Basic Social Skills Guide

Take a look at Vinh Giang [1], he specializes in communication skills and vocal clarity, and is a super fun guy to listen to speak.

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/@askvinh

For the few times where I had to speak to someone about topics I don't care much about, I found that simply asking questions to learn about them ( as well as the person I'm speaking to) is enough.

"What team do you support? Has it always been the case? How do you think they compare to ?" "What car do you drive? Any particular reason for that car model? What's the brand's best and worst things? Oh, that piece tends to break easily; pardon my ignorance, but what's the purpose of it?" "Any key difference in the way you hunt/fish this or that animal, or the time of the year during which you hunt/fish? I don't know that word, what does it mean? Do you have any anecdotes about some hunting/fishing you did?"

Those have to be adapted to the person and situation, but they are pretty good to keep a conversation going. People love to speak about their interests, and a lot love to even teach about them. Putting yourself as the listener makes them perceive you as nice, and you might even gather interesting information to yourself, or at least gather enough knowledge to have an easier time speaking about it next time..

There's nothing to be ashamed of when crying while being faced with the limitedness of life.

I think this guide is already failing people by assuming successfully initiated conversations and labeling it as "basic". If you have plenty of social contacts, that already warrants being considered "intermediate".

The really difficult things are maintaining good first impression and talking to (perceived) strangers. You know nothing about a person until you talk with that person, so what exactly are you supposed to do? There is a bootstrapping problem.

Classified ads are a good example. It's not like ebay, where you click a button and the delivered product is guaranteed to arrive a few days later. Instead you get a blank form of nothing, where you can write whatever you want and there is always the possibility of rejection. It's very much unlike any store you've ever visited, where money is king and the customer('s money) is always right.

> Interestingly enough, not nearly as much gets published for e.g. Europe. Innate ability ?

From my personal feeling:

US culture is more on the extraverted side (i.e. a lot of people want/need shallow conversation instead of shutting their mouth, except if they have something important to say) than what is common in many European countries.

Thus, people who are more on the introvert side have a harder time in the USA than in many European countries, I guess.

Also, for various reason the whole "self-improvement industrial complex" is much less prevalent in European countries than in the USA.

Relatedly, I would say that in the USA, there is the mentality "Our society is the greatest ever made since God created Earth, so if you don't feel happy, the fault is on you: you need to self-improve."

On the other hand, in many European countries, the mentality is rather like "The society [note that I didn't write "our" - there is barely any sense of belonging] is a corrupt, messed-up shithole. Yes, there exist those smooth talkers who tell you that you need to self-improve (e.g. social skills), but do you know what: those just want to make money from the mess you are in, and/or are telling you the things that those in power want you to brainwash with. So, instead of wasting time and money to get yourself a brainwashing to make yourself 'socially adapted', better invest this energy into exposing all these assholes in power who are responsible for the whole mess. Since there are so many people who also have this kind of hate, you will easily find friends this way, and thus become more socially skilled." :-)