From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishshy away from something phrasal verbAVOIDto avoid doing or dealing with something because you are not confident enough or you are worried or nervous about it They criticized the leadership, but shied away from a direct challenge. → shy→ See Verb table
Examples from the Corpus
shy away from • Checks around the state in recent months have confirmed that many prominent Democrats are shying away from a run against Quackenbush.• The wise politician tries to deliver what really grabs voters and shies away from complicated, long-range concepts that alarm and confuse.• Agencies without a clear-cut wartime role will shy away from conflicts.• Politicians shy away from hints that they may be complacent.• Kritzer, however, said most of the mainstream media are shying away from it.• Yet science has consistently shied away from the task.• These memories are still quite fresh, and Clevelanders do not shy away from them. 