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My stages of learning to be a socially normal person

sashachapin.substack.com

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Re: My stages of learning to be a socially normal person

#161

Post by boricj »

tibbar wrote: post #138

This resonates. I spent many years going hard at `5: Connection is about projecting love and acceptance`. I focused on providing unconditional acceptance to everyone I met, inviting them to share their burdens and listening empathetically and supportively. People often left our conversations thanking me for the "therapy session." And in many ways I think this was a positive energy to bring to the world! But eventuall…

> And in many ways I think this was a positive energy to bring to the world!

Or in other words, becoming the landfill of negative energy of the world.

As someone who used to be that person for over a decade, having people endlessly confiding their relationship/health/mental/work/legal/family/gender issues will over time completely wreck your sanity. Because when you're that someone, people will not just tell you the light stuff, but also some really heavyweight and/or deeply fucked up things.

Re: My stages of learning to be a socially normal person

#162

Post by fsckboy »

ZpJuUuNaQ5 wrote: post #12

Appreciate the writing and the author's fortitude in achieving their goals. While I never had friends, neither online nor in person, I cannot identify with this at all - it reads like a strange, obsessive seeking of external validation which I have never felt myself. Maybe I am just disinterested in people in general.

>obsessive seeking of external validation which I have never felt myself

if you've never felt it, why are you mentioning it? why are you so focused on it?

A useful psychoanalytic rubric is "there is no negation in the unconscious mind". Negation is a conscious mind idea, the unconscious mind just thinks of things, it doesn't think of something and claim it's not thinking of it.

so, rephrasing what you wrote in the unconscious sense, "obsessive seeking of external validation which I have felt myself": yes, you have identified something, identified with something, interesting, about other people and about yourself. If you are aware that you are not seeking external validation, but also aware when other people do, you have to ask yourself...

if your complaint about this argument is along the line of "no fair, i can't escape from this!", you're getting the point.

Re: My stages of learning to be a socially normal person

#163

Post by zozbot234 »

mcdeltat wrote: post #157
zozbot234 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of normal people may routinely act charming and game social interactions, but they generally aren't being "manipulative" in the process. "Manipulation" is really just a polite word for routinely lying and BS'ing people on the off-chance that they are going to be fooled and/or not want to call you out on it. If you're reasonably socially skilled, you can usually see it coming a mile away and react accordingly, b…

So for the same set of actions, it's fine if you're unaware of the underlying mechanisms, and manipulation if you are aware? If you dig through the weeds of it you can argue just about everything we do socially is manipulation. We are social because we're social animals and will die without help from other humans (well, particularly thousands of years ago). At the end of the day, we are nice to people to get things f…

You can absolutely be charming towards people and play the "game" of social interaction while being quite aware that this is what you're doing. The point is that this need not involve outright lying or BS at all and that the latter is what such terms as "manipulation" actually imply in a very practical sense; not that it somehow counts against you if you're aware of what's happening at a pure level of social interaction. (In fact, the opposite is generally the case; active social awareness and mindfulness is a big part of what people variously call "EQ", "empathy", "cross-cultural competence", etc.)

Re: My stages of learning to be a socially normal person

#164

Post by overfeed »

ghurtado wrote: post #117
pseidemann wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. It's the playbook of social interaction written out. Nothing offensive about that.

I would take it further and say that the more light we bring to this subject, the less it becomes the exclusive domain of snake oil salesmen and the "sales tips 101" type books, and the more inoculated the general public becomes to manipulation.

Why dontou consider it "manipulation"? Would you consider what goes into you resume, or performance/promotion packet "manipulation"? In every interaction there are spoken and unspoken rules, and those who excel tend to be those who can understand the subtext and express themselves effectively.

Re: My stages of learning to be a socially normal person

#165

Post by zozbot234 »

overfeed wrote: post #164
ghurtado wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would take it further and say that the more light we bring to this subject, the less it becomes the exclusive domain of snake oil salesmen and the "sales tips 101" type books, and the more inoculated the general public becomes to manipulation.

Why dontou consider it "manipulation"? Would you consider what goes into you resume, or performance/promotion packet "manipulation"? In every interaction there are spoken and unspoken rules, and those who excel tend to be those who can understand the subtext and express themselves effectively.

It depends, of course. Some people might fill their resume with outright BS, and this would be widely regarded as manipulative.

Re: My stages of learning to be a socially normal person

#167

Post by svat »

hypeatei wrote: post #75

The bit about him spilling olive oil onto someone's dress then playing it off with a flirtatious joke seems very strange to me. Maybe it's just my upbringing but trying to pull off a joke like that in a tense situation seems very risky. I would be worried about coming off unserious, indifferent, and sleazy while also stoking an even angrier reaction from the person.

You're right, but consider:

• Of course it's very strange; that's why he wrote about it — the point is to convey what is not obvious.

• Of course it's risky, but that's the point of much of the author's journey of social ease, at least the initial stages up to that point. If you're willing to take the risk of coming off , or of an angry reaction, you open yourself up to a wider range of experiences / social interactions. Probably much of the interaction was non-verbal and even the author's paragraph cannot capture exactly what went on.

Not everyone needs to take such risks of course, but the author consciously chose to “install” social skill, and has shared their experience.

Re: My stages of learning to be a socially normal person

#168

Post by avhception »

switchbak wrote: post #140
jamilton wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. I wonder why that is - is it because it highlights a conflict between our actions and values? If left unexamined, it's a non-issue, so having it spelled out feels like a problem being created?

I would much rather assume the people I'm interacting with are honest and conveying their real feelings, vs playing some (probably) Machiavellian game with N levels of dishonesty and manipulation from what could easily be a malevolent person at the core. At least that tends to be the assumption when you pick up on a lack of authenticity in this way. When you have a real indication of dealing with a master manipulator…

This strikes me as a glass-half-empty interpretation. Why is the stuff from the blog post necessarily machiavellian and manipulative? I didn't read any of that into that blog post. Rather, it was about how to create win-win situations where the people involved genuinely enjoy each others company. No need for bad intentions here.

Re: My stages of learning to be a socially normal person

#169

Post by bad_haircut72 »

mcdeltat wrote: post #157
zozbot234 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of normal people may routinely act charming and game social interactions, but they generally aren't being "manipulative" in the process. "Manipulation" is really just a polite word for routinely lying and BS'ing people on the off-chance that they are going to be fooled and/or not want to call you out on it. If you're reasonably socially skilled, you can usually see it coming a mile away and react accordingly, b…

So for the same set of actions, it's fine if you're unaware of the underlying mechanisms, and manipulation if you are aware? If you dig through the weeds of it you can argue just about everything we do socially is manipulation. We are social because we're social animals and will die without help from other humans (well, particularly thousands of years ago). At the end of the day, we are nice to people to get things f…

"we are nice to people to get what we want" is flat out not true. We are nice to people because cooperative societies out performed the non-cooperative ones on the macro level. On a micro level this kind of attitude sometimes/often prevails, we call the people who act like this "jerks", and the people who try to justify it with these kinds of rationale "sociopaths", because to the group as a whole its so incredibly damaging, and to the individuals on the other side of it, insufferable.

Re: My stages of learning to be a socially normal person

#170

Post by scandox »

etangent wrote: post #72
Aurornis wrote: post #47

This post wasn't what I was expecting from the "socially normal" title. While there is a lot of self-reflection and growth in this piece, a lot of the points felt more like learning how to charm, manipulate, and game social interactions. Look at the first two subheadings: > 1: Connecting with people is about being a dazzling person > 2: Connecting with people is about playing their game The post felt like a rollercoa…

> a lot of the points felt more like learning how to charm, manipulate, and game social interactions. A lot of stuff "normal" people do is charm, manipulate, and game social interactions. Except because they are not conscious about it, we give them a pass. One of the characteristics of autistic-spectrum individuals is that they must make a conscious effort to achieve goals that are achieved unconsciously by most of u…

That is a mistake I think. Many 'normal' people who grow up (emotionally) make a conscious effort not to instrumentalize their social interactions even if they do know how to do it. Certainly with friends they aim to be authentic.

I think emulating things that a serious person discards is a step backwards.

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