Social Anxiety
Feb 6, 2018 12:27:33 GMT -5
Post by 40oz on Feb 6, 2018 12:27:33 GMT -5
Bare with me, I'm just working out some weirdness in my head and I'm trying to make sense out of it.
I've come to understand that, being on the internet for this long, many people seem to suffer from some form of social anxiety. Some worse than others. I think I do a pretty good job of masking it most of the time, but there are definitely other times where I will quickly bury myself in unrealistically terrible made-up scenarios in response to the thought of being in a position where I have to talk to other people. It happens at the exact moment between deciding yes or no to make the first proactive step at being a good and friendly person in face to face talks. Although I know it would be good for me and everyone around me if I put as much creative energy into being the life-of-the-party as I do for other things people seem to think I'm very good at, I usually lose this one-second war against myself when it comes to actually opening my fucking mouth and saying something that might eliminate any little uncomfortability in the air.
I often think in my head in terms of reciting words and sentences in my head the same way I would if I were talking out loud, except I don't use my vocal cords or move my mouth so that anyone can hear them. I do worry sometimes that I spend a little too much time having conversations with myself in my own head instead of talking to other people. The adverse effect being that I don't really know how people will react or respond to the things I have to say, and by making them so commonplace in my head and saying them out loud might be kind of shocking to everyone but myself when they've never followed my train of thought before. That's not a very rewarding feeling. There are probably other people out there like me, and to actually talk to other people is a pretty mutually helpful thing. The reasoning behind this motivates me to spark these random suggestions that pop up in my head once in a while.
"I should go say hi to that person"
Before I've even finished reciting that sentence in my head, I'm convinced into believing that I don't want anything to do with that person. What seems to me to be happening is that the sentence begins, and then there's a secondary process that begins in the background in parallel with it. At the start of the first word, the secondary process begins a persuasion process and before I can actually finish reciting the entire sentence, I'm made to be 100% certain that this is going to yield a future of unwanted results. The results are something like this: The conversation will go extraordinarily well, I'm going to accidentally make this person into my best friend, and then they're going to call me every day and want to go on dates with the weirdos they go out with, and hang out on weekends when I'd rather be by myself, filling my life with unwanted invitations to things that I'd more likely not want to be a part of than be by my lonesome, leading them into the expectation of germinating this long lasting friendship that will ultimately end with me deeply hurting the person after I lose all interest and stop doing anything to maintain the relationship further.
It goes with some sort of possibly ill-concieved presupposition that I have an extremely magnetic personality. It seems to me, to be an obnoxious thing for anyone to believe about themselves, especially if they don't have anything to prove it. There is some evidence in my life that seems to point to this being true. I've allowed it to happen on more than one occasion, that I've made good friends and in the process, located some kind of staleness or lack of substance in in their personality that would be useful and stimulating for me, so I just kinda drift off and have a hard time keeping friendships going for very long. And I think this hurts the person in one way or another.
I am wondering just now after writing this so far, if friends turning into hollow shells of people with no really deep or personal interests is more my fault for not digging deep enough to find it, rather than me just projecting an image of emptiness on them when I let them bore me with surface-level chit-chat instead of turning each exchange into a remarkable compelling life-changing experience. If doomworld is any indication, Doom fans often reveal being interested in some pretty crazy shit that they almost never talk about until you ask them the right kinds of questions.
Still I don't know how to explain why I do and say things that convince people on doomworld to believe that I'm a really unpleasant person. The way I see it is that I treat people on doomworld with a level of intimacy and confidence that isn't reciprocated from them. People I talk to in my normal life often find that bluntness and honesty to be refreshing. idk.
If you order the shittiest flavor of ice cream, You still get some ice cream.
I've come to understand that, being on the internet for this long, many people seem to suffer from some form of social anxiety. Some worse than others. I think I do a pretty good job of masking it most of the time, but there are definitely other times where I will quickly bury myself in unrealistically terrible made-up scenarios in response to the thought of being in a position where I have to talk to other people. It happens at the exact moment between deciding yes or no to make the first proactive step at being a good and friendly person in face to face talks. Although I know it would be good for me and everyone around me if I put as much creative energy into being the life-of-the-party as I do for other things people seem to think I'm very good at, I usually lose this one-second war against myself when it comes to actually opening my fucking mouth and saying something that might eliminate any little uncomfortability in the air.
I often think in my head in terms of reciting words and sentences in my head the same way I would if I were talking out loud, except I don't use my vocal cords or move my mouth so that anyone can hear them. I do worry sometimes that I spend a little too much time having conversations with myself in my own head instead of talking to other people. The adverse effect being that I don't really know how people will react or respond to the things I have to say, and by making them so commonplace in my head and saying them out loud might be kind of shocking to everyone but myself when they've never followed my train of thought before. That's not a very rewarding feeling. There are probably other people out there like me, and to actually talk to other people is a pretty mutually helpful thing. The reasoning behind this motivates me to spark these random suggestions that pop up in my head once in a while.
"I should go say hi to that person"
Before I've even finished reciting that sentence in my head, I'm convinced into believing that I don't want anything to do with that person. What seems to me to be happening is that the sentence begins, and then there's a secondary process that begins in the background in parallel with it. At the start of the first word, the secondary process begins a persuasion process and before I can actually finish reciting the entire sentence, I'm made to be 100% certain that this is going to yield a future of unwanted results. The results are something like this: The conversation will go extraordinarily well, I'm going to accidentally make this person into my best friend, and then they're going to call me every day and want to go on dates with the weirdos they go out with, and hang out on weekends when I'd rather be by myself, filling my life with unwanted invitations to things that I'd more likely not want to be a part of than be by my lonesome, leading them into the expectation of germinating this long lasting friendship that will ultimately end with me deeply hurting the person after I lose all interest and stop doing anything to maintain the relationship further.
It goes with some sort of possibly ill-concieved presupposition that I have an extremely magnetic personality. It seems to me, to be an obnoxious thing for anyone to believe about themselves, especially if they don't have anything to prove it. There is some evidence in my life that seems to point to this being true. I've allowed it to happen on more than one occasion, that I've made good friends and in the process, located some kind of staleness or lack of substance in in their personality that would be useful and stimulating for me, so I just kinda drift off and have a hard time keeping friendships going for very long. And I think this hurts the person in one way or another.
I am wondering just now after writing this so far, if friends turning into hollow shells of people with no really deep or personal interests is more my fault for not digging deep enough to find it, rather than me just projecting an image of emptiness on them when I let them bore me with surface-level chit-chat instead of turning each exchange into a remarkable compelling life-changing experience. If doomworld is any indication, Doom fans often reveal being interested in some pretty crazy shit that they almost never talk about until you ask them the right kinds of questions.
Still I don't know how to explain why I do and say things that convince people on doomworld to believe that I'm a really unpleasant person. The way I see it is that I treat people on doomworld with a level of intimacy and confidence that isn't reciprocated from them. People I talk to in my normal life often find that bluntness and honesty to be refreshing. idk.
If you order the shittiest flavor of ice cream, You still get some ice cream.