Social anxiety isn't about being liked • Hacker News Board

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#181

Post by dyauspitr » Sat, Oct 04, 2025, 3:46 PM UTC

dfxm12 wrote: post #61

starttoaster wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why did it put you off? Did you not understand the intention behind the words, or were the words unforgiveable despite their intention?

Not OP. It's not about the words or the intentions, it's about the fact that we can talk about anything in the world, do any activity together, and you want to do something I'm not comfortable with. That said, I understand relationships are about give and take. I couldn't be in a romantic relationship like this, but I'll indulge my friends or my cousins. I have a friend who engages in "countersignaling" often. Our co…

It’s 100% about intention. The whole premise of male ribbing depends solely on intention, and you can always tell the person’s intention.

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#182

Post by Mithriil » Sat, Oct 04, 2025, 4:00 PM UTC

I like seeing something along the line of constructive logic in the wild (i.e. not (not p) != p).

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#183

Post by elevatortrim » Sat, Oct 04, 2025, 5:01 PM UTC

nico wrote: post #126

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…

This is not a full solution, but it really helped me; the book The Charisma Myth Every chapter has exercises that help deal with social anxiety Even doing just the 3 basic recommendations in the intro can be very impactful

Thanks! Checking this out now...

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#184

Post by elevatortrim » Sat, Oct 04, 2025, 5:03 PM UTC

tutanosh wrote: post #66

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…

You have the fear of being judged; the antidote is realizing that most people barely notice you, it just feels like they do because you’re self-conscious around new people.

I believe most people barely notice me but how do I realise this?

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#185

Post by zkmon » Sat, Oct 04, 2025, 5:06 PM UTC

smeej wrote: post #166

zkmon wrote: post #97

A person's existence is made up of what others think about the person and how the person relates to them. There is hardly anything else to make up the existence for the person. You are just a collection of perceptions about you, and your relations with the world. Even your money and assets are only as a valuable as seen by the world around you. You look trendy and stylish only because you align with the trends of the…

Have you no interior life at all? Nothing that matters to you even if nobody else knows or cares that it does? This is one of the bleakest, most discouraging comments I think I've ever read, and it's hard for me (in a sad way) to believe anyone might actually mean it.

There is nothing bleak or discouraging in what I said. This is true for even inanimate things on Earth or in the Universe. There is hardly any absolute existence of anything. Try to describe an alien life form. All your description is nothing but list of relations between that life from and things that you know about on the Earth. Things like, size, color, weight, shape - everything is a relation to some referential unit or frame. Things come into existence by relating themselves to the already existing worldly things.

If a thing can't be described, it simply doesn't exist.

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#186

Post by elevatortrim » Sat, Oct 04, 2025, 5:09 PM UTC

jm__87 wrote: post #157

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…

Maybe it's just me but this seems pretty normal? I don't see myself as having social anxiety, but I am probably more reserved than what you described.

Perhaps it is normal, it has been a great challenge my whole life.

Every new school, new job, new environment has been a struggle until I made friends in natural ways (either I had to wait someone approached me, or it has been through activities like shared home work etc.)

But moving to a new country has been a disaster in terms of relationships. I'm already very anxious, but I now need to approach people in a foreign language and there's no school-like environment where relationships form naturally. Clubs and events do not help as they are at most an hour a week so nothing like the school.

I am sure there are many people like me, but I doubt it is the majority. I am just back from my kids birthday and as far as I could see, among 20, there were only one or two other adults who did not speak to anyone, majority somehow has less challenge.

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#187

Post by elevatortrim » Sat, Oct 04, 2025, 5:12 PM UTC

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…

What you say about "extroverted" is interesting, because I do not see myself as an introvert. Once I am familiar with the people around, I am social bee, very chatty, energised by speaking with others etc. I crave social relationships but I can't find or start them.

My wife is exact opposite. She is an introvert who does not have a problem with approaching people. Relationships drain her energy, she can't chat to even a close friend for more than a couple of hours, but approaching a complete stranger when necessary or she wants to? That's not a problem for her at all, she just does not usually want it, and she loves her alone times.

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#188

Post by throwaway295729 » Sat, Oct 04, 2025, 5:24 PM UTC

lokimedes wrote: post #91

cortesoft wrote: post #3

I hadn’t heard the word countersignaling before, but it matches something I had observed many years ago. My closest groups of friends always make so much fun of each other. We make negative comments about the worst traits about each other, the things that we are most self-conscious about… yet every time my friends make fun of me for something I worry about, I actually feel better and more comfortable with myself. Whe…

That may be an interpretation. Another is that many have difficulty regulating their feelings, and “venting” the discomfort in this semi-controlled manner is a socially acceptable release because it invites others to do the same to you, and you all minimize the risk of catastrophic attacks under tension.

Yes! I’ve noticed that when people struggle to manage their emotions, it often comes out in a kind of jabbing or teasing way. It’s usually not really about the other person, it’s more a reflection of their own insecurities. For example, the guy jabbing his friend for being short is probably not that tall himself and may feel insecure about it deep down. There could be some unprocessed feelings around it. The genuinely tall person usually couldn’t care less. The thought of making that jab doesn’t really even surface lol

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#189

Post by h14h » Sat, Oct 04, 2025, 5:27 PM UTC

abxyz wrote: post #47

The problem with using clinical phrases to describe normal behavior is demonstrated in this post. "Social anxiety" has a specific clinical meaning that is not covered by this post. The post is actually discussing a very natural and rational nervousness that normal people have in social situations. The post is providing a way of thinking about that nervousness that can help reduce it, for the nervous person's benefit,…

I didn't get the sense that this article was trying to help people rationalize away social anxiety. Rather, it seemed much more that it was trying to get the socially anxious to accurately assess the nature (and effects) of their reactionary behavior.

IMO it's a useful first step, as a major facet of treating anxiety disorders with CBT involves challenging negative thoughts and beliefs and replacing them with positive alternatives.

Properly understanding that your anxious lizard brain is (successfully) trying to protect you from the threat of being disliked helps reframe that behavior in a positive light.

Re: Social anxiety isn't about being liked

#190

Post by eszed » Sat, Oct 04, 2025, 5:47 PM UTC

trogdor wrote: post #179

smeej wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> sometimes outgoing autistic children develop social anxiety after their peers reject them repeatedly. As a middle-aged woman who can't figure out what the benefits would be that would outweigh the costs of pursuing formal diagnosis at this stage, I related a lot harder to that line than I wanted to. I've always been extraverted. I always do fine in new interactions, because I'm chronically interested in anything I…

> after about the fourth interaction, something about me registers as "off" to other people and they start to distance themselves from me. I have never understood why I’m not sure it would be helpful, but have you tried asking anyone?

Speaking strictly for myself, it's because I did eye contact wrong.

As a teenager, with standard-issue high-function ASD eye-contact aversion: fake it, by looking only at the bridges of people's noses.

After learning, from doing theatre, that vulnerability is amazing, actually, and eye-contact is powerful: try for it, by looking fixidly at one of their eyes.

After being told by a kind friend, in my early twenties, that I had a "staring problem": shift focus between both of their eyes.

Soon after: figure out that you're supposed to look away from their eyes sometimes.

Since: try to pick up and match their gaze-rhythm. I still have difficulty doing this with some people: there are folks who don't seem to have a rhythm. I don't get them!

My wife told me a few weeks ago that when we first got together (over a decade ago) that the times I forgot to mask - during sex, specifically - sufficiently weirded her out that it's why she broke up with me (for about twenty minutes, lol; she reconsidered on her own). Now, bless her, she says she likes it when I "stare", because she says she knows it means I'm comfortable with her and feeling relaxed.

I've got other peculiarities - and some I haven't noticed yet, I'm sure! - but that's a big one, and how I've dealt with it. I hope that helps someone.