I guess there are similar posts like this one over here, but I feel writing it out might help.

I have terrible social anxiety. Be it making friends, going on dates, or just texting people I'm interested in, all of these tend to be super difficult for me since the last one year. I joined a masters degree last year and have struggled making friends because of how anxious I get around people. I constantly think about whether I can trust them, what are they thinking of me, I guess they won't like me after they've known me for a while. As a defense mechanism, I just give a cold shoulder to anyone who seems mildly interested in talking to me because then my "rudeness" will justify their negative perception of me (in my head). I've also noticed that I'm faking it when around a few well-acquainted classmates of mine, i.e., I act like I'm highly functional and normal around them but the moment I move away from that conversation, I'm back to overthinking everything. I hate how I've become. I was never an anxious overthinker about these things and this just hurts my self-esteem.

Recently, I started hanging out with a classmate of mine whom I'm very attracted to. I haven't told them anything about how I think of them, but my anxiety keeps destroying me from the inside about the way I might be rejected or the outcomes of that. I get palpitations everyday when I think of inviting them to hang out again. For instance, they replied to my text after 2 hours yesterday and just that made my mental composure downhill. I had a full blown panic attack recently just thinking about the prospects of this thing b/w us (which I'm also v embarrassed about).

I really don't know what to do. Avoiding my social instincts of making friends and being by myself makes me lonely. And while I think not pursuing my classmate might give me some peace of mind (and body), it makes me depressed because it might turn out to be like this every time I'd like to date someone.

Besides this, there must be some hope in other ways? Like there must be careers out there in which overthinking + deep analysis might prove to be an advantage?

Let me know what you all think, thanks.