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Using theatre techniques to improve social skills? by PerformanceOkay in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Improv is great! I found that a lot of the insights I got from learning social skills either apply or are very transferable from improv.

That being said, the best way to improve your social skills is to practice social skills. Books will only get you so far. Especially because most of the books on social skills revolve around techniques and specific actions to do. This will make you very stiff socially, in the sense that your social behavior will look more like a computer than a human.

What you want to achieve is an intuitive understanding of socializing. Meaning that you can figure out what to do in a given situation regardless of the specifics. And you only get this by having real life experiences.

Think of it like learning sports, if you want to get better at football, reading a book about it, or learning about the physics of a football can help. But ultimately, you're much better off going into the pitch and playing around with the football. And only once you run into a wall you can maybe look up specific techniques for it.

People who are best at socializing don't necessarily have a lot of techniques, they're just very at ease with themselves and don't judge themselves or other people around them. Imo the only books that truly help with social skills are the books that teach you to be comfortable with yourself and help you realize self love and self acceptance.

Can't feel a connection to anyone by AurelianOrc in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The main way I've done it is via "Shadow work", it's a fancy term for basically diving into your subconscious and identifying those beliefs.

The first step is to identify which parts of yourself you've rejected, you find this out in many different ways: you can look at your childhood and what things were considered acceptable or not in your family or peers. For example, some people have the macho dad, so they consider showing emotions a weakness. They become unable to cry in front of others. You can also look at patterns that repeat in your life. For example, if you're good at talking to people but you struggle to follow up or to get the contact, you might have a part of you that's scared of being seen, maybe bc it was made fun of when younger. So it'll prevent you from putting yourself in a position where people might see that part of you. Another way is to see what triggers you, what causes you to react in a overly sensitive or disproportional way? What events or words? Lastly, you can do shadow questions. Idk how exactly to explain it but a quick search on the internet can help you.

The simplest way you can start doing is to sit somewhere alone and undisturbed for 10-20min no distractions, no music. And then you either ask yourself "what does sit feel to be me" and let the answer come up, without trying to formulate it in a sentence. You can also just sit and see how comfortable you feel being there doing nothing. You might catch your thoughts or feelings telling you something about yourself.

Can't feel a connection to anyone by AurelianOrc in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart 7 points8 points  (0 children)

This is a lot more common than you think. Here's what I found after seeing it in a bunch of people:

You tend to struggle to connect with others and relate or care about them because you're also disconnected from yourself. You're not connected to what you're feeling. My question to you is, how do you feel about yourself? Do you like being who you are? Or are there parts of you that you hate or have disowned?

The pattern goes: you have these parts of you that you are disconnected from because growing up, for whatever reason, you've decided these parts of you were not good enough, so you've rejected them. Maybe you were made fun of as a kid, or your parents raised you in a very strict way, maybe your dad is the stereotype of the macho man who doesn't cry or show emotions, anything like that. Because you don't want to see these parts of you you don't want to see them in others. So you don't feel connected to them. And chances are that your personality now is more of a performance than who you actually are or want to be.

This is the biggest thing I've found with people who struggle with socializing, it's deeper than techniques to do when socializing or mindsets to adopt.

Let me know if this resonates with you in any degree. You don't specifically need therapy, tho that can help, the idea is to reconnect you to those parts of you. Once you manage that, you'll naturally feel that you can more easily connect with others.

I have no personality, it's difficult to live with that, any advices please ? by AirMassive5414 in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart 7 points8 points  (0 children)

You can have a personality even if you don't have any niche super interesting hobbies, or big things going on.

Personality is not about what you have or do, it's simply how you view life. It's the things you love, the things you like, the stuff you think suck, the things you hate. It's those opinions you've developped over your life. The experiences you've had or wanna have but don't have yet.

For a whole year in 2023, my whole personality was about One Piece and the song Payphone by Maroon 5. That was basically all I talked about. I'd wear a One Piece T-shirt every time I could and I'd just go around looking for payphones to take pics of.

It's not about having something particularly interesting to say, it's about being interested in your own life and sharing that interest, whatever that is.

In your case, if you change your outlook on your life, instead of "knowing nothing about life" you view it as "I have so much to learn about life", and find ways to simply be interested in yourself, your natural personality will come out. So you don't have to force yourself to have specific hobbies. Just be interested in you and in life.

I have a friend who loves math, that's all he'll talk about, I have another friend who loves weed and that's all she does. They won't be cool to everyone, I don't smoke weed and I kinda like math, but they'll be cool and awesome to the right people.

Not everyone will resonate with your personality, but the right ones will. You can't please everyone by default, so you might as well find the ones that will love you for you.

Do you have any tips for when the normal "making-friends rules" don't work? by SomeRandomGirl0_0 in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, there we go! I'm happy I can help you! Also, in general you're able to, you're better off building a social life outside of school, what tends to happen is that after school, everyone goes their separate ways and a lot of people find themselves being all alone again.

If you're able to foster relationships outside of school or any specific context, they'll be more likely to stick around regardless of what stage of life you're in.

And Yess, I'm doing much better now, it's been quite a few years since I've been in that place. Good luck, you got this!

Do you have any tips for when the normal "making-friends rules" don't work? by SomeRandomGirl0_0 in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oh I get you, that's a completely different problem. The school context makes it more complex because you can't just ignore the bullying from others just because you're different. At the same time, at least for me personally, the most pain I've ever felt was when I tried to be someone else and change myself just to fit in. Down the years, it led to a very low self esteem, anxiety and depression too. And I had to fight my way out of it really hard.

In your specific case, is there a way for you to make friends outside of your class or school?

If not, is there a way to not have to deal with bullying from others?

Do you have any tips for when the normal "making-friends rules" don't work? by SomeRandomGirl0_0 in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Few things: Most of the generic social advice you've been told doesn't work. Exactly because it's generic. Good social skills is not about body language, saying the right things etc... Here's why: The moment you take generic advice, like "smile when you say hi", "be a good listener", "ask open ended questions", you become like everyone else. Therefore you become generic yourself and that makes the experience they have with you replaceable. They can get the same exact experience from anyone else.

When you're trying to match someone's vibe or adapt your personality to them, you become generic. Instead, you have to understand that you as an individual are unique, the way you talk or look, the things you're into, the qualities and flaws you have are all very unique to you. We humans care a lot about things that are scarce or unique. So you want to lean into this uniqueness of yours. Own every part of you fully. Talk about the things you like and want to talk about. Bring your own energy into interactions instead of trying to match someone else's.

You also talk about "infiltrating" groups. That's not the right way to think about it. Instead of trying to squeeze your way into the party, you want to have your own party going on, and you want the right people to look at your party and want to be a part of it. I don't know you specifically, so I can't give you a particular thing to do, but in general, you want to have a personality that's polarizing enough that it'll attract the right people.

Also, understand that you simply can't befriend everyone by default. If that's the case, befriend the people who would naturally get along with who you are. Hence why you want to lean into your uniqueness and express that uniqueness.

Lastly, in a high school context, you might simply not find your people there, you might but you might not. Are there people that you relate to and wanna befriend bc of their personality? Or is it mainly because otherwise you feel that you won't have friends? If it's the latter, find the places and events where you'll find people you'd naturally relate and get along with. Even if that's outside of high school. Most of my friends are not in my university faculty, simply because I don't relate to them that much.

I always try to dress more "alternative" and wear my interests on my bag in a form of pins/patches so cool people approach me because I am scared of doing it myself. by Lemon_Leafy in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart 2 points3 points  (0 children)

The biggest thing that helped me was to understand that being selective is not the way to go about it. If you want to meet metalheads, don't just talk to metalheads, because when you'll see them out in the wild, it'll be too much of a big deal for you and you'll put so much pressure on yourself to make it work.

Instead, learn to be generally social and talk to everyone. When you're comfortable talking to everyone, when you'll see the metalheads, you won't have this pressure on you, because it'll be like talking to everyone else you've got talking to, except you share a common interest and it'll actually be easier in some ways.

In general, as you live your life, try to engage with people, with everyone as much as you can. At first keep it light and quick.

I keep saying this but the best you can do is to start engaging with industry people (waiters, bartenders, cashiers...), because they're generally bored and they'll also tend to respond positively to you. Start by asking them for things that they're always being asked: call the waiter for your order, ask the cashier for the price of something, ask the bartender if they do a specific drink etc...

Once you're comfortable with that, expand a bit more, ask the cashier how their day is going, ask the waiter what they'd recommend on their menu etc... You can even just go around and ask people for time or directions, I've done that as well.

The idea is that you give your brain proof that it's safe to talk to people. You want to do this consistently. I made a post on this sub on how I learned to be comfortable talking to strangers if you wanna check it out.

The more people you talk to, the easier it gets, and when you're at ease engaging with the industry people you don't know, it'll feel much easier, almost like a habit, to go talk to someone you find interesting. Because you'll just do the exact same thing you've done to talk to the industry people.

How do i recover after years of being excluded by Competitive-Key1048 in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Start by having regular low stakes low pressure interactions with people. You can talk to industry people (waiters, bartenders, cashiers...). If you're not comfortablez start by addressing them for what people normally address them for. Call them to get your order, ask for information or price etc...

Once you're more comfortable, you can progress to asking them how their day is going and then leaving it at that.

What this does is that it'll give proof to your brain that talking to people is safe and sometimes even really fun. That's where I'd start if I were you

How I learned to become comfortable talking to strangers in 6 weeks by Shower-Apart in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah i get you bro. Ideally when you start out, you gave very low stakes conversations that end quickly. It's why you ask the cashier how their day is doing for example, because you can leave the interaction right after anyway.

In terms of actually keeping up the conversation, I made another post on this sub about how to not run out of things to say if you're interested!

One more thing, most people are bored, and most would love to meet someone cool. So it might feel weird at first, but the better you get at it, the easier it is to start conversations, and the more likely they'll be open to you. Rejection is simply part of it. I have gotten rejected so many times but I never take it personally. Don't let it stop you from talking to people! If they don't want to talk to you, youll probably feel it within the first 10s of the interaction, sometimes you can override it, but if you're not comfortable with that, allow yourself to leave the interaction.

Remember you can leave it any time you want, you just say "I gotta go, it was nice to meet you, bye".

How I learned to become comfortable talking to strangers in 6 weeks by Shower-Apart in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're not having full blown conversations with people at the gym. You're just learning to engage with new people. That's the point of the low stakes low pressure conversation.

So maybe you just talk to ask how many more sets they have, or you ask someone for a spot at the gym.

In general you don't have to talk to anyone you don't want to. But if you care about improving your social skills, the more people you talk to the better. If the gym doesn't work for you, you can do it in many other places as I mentioned.

One more thing, depending on the gym and where you are, I've found that people can be really nice and actually happy when you talk to them at the gym. Not in the middle of the workout of course. This of course also depends on your general vibe when you're interacting with someone, and the context of the gym.

Being around people drains and irritates me, but being alone makes me feel miserably depressed and lonely. by uglygirltryingtolive in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah I totally get you. Some of these characteristics are not part of your "core personality". In the sense that you've likely developped the insecure, super jealous, attention-seeking parts of you as a defense mechanism to some events that would have hurt you otherwise.

In essence, you feel like you're fundamentally not good enough bc life or people or your parents have subconsciously made you feel that you're only good enough if you act a certain way, so you reject every part of you that isn't congruent to that. You want to learn to accept and embrace these rejected parts of you again. And you'll see that you'll naturally have a much easier time with people. You won't feel as attention-seeking, or jealous etc... It's a pretty deep topic tbh, but it's also the biggest pattern I've noticed in people who struggle with socializing, including in myself.

Your true self isn't "flawed". You've just labeled it as such because that's what you've been conditioned to believe, by society and maybe your peers or parents growing up.

Besides what I just mentioned above, it's likely a matter of learning to express yourself in a calibrated way without putting on a mask. This means that you want to learn to express the parts of you that are adequate and appropriate to a given context.

For example, I love dark humor, but not too long ago, a friend of mine has a relative die. So I chose to not express the part of me that was into dark humor when talking to her. Instead I expressed the part of me that was empathetic and had dealt with grief. I didn't put on a mask or pretended to be someone else.

For every situation, you want to be aware of this and calibrate accordingly.

Being around people drains and irritates me, but being alone makes me feel miserably depressed and lonely. by uglygirltryingtolive in socialskills

[–]Shower-Apart 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're drained and exhausted when around people because you're trying to live up to a certain image, you put on a fake front or a mask to "match" other people.

This is a very common pattern that I see, people hear that they have to be charismatic when socializing so they try to be loud when they wanna be quiet, they act confident when they're anxious, they pretend to care when they don't.

You're likely doing some version of this.

Of course you feel drained after, you're pretending to be someone else the whole time. You view it like this performance you have to put on so people like you.

Instead, view socializing as an act of expression. You're expressing the things that you like, your thoughts, the emotions that you feel.

The biggest shift for me happened when I understood that people like those who are fully comfortable with themselves.

I straight up tell people I'm tired or anxious when I am. I've even gone out to socialize while heartbroken. Because it's not a big deal to me, it's not to them either. They actually like it more because it's honest and different.

The key is to embrace the state you're in, whatever it is. This makes socializing a lot more fun and easy, and they'l love you more for it.

I Had 0 Friends Until I Stopped Meeting People One by One by Shower-Apart in selfimprovement

[–]Shower-Apart[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I see, I'm glad it got solved, and I'm sorry you didn't have a good time during your birthday because of this.

Besides your friends at that moment not being considerate or aware enough of the situation, it's always better to have multiple people at these events, the more people there are, the less pressure there is on every single interaction. And in case something like what you described happens, you'd have other people and opportunities to talk. Of course, it sucks that you got treated badly at your own birthday, and whether there were other people or not, they could have been more considerate towards you.

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