1. I put myself willingly in social situations in which I didn't know anyone. The trick for me was picking and going alone to social events (= events in which t

1. I put myself willingly in social situations in which I didn't know anyone. The trick for me was picking and going alone to social events (= events in which there is a lot of group talks) in which I was fairly interested but not REALLY interested, so I felt that was not problem to bail out at any moment, in any way, without giving any explanation, nor I cared if I did something really awkward or even had a panic attack (it surprisingly didn't happen), I said to myself "In that case, if I felt really in the wrong group of people, I would just not come anymore to this specific series of events and that's all... no one is really gonna care" 2. In those social situations I tried to listen far far FAR more than I talk, and also observe. Once you really observe people around you you can see how many of them are awkward and shy and make "social mistakes" and recover from them without problems. You'll see most people are really not that different than yourself. It worked very well for me, got confident incredibly fast. The hardest part is probably the first one or two events. I remember that for the first one, which was a recurring monthly event, I went physically as far as the door of the location in which it took place for two times without entering and bailing out at last second because of anxiety. Than the next month I went in and since then I still go to that series of events, and I found one of the best shy community I could hope for.