2 mins

What can I do to help my social anxiety outside of therapy?

Video Description

Chelsea based psychologist Emma Smith says that opening up to friends and family and using mindfulness based techniques can be helpful in managing social anxiety outside of therapy sessions. Chelsea Psychology Clinic are a group of London psychologists and psychiatrists offering private psychological therapy and psychiatry treatment from their premises across central London and Chelsea. The private therapy sessions cover the following areas: – Acceptance & Commitment Therapy – Cognitive Analytic Therapy – Cognitive-behavioural Therapy – Couples Therapy – Dialectical-behaviour Therapy – Mentalisation Based Treatment – Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy – Schema Therapy https://www.thechelseapsychologyclinic.com

Video Transcription

There’s a lot that you can do to manage. I think, opening up with friends and family and letting them know a little bit what your struggle is can be really helpful. Because often when people experience social anxiety, it can feel really shaming and embarrassing to actually open up and say to your friends, “You know what? I get really anxious going to social events. I worry that…” Whatever the specific worry is, “I worry that I might spill food down my top. I worry that I might say something stupid and embarrass myself.” If you can open up to friends and family, trusted friends and family, people that you can rely on, then actually they often want to support and help, and that can be incredibly, incredibly helpful in terms of putting yourself into new situations and extending what you’re doing. So opening up to friends and family and also using mindfulness can be really helpful as well.

Dr Emma Smith

Dr Emma Smith

19 June 2022

"Dr Emma Smith completed her BSc (Hons) at the University of Warwick, an MSc in Forensic Psychology at the University of Portsmouth, and her Doctorate in Clinical Psychology at Christ Church Canterbury University. She worked as a clinical psychologist in a specialist service in a Central London NHS Trust until moving to Sussex where she now works as a Consultant Clinical Psychologist in the NHS and continues to offer sessions with The Chelsea Psychology Clinic online."

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Dr Elena Touroni

Dr Elena Touroni is a skilled and experienced consultant psychologist with a track record of delivering high-quality services for individuals with all common emotional difficulties and those with a diagnosis of personality disorder. She is experienced in service design and delivery, the management of multi-disciplinary teams, organisational consultancy, and development and delivery of both national and bespoke training to providers in the statutory and non-statutory sector.


Having obtained a first degree in Psychology (BSc) at the American College of Greece, she completed her doctoral training at the University of Surrey. Dr Touroni is highly experienced in the assessment and treatment of depression, anxiety, substance misuse, personality disorder, eating disorders, obsessive compulsive disorder, adjustment disorder and relationship difficulties. She works with both individuals and couples and can offer therapy in English and Greek.


Dr Touroni has held a variety of clinical and managerial positions including as Head of Service in the NHS. Further she has held academic positions for the University of Surrey and the Institute of Mental Health lecturing on specialist postgraduate Masters and Doctorate programmes.


She is trained in several specialist therapeutic approaches such as schema therapy, dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT), cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), mindfulness-based approaches and Cognitive Analytic Therapy (CAT). As well as holding a variety of NHS positions, Dr. Touroni is the co-founder of a private practice in Central London that has been a provider of psychological therapy for all common emotional difficulties including personality disorder since 2002. She is the founder and one of two directors of The Chelsea Psychology Clinic.