This is actually one of the bigger goals I've accomplished that I'm proud of, but it's weird to talk about it most of the time.

I took baby steps by giving myself small goals. For a while it was just to say good morning or hello to one stranger every day, assuming I crossed any. Just say hello and sort of nod, not really inviting conversation but just being polite. Then it would be to ask coworkers or people I "knew" but didn't know well something about themselves. Sometimes those things led to more talking and sometimes not, but when you make little steps like that people recognize it and usually return the favor. If you find these attempts not going anywhere, don't just say you liked the movie, think about what you liked about it, etc. Answer a question and then ask it back. I think another step was to learn how to make comments on things around you. Say things just to talk. It's hot as balls today. She looks really good today. Man I've got a headache. Just the dumb shit people say for whom speaking is not worthy of planning.

A huge thing that helped was realizing that I'm not weird. Well, honestly I am kind of weird, but when you have social anxiety you tend to think your normal things are weird and assume people are judging every little thing. I spent a lot of time doing "self-talk" about what's normal and doing things that I knew in my head were normal even though they felt weird. Basically, just pretend. Fake it 'til you make it. If you pretend to be normal, after a while it becomes your new normal. I think because getting over it was a conscious goal in my mind I started to recognize which thoughts in my head were the "wrong" ones and started to ignore them. When I was getting over being afraid of calling someone on the phone I would literally think "la la la la" in my head while I was dialing the phone as quickly as possible, like I was sneaking around my own mind. But it worked. If my gut reaction was to say no to an invite, I'd spit out yes before my brain knew what was happening. That doesn't sound like it makes sense, but that's how it worked for me.

The absolute biggest obstacle, in case you're a hardcore introvert like me, is learning how to translate your inner mind into actual sentences you can speak out loud. You know what I mean if you hate when someone asks what you're thinking about because the answer is both nothing and everything at the same time. It just takes practice. Listen to the kinds of comments other people make and copy them. Accept that you're gonna sound stupid sometimes and that's ok. You'll get better and people might think you're sort of awkward, but there are worse things, and after a while you'll meet new people who only know this less-awkward version of you. Maybe before you get to the step of trying to offer your opinions, spend some time forming hypothetical answers in your mind to practice. Not super eloquent articulate end-goal answers, but just normal everyday stuff like "yeah they're ok, but I really like so-and so."

Anyway, that's what I did. Hope it helps.

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[Serious] Redditors who overcame social anxiety, how did you do it?