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Blueberry comments on How to always have interesting conversations - Less Wrong
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Yeah, that would make things rough. If it's at all feasible, I would look into moving to a large city, but of course moving can be very difficult, especially if you're in a school program (I think you said you were in grad school).
Oh, I definitely went through, and still go through, a lot of ostracism and rejection. I did, and do, have to go through it. I don't think I'm at "great" by any means. And I don't have these skills naturally. First of all, I don't think anyone has them naturally, which was my point. Have you spent much time around kids or teenagers? Very few of them have any social skills at all; they're still making mistakes. But if you mean that you think I learned social skills quickly without trouble or pain, no, they're not easy for me either. I may not be able to provide helpful advice, because I don't know all the details of your brain and your experiences, but it's definitely not something I take for granted.
You're right, of course talking to people who know a lot about improving social skills will help. My point was that, if you inadvertently creep people out when you talk to them, then you have to risk it for right now as you go about conversations in your life, or else avoid people in general. In fact, I think that a large part of social and conversational skills is just not worrying or being afraid of people reacting negatively.
No, you're referring to relatively minor goofs in a context where the social consequences are much less severe, where you've already done significant deft social navigation around that group, and where those who see the error have good reason to be much more understanding of the goof. While I agree that rejections, mistakes, etc. are to be expected and are part of life, you are equating very different kinds of rejections, and -- like most sociality advisors here -- assuming away the problem of having passed a certain social barrier.
Those are far different kinds of failures than "becoming the creepy guy at the bookstore" or having people get the bouncer to talk to you because of conversational goofs (which has happened to me, so this isn't idle speculation).
To clarify: Have you been approched by a venue supervisor because of a conversational goof with a stranger or new acquaintance? If not, you're not going through the risks I'm referring to or speaking to the situation I'm in.
I'm not asking that the entire situation be pleasant; I'm asking that I can reasonably expect the failures not to cascade so that I can really go through a large enough number of interactions while actually learning. When you're ready to stop misinterpreting me otherwise, I will revise my opinion on the merit of your suggestions.
(And a suggestion for you: if you want to drop out and save some face, make a remark like, "Gosh, you're unpleasant. Now I know why you have so much trouble. You deserve it, and I hope you do everyone a service by staying away from them." I try to help people, even if they haven't been as kind in the past.)
Frequently. And I've been ostracized and kicked out of groups before as well. I considered those minor mistakes, and just moved on to the next venue. When this happened, of course it hurt. A lot. But I tried to be a good conversationalist, and gave it my best effort, and it didn't work out, so I learned what I could. People are weird sometimes.
I have had similar problems to yours (though, as I said, I don't know your exact situation), and I'm trying to tell you exactly what I have done and am doing to solve them. (It's worth noting that almost everyone has gone through the "huge failures" you're talking about; it's just that most people went through them as young children or teenagers, when they had an excuse for not knowing, and we just happened to learn slower.)
I'm not exactly sure what you mean. Are you worried about building a negative reputation in your small town? Are you worried about being banned from every single location there? This sounds more like anxiety than a realistic concern (though as I said, I don't know your situation), and I suspect it's this very anxiety that's the problem.
Were the past situations where you've been kicked out of venues or whatever in a different town, or in your current small town? Did these mistakes follow you afterwards? I think Jim Random H.'s comment that small towns are toxic is accurate: they're not toxic for everyone, but for people with social difficulties, they can be horrible places because your mistakes follow you everywhere. Leave as soon as you can.
I wouldn't do something like that. I'm trying to help, and I'm interested and curious in your situation. But I'm curious if on some level you actually want people here to give up and say "yes, you're beyond help, you're way worse than me."
Okay, is everyone's knowledge of social skills really so brittle that their models break down for small towns? (And I mean on the order of 200k, shifting with the college year, not e.g. 10k. But still, most social places don't even have many people there at any given time.) Is it really impossible to develop social skills except in large cities?
I'm ashamed to admit that Juggler told me something similar a few years ago, that what he teaches doesn't work except in large metro areas (his site said nothing whatsoever about this being a prerequisite for his program, and yes he refunded).
Moving to another city is a non-trivial task, not because I'm in school, but because I don't have the connections or exposure that make job-hopping easy.
By the way, when exactly did you have rumors spread about you being threatening? I guess I may not have appreciated the relevance of your experience.
200k is one order of magnitude larger than what I was thinking when you said "small town". The relevant criteria is how far you can narrow down the set of activities and demographics you interact with and still have an effectively unlimited supply of strangers. My experiences are all plus or minus an order of magnitude from that, so I don't really know if 200k is sufficient.
As for rumors about being threatening - if you're referring to the conversation here on LW where I posted a nasty ill-considered reply to a deleted comment and ended up deleting it, then I apologize for that. If you're referring to something that happened in person, then I think you'll find people have surprisingly short memories for that sort of thing.
Wow. It was two orders of magnitude off what I was thinking! I grew up 20 minutes from the nearest town, which was ~4k so I had a different expectations of what would be limiting.
No, I wasn't. As I should have said at the time, you're not the first person to publicly accuse me of a serious crime I didn't commit, due to conflict with me. You're just the most remorseful.
In the case I have in mind, it was at least two years.
I, for one, would really really like to see a videotape of several of your conversational attempts, if such videotape would be legal to take in your state. In fact, after reading the social awkwardness saga here, it's almost worth a ticket to Texas to walk along and observe in person.
PM me to schedule a time, I'll pay for the trip just so I can have a witness.
I'll second the request for video. Maybe a web videoconference? That's not as good as an in-person conversation (in particular, it screws up eye contact and eliminates location/distance-based signalling), but it gets around the need to travel and it's easier to film.
I'd love to vidchat with people. I wanted to do it a lot when I got my MacBook back in '07, but no one I knew wanted to do it and there weren't good random-stranger vidchat sites at the time.
I'll post my skype name when I get home.
But I hope you meant this as a separate measure of me than someone's "in the field" observations.
200k isn't a small town! You're fine. Can you please answer these questions:
(I removed the small town references.) If you have these concerns in a college town of 200,000 people, I stand by what I said about anxiety being the problem even more.
Juggler comes from, and developed skills in, a college town of about 100,000 people, so I'm surprised.
You keep moving the goalposts. I may not have had every negative experience that you've had, but I've also had large social difficulties, as have many other people here trying to help you. You ask for a specific plan that you can do right now, and I'm giving you one (go to lots of public places and start friendly conversations with lots of people). If you have too much anxiety to do this, that's understandable, but let's address that issue then.
I suspect that, if you're a student, college towns' social flexibility is more like considerably larger towns-- the transient student population means that social networks have much less institutional memory than a stable population of the same size.
In my experience, this is true even if you're not a student.
The answers to the first block are all yes, except for a little uncertainty on the last one.
And 200k rises and falls with the college year. There are very few hangout places with a lot of strangers you can interact with, and even out of those, very few people want to talk, at least to me.
You're giving me something that has downside risk no one else would tolerate, and which is extremely vague (starting a conversation is a complicated process). Also, since I've had lots of conversations with non-strangers with no improvement, its not clear how I would even know what I'm doing wrong.
There may be anxiety issues (I do better after consuming things which suppress this), but I'm not sure you can call it that if failure really would mean wiping out most of my practice grounds, and if I can't effectively "reboot" whenever I want.
Now there is an interesting topic. Do you just mean alcohol, nicotine and pot? Or have you considered the actual good options. For example: Phenibut, picamilon or aniracetam? Those are some substances that are seriously handy when it comes to socializing. In the case of aniracetam it comes with enhanced verbal fluency as well as anxiolytic properties.
The things I refer to are alcohol, or prescription medication with anti-anxiety effects (but only some of them). I've noticed that my normal condition is to have a sort of "inhibitor" in my brain that's always saying, "no, don't do that, here's a downside"; after having consumed one of the above, that feeling is suppressed in proportion to dosage, and I feel comfortable enough to quit contemplating consequences and take an action.
In my normal state, I have to concentrate to speak like a normal person because I'll get the same internal criticism about any phrasing I try, which makes me frequently trail off or re-start sentences. (Also, I'm often told that I sound like a foreigner, even though I've lived all my life in Texas.)
Note that it's not that I have inhibitions per se, but rather, that I generate specific counterarguments as the inhibitor. It seems like a low-grade version of those cases you hear about where someone had brain damage to their emotional centers and they can't make decisions because they won't stop weighing the alternatives.
Thank you for the pointers to those three "supplements"; I didn't know that such effective anti-anxiety substances were available OTC in the US! I've tried some supplements that "support positive mood" via effects on neurotransmitters, but not the ones you've listed; I'll have to check them out.
Thankyou for sharing your introspective experience. I'm always interested in how the human brain works and I find that the more I am able to instantiate the model of 'human' for a specific person the more I am able to empathize, comprehend their meaning and cross the inferential gap when trying to express my thoughts in a way that translates accurately.
I too have a particularly active inhibitor in my brain, although through experiences and active personal development have significantly reduced the negative effects. The challenging part was removing the maladaptive inhibitions while keeping the 'perfectionism' benefits that for me came hand in hand with that overactive system.
I should clarify somewhat what I am suggesting the supplements can be useful for.
Aniracetam
Very safe. As in, it is more or less impossible to overdose on the stuff and it isn't going to mess you. It is probably safer than just about anything you can get in a pharmacy, including the glucose lollies they sell the front desk. It also doesn't seem to come with significant tolerance/dependency problems that anxiety drugs are notorious for.
... But the anxiolytic properties are not the primary use of aniracetam. It is a cognitive enhancer that happens to have some anti-anxiety effects thrown in as a bonus. It isn't going to completely counter serious anxiety problems but most people find that it makes socializing more relaxing and flow better. More significant to me is that the primary effect is just what is needed when socializing too. It boosts verbal fluency in particular and (by subjective reports) makes the subtleties in communication and the naunces of music more salient.
Picamilon
"Mostly Harmless" - It is just Niacin and GABA hooked up together in a way that will get it through the blood-brain barrier before it falls apart. Reports tend to be that it has a mild but reliable effect on reducing anxiety without a nasty rebound. People tend to 'cycle' on and off so that they can maintain the effectiveness.
Phenibut
"Use Responsibily" - Phenibut is safer and way healthier than either benzos or booze but at the same time it is not a toy. With aniracetam you can casually eat a tablespoon of the stuff just to see if you notice the difference. You do not do that with Phenibut. This is a real drug, you show it the proper respect.
In terms of effect this stuff is powerful. It isn't a 'oh, yeah, that is a bit better' kind of thing. When used to treat anxiety it is basically a drug with reliable and significant effects (and effectiveness). It does, however come with side effects when used excessively. Specifically it has unpleasant withdrawal effects if you stop using it suddenly after long term, high dose use. it also builds up tolerance relatively so you can not use it every day. It is better to use it once a week or so, when you are out socializing. ie; as an all round superior replacement for alcohol.
In comparison to alcohol: The effects on inhibition are extremely similar. This isn't surprising since it approximately the same mechanism at play (boosting GABA). It also tends to boost confidence and mood (as alohol sometimes does). Unlike alcohol Phenibut makes you smarter, not dumber. It also doesn't eliminate your sound judgement, ruin your liver and kill your neurons. (A note - if you combine phenibut with alcohol expect each drink to have twice as much effect as you are used to.)
Benzodiazepine (diazepam, Valium)
THIS STUFF FUCKS YOU UP! Yes, I am both yelling and using an expletive. Whenever I lament the flaws in the medical system or suggest taking personal responsibility for your medical needs the misuse of benzo prescription is right up there on the list of reasons. I'm not being particularly contrarian here. This uncontroversial medical science (that isn't reflected in medical practice in a sane way).
In terms of effectiveness this stuff will work to knock out anxiety (come to think of it it'll knock the rest of you out too if you bump the dose). If you are having a panic attack or a seizure you want someone to be injecting it into you. What it also does in the short term is to impair all of your brain functions. What it does in the long term is permanently deteriorate both your physical health and brain activity. If you want to shock yourself look up some 'before and after' SPECT scans of the brains of benzo users.
To the usual disclaimer "I Am Not A Doctor" I will add "and you shouldn't put your faith in what I say all that much even if I was."
What about oxiracetam? Some of these sites list it as being more powerful and faster. Would that rank above phenibut?
Thanks! I just ordered two bottles online and I'm curious to see how they affect me.
Thanks for the info! Are these mostly things you have to order online, or can you expect to find them in pharmacies and supplement shops?
In this post you indicated that you have already been doing a lot of productive work going places and practicing conversations. What I'm saying is just that continuing to do more of that is pretty much the only way of building more skills, and it does come with risks of rejection.
What's the difference between what you've been doing, and going to a coffeeshop or bookstore and talking to a couple of people? I'm a little confused. From that previous post, it sounds like the risk is mostly in your head, since you've listed a number of recent successes. Doesn't what you've been doing have downside risks as well? There are lots of strangers at weddings, for instance.
So the bad experiences you described were all in a different town? How long ago? And are you reluctant to go to a bookstore and talk to people because you don't want to wipe out your practice grounds in your current town, like you believe you did in the previous town?
You've indicated that you've been complimented on your ability to make people feel comfortable in a group. This ability can transfer to starting friendly conversations with people in a public place.
I can guarantee that there's been some improvement. And you don't need to know what you've been doing wrong; at least for me, trying to figure out exact rules and specify my mistakes was just an exercise in frustration. People react in weird ways sometimes, and you can't always predict or model when and why, but with practice, you can reduce the frequency of negative reactions.
Tentatively offered: You've come up with something which makes it much easier for you to manage socially on LW.
It looks to me as though you're no longer showing hostility, but I don't know how you've framed it to yourself.
Is there anything about how you've changed your approach on LW which could be applied to real world interactions?
Much as I'd like to explain how awesome I am, I think you're forgetting this whole thing from less than a month ago.
No, I remember it, though probably in much less detail than you do.
I think the tone of your posts has changed since then.
Evidence that people are not necessarily good at evaluating their own behavior: I know two people who became much more pleasant company after using anti-depressants. Neither of them had any idea that they were doing anything different, they just thought other people had become nicer for no apparent reason.
Well, I think we can rule out me having started on anti-depressants after that one ...
Where do you live? Some places have tighter courtesy rules than others (and, of course, rules vary from one place to another, too)-- what Suzette Haden Elgin has written about Ozark courtesy sounds like it would be terrifying if I had to get it right. Grammatical shifts which I can barely notice mean different things. (Sorry, no examples handy to mind.)
Can you video yourself in conversation? It's conceivable that some bad habits will be more visible from the outside?
That sounds really interesting. Do you have a book title or reference or anything, even if you don't have examples?
Somewhere in her blog.
Ouch.
With difficulties like that, you're probably not going to find any genuinely useful advice on the Internet. It might help if you got some extroverted person to coach you face-to-face. Have you tried that?
(FWIW, I overcame my problems on my own, but my problems were minor compared to yours. I had low-status behaviors that caused people to ignore me, but I could always parse the nonverbal context just fine.)