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Social anxiety isn't about being liked

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Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#141

Post by daseiner1 »

socalgal2 wrote: post #99
BurningFrog wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps this is controversial, but I think this is a mostly male way of expressing affection. Women observing this sometimes conclude that men are horribly cruel to each other.

It's a stereotype that women are directly mean to other women more than men are mean to other men. No idea if there is any data to back that up, only that it's a commonly repeated meme. https://www.google.com/search?q=women+are+just+horribly+crue... There's also culture at play. I don't know if men affectionately dissing their friends is universal but there's plenty of related things like: In Japanese culture you don…

the stereotype is also that when men don't like each other they'll just get into a fight once and move on whereas when women don't like each other they'll tear each other down in extended social and psychological campaigns

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#142

Post by JumpinJack_Cash »

codersfocus wrote: post #133
JumpinJack_Cash wrote: post #70

Social anxiety has to be correlated with deepness, aka the more shallow a person is the less social anxiety they present. Also some fixation with a person/ small group of people in particular and trying to win them over. The less socially anxious people cast a big net and that will cause people who'd like them and dislike them but the net is so big that they simply stick with those who like them.

The reason you feel that way is because social anxiety correlates with anhedonia. The person doesn't engage in playfulness which is the basis of social connection across mammals. Because they aren't playful, you perceive this as "deepness." This cognitive fallacy connecting deepness / seriousness to substance, and connecting playfulness to triviality and frivolity has unfortunately affected me (I remember arguing it…

I have never seen a place more playful than a roulette or a craps table in Vegas, people high five each other, they form groups they trash the casino when the bank wins... but it is very shallow and not very deep, it lasts a couple of hours and then each of the participant go separate ways.

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#143

Post by quesera »

thewebguyd wrote: post #42
elevatortrim wrote: post #34

I have social anxiety and it is completely unrelated to likeableness. I do not think people would not like me, I do not try to avoid people disliking me, that's not the point at all. Quite the opposite, I'm sure I'm an interesting person and I'm confident people would like me if I could take the step. Problem is, there is something that physically prevents me from saying "Hi!" to a stranger. I literally cannot get my…

I have the same exact experience as you. It's like some weird physical barrier, but I can't really articulate the feeling or explain it. The exposure therapy method here doesn't work because "just do it a bunch of times and you'll get more comfortable" isn't even possible for me, I can't "just do it." For me though, it takes more than a few beers to be comfortable approaching someone. I'd have to be completely sloshe…

Make your own decisions of course, but make sure you are fully educated about the risks of MDMA. It is not generally considered to be a dangerous substance. It is illegal though, and moderation is always prudent.

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#144

Post by quesera »

flax wrote: post #69

Neither "wanting to be liked" or "wanting to avoid being disliked" rings true to me, at least as applied to my own social anxiety. I want to avoid being thought of at all. The idea of being liked is just as anxiety-producing as being disliked. Possibly more so. Every relationship with another person, positive or negative, is another cognitive burden to maintain. I would vastly prefer most of my interactions to just r…

This might be therapeutic for you:

The vast majority of people who interact with you in any way, think about you extremely little or not at all beyond the moment of interaction.

We just don't play nearly as big a role in other peoples' lives as we sometimes imagine.

It's the observant and introspective people among us who believe otherwise. Most people are neither.

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#145

Post by bunderbunder »

cortesoft wrote: post #120
Trasmatta wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also the common experience of a bully who always retreats to the defense of "I'm just ribbing you, why are you so defensive?" anytime they're challenged. Making the victim feel like they're the problem.

This is the case for so many things, though. Some people try to be funny but aren’t. Some people think they know how to drive safely but can’t. Some people think they are great programmers but aren’t. This doesn’t mean that there aren’t funny people, or safe drivers, or great programmers. It also doesn’t mean that it’s impossible to KNOW you are funny, safe, or great at something. It is a bit of a paradox, though, th…

If you cause a car wreck, you failed at driving. It doesn't necessarily make you a bad driver in and of itself - everybody makes mistakes - but if you also refuse to acknowledge and own your error then that certainly suggests a lack of competence.

If you ship code that blows up in production, you failed at programming. It doesn't necessarily make you a bad programmer in and of itself - everybody makes mistakes - but if you also refuse to acknowledge and own your error then that certainly suggests a lack of competence.

If you tell a joke that lands disastrously, you failed at comedy. It doesn't necessarily make you a bad comedian in and of itself - everybody makes mistakes - but if you also refuse to acknowledge and own your error then that certainly suggests a lack of competence.

I still don't understand why, for many people, that last point is so much harder to understand than the first two.

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#146

Post by [deleted] »

elevatortrim wrote: post #34

I have social anxiety and it is completely unrelated to likeableness. I do not think people would not like me, I do not try to avoid people disliking me, that's not the point at all. Quite the opposite, I'm sure I'm an interesting person and I'm confident people would like me if I could take the step. Problem is, there is something that physically prevents me from saying "Hi!" to a stranger. I literally cannot get my…

[deleted]

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#147

Post by quesera »

keernan wrote: post #74

I've struggled with social anxiety for years. Just yesterday I discovered that I am unable to visualize mental images such as faces (aphantasia). I have always struggled in social settings where I people will be attending whom I've met on multiple but infrequent prior occasions - and I will recognize that I know them from somewhere but will be unable to place them or their name. This has happened for 40 years when I…

Some people who struggle with this maintain a "personal CRM" system.

Write down some names and notes about people. Re-read them when you're traveling to a place where you're likely to encounter them. Just writing the notes might be enough to solidify the memories for you, but re-reading surely will.

Salespeople do this to feign familiarity, and it's artificial. Don't do that. People you see every few years will not expect you to remember their kids' names or birthdays.

Specifics are often too intimate. But starting with their names, and building on with the simulation of a general memory or two (e.g. "are you still doing a lot of traveling for work?") are fine.

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#148

Post by stldev »

Anyone who has had to contend with social anxiety should be insulted reading this.

Author is trying to frame social anxiety as "rational risk aversion"; it's not. Social anxiety isn't a strategy— it's your brain misfiring and treating normal social interactions as more serious threats. It's not about being liked. It's not about being disliked. At all. Reframing avoidance as "successfully avoiding dislike" just repackages the dysfunction with a motivational poster.

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#149

Post by quesera »

JumpinJack_Cash wrote: post #70

Social anxiety has to be correlated with deepness, aka the more shallow a person is the less social anxiety they present. Also some fixation with a person/ small group of people in particular and trying to win them over. The less socially anxious people cast a big net and that will cause people who'd like them and dislike them but the net is so big that they simply stick with those who like them.

I think this is deceptive. Superficial interactions seem less anxious, but they are not necessarily representative of what's going on inside the minds of the participants.

Learning to be superficial in superficial situations is a good way to fake your way through social anxiety. It isn't necessarily rewarding in itself, but it does smooth over some otherwise awkward scenarios.

Maintaining the balance is critical, and an important aspect of social maturity.

(It's a waste of time, yes! But being comfortable with a little bit of social inefficiency is essential to casual interactions which often have beneficial repercussions.)

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#150

Post by Sparkle-san »

sixo wrote: post #90
elevatortrim wrote: post #34

I have social anxiety and it is completely unrelated to likeableness. I do not think people would not like me, I do not try to avoid people disliking me, that's not the point at all. Quite the opposite, I'm sure I'm an interesting person and I'm confident people would like me if I could take the step. Problem is, there is something that physically prevents me from saying "Hi!" to a stranger. I literally cannot get my…

I find it helpful to think of that physical barrier as your own emotions barring you from entering a state where the uncertainty as to whether you'll be safe grows too high to trust yourself to operate in real time. The problem isn't really being liked or not being liked, the problem is the cognitive overload of trying to predict what will happen and respond to it in realtime, which is sure to set in when one's menta…

> The problem isn't really being liked or not being liked, the problem is the cognitive overload of trying to predict what will happen and respond to it in realtime, which is sure to set in when one's mental model of the potential interaction is very uncertain.

I think is a big piece. I have social anxiety and I have a tendency not to answer with what I'm thinking but what I think they want to hear because it's more predictable. This gets amplified tenfold in interviews. In an interview, I know that they're looking for a specific answer when they ask a question, but also that the answer differs from interviewer to interviewer. It's like there's this sub-process that is constantly running trying to figure out what to say, but in some situations it ends up locking up the system because it's using too many resources due to the constraints.

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