, what's the least threatening person I can interact with? I made the decision like, I'm going to do the opposite. So when I got in, I chatted with Siri for a second and then I just like made a— it's like, oh, I don't know where I go. And the first place I ended up in is the kitchen where everyone's got like alcohol everywhere. And so I like walk into the kitchen. I'm like, I gotta go to something. I gotta talk to somebody. And so the first thing I see this— shot glass on the table, and I grab it. And there's these 3 women standing there next to the drinks. And then I slam— slam the shot glass in front of the 3 of them. They all pause and look at me. And I'm like, what are we drinking? It was one of those magic moments. Because if you had asked me ahead of time, if I'd done all of that, before all this boldness training, and even me being willing to change my identity, I would have said, I'm going to get 3 looks of confusion and revulsion. Like, who are you, you loser? You're not like Siri and Chris. What are you, this little annoying guy? You know, whatever I thought I would get. And I played on the table and I looked at them too. It wasn't, you know, I apologize, I'm gonna look right at these people. I'm gonna interact with people. And I got 3 big wide smiles. And I was hooked. I was like, wait a minute. And I didn't have the words for it yet. But that's when I started to formulate was in life boldness is rewarded. Sometimes in the short term, like then, sometimes in the long term, but always.
