By the Mayo Clinic Health Oasis , part of the Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research. Learn about Paxil , an FDA-approved treatment to combat shyness and anxiety. I t is something of a miracle that Grace Dailey is sitting in a restaurant in a coastal New Jersey town having an ordinary lunch, at ease with her world. Her careful, tiny bites of a tuna sandwich may seem unremarkable, but they are in fact a milestone. Back in her grade school cafeteria, she could only sip a bit to drink each day, unable to eat while she imagined her classmates' eyes boring into her.
Shyness is a nearly universal human trait.
Most everyone has bouts of it, and half of those surveyed describe themselves as shy. The human species might not even exist if not for an instinctive wariness of other creatures. In fact, the ability to sense a threat and a desire to flee are lodged in the most primitive regions of the brain. But at some life juncture, roughly 1 out of every 8 people becomes so timid that encounters with others turn into a source of over whelming dread. The heart races, palms sweat, mouth goes dry, words vanish, thoughts become cluttered, and an urge to escape takes over.