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Basic Social Skills Guide (2012)

improveyoursocialskills.com

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Re: Basic Social Skills Guide (2012)

#191

Post by filoleg »

username90 wrote: post #108
Madmallard wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would you say is the right behavior in that situation, then?

You have to know the person to be sure they are ok with it. If there is any uncertainty then don't be honest about what you think, just give the standard advice like "Just be yourself" or "You are wonderful, just haven't found the right one yet!". The alternative is to just be brutally honest and that way filter out friends who aren't ok with it. It might hurt a bit, but if you value this kind of communication over h…

>The alternative is to just be brutally honest and that way filter out friends who aren't ok with it.

I found the inverse to be even more valuable. Finding friends who are not afraid to be brutally honest with you when the situation calls for it is difficult, but worth it so much. Just make sure you actually can receive this kind of criticism first without taking it as a personal attack.

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide (2012)

#192

Post by dustingetz »

rollerboi wrote: post #90
wallflower wrote: post #53

While some of you may make light of the fact that I am giving you advice, my single most important piece of advice to people who are highly analytical and/or always solving problems is to not give unsolicited advice to friends, family, acquaintances, or even strangers. People will ask for advice if they really want it. People are not “broken pieces of code” begging to be fixed. I’ve lost friends over this, until one…

I've been working on this since I noticed it in myself a few years back. It's really difficult because I'm the "problem-solver," but I'm also the person that people want to vent to. So I've come to realize - After a friend/coworker shares something that they're sad/angry about, my standard MO is: 1) Say something like "Wow, that must really feel terrible. I'm sorry to hear that!" (I always feel the need to add more t…

I think you can skip #2, if you're trying to help then this is about them, it's not about you, so probably the word "I" can be removed from your vocabulary for the rest of the conversation. Algorithm for nerds is: ask questions, repeat back what you heard. Also works in sales!

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide (2012)

#193

Post by ljm »

hysan wrote: post #189
ljm wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m a coach in training and question number 3 there is a powerful question. That’s a really great question to ask because you’re not getting involved in the topic, you’re not giving them ideas, and you’re not working through it for them. The others are too nuanced to easily explain, but “what are you going to do with that,” is a fucking fantastic question when a friend confides in you. You’re right that this requires…

This is a great teaching technique as well. It opens the door for students to realize that they can attempt to solve a problem on their own. You also gain more insight into what roadblocks they are running into and what to really focus on. They also get to practice conveying their thoughts and in some cases, this builds confidence as they might find that they were much closer to the answer than they thought.

This is classic mentoring. The difference between mentoring and coaching is that as a mentor you will offer answers. As a coach, you will offer none. In both cases you’re giving them the ropes but in the first you’re holding their hand around them.

And as a teacher, you are telling them.

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide (2012)

#194

Post by cliffdover »

wallflower wrote: post #53

While some of you may make light of the fact that I am giving you advice, my single most important piece of advice to people who are highly analytical and/or always solving problems is to not give unsolicited advice to friends, family, acquaintances, or even strangers. People will ask for advice if they really want it. People are not “broken pieces of code” begging to be fixed. I’ve lost friends over this, until one…

I'm taking notes.

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide (2012)

#195

Post by AnimalMuppet »

wallflower wrote: post #53

While some of you may make light of the fact that I am giving you advice, my single most important piece of advice to people who are highly analytical and/or always solving problems is to not give unsolicited advice to friends, family, acquaintances, or even strangers. People will ask for advice if they really want it. People are not “broken pieces of code” begging to be fixed. I’ve lost friends over this, until one…

With my wife, when she was upset about something, I'd tell her how to fix it. That... didn't go well. Eventually, I learned to just let her talk, and for me to say "Uh huh", for about five minutes. Then I could tell her how to fix the problem. But I had to listen for five minutes first.

Note well: Five minutes worked for me talking to my wife. For person X talking to person Y, the correct time may range from 0 to infinity.

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide (2012)

#196

Post by 127 »

wisty wrote: post #43

Why are social skills always focusing on the positive? A lot of programmers often seem to be more nice guys than anything else, and need to be able to be more assertive / aggressive. Everyone tries to distinguish these two, it's mostly just in the eye of the beholder - IMO aggression is just assertion when it's judged to be inappropriate or incompetently done - a drill instructor being assertive looks different to a…

Yes, this is pretty much it. Learning how to be assertive without looking weird, creepy or a lunatic. It's just a lot of practice.

Most advice given to men how to be more socially adaptive is actually advice how to best be taken advantage of. It has nothing to do with their own best interest.

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide (2012)

#197

Post by filoleg »

kempbellt wrote: post #115
throwaway0xb wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty incredible exchange you are having with people right now where you are just straight up ignoring valid points or sweeping them aside as idealism...

Think of it as a free lesson in self-advocation if you'd like. I'm engaging in the conversation by bringing my points to the table. I see it as an idealistic proposal that doesn't match my understanding of reality. It is very plausible that I am wrong - please explain to me how you disagree, I'm happy to listen. Seriously. Just because someone has an idea doesn't mean I have to immediately agree with it or like it. F…

>Just because someone has an idea doesn't mean I have to immediately agree with it or like it. Feel free to disagree with me on this, as it would prove my point.

Exactly. I am very happy to be proven wrong, given the arguments against my position are good. A lot of people shy away from criticizing ideas, thinking that a person will take it as a personal attack (gotta admit, I am guilty of this too, if I don't know the person well enough to assume they take criticism well).

When it is the fight for the best idea or solution, I don't care how wrong I am, I care about finding the "truth" aka the best solution given the situation. As long as the criticism is directed towards the idea and not the person, I am just as happy, regardless of whether my idea won or not (as long as the idea that won had better arguments for it).

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide (2012)

#198

Post by exhilaration »

cwkoss wrote: post #168

I read some "pick up artist" literature in college: about two thirds of it is misogynistic garbage, but the remainder has some good tips on general platonic social interaction (and a major issue with insecure men is learning to interact with women in a casual platonic way without acting odd and creepy because they are hoping for more). - If you aren't good at speaking in a captivating way, literally write out your be…

Your link to the Cube is great but how do you bring this up in a conversation? I'm trying to imagine being in a social setting, after having a long conversation with someone that's starting to peter out, and then ask, "So I've got a funny question: First I want you to imagine a desert...".

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide (2012)

#199

Post by AnimalMuppet »

twoquestions wrote: post #30

I fundamentally disagree with the thesis of the "Overcoming Fear and Social Anxiety" page. For example, laugh at a dongle joke in front of a journalist or some other influencer who's sneaky with a camera and a million followers, your career is over, if not your life depending on how nuts their followers are. Nearly everyone you meet is out to get you, and a social misstep is a fabulous casus belli. We're all politici…

If you really think that's true, you shouldn't have posted this. Because, you know, we're all out to get you, and you just gave us ammunition...

[Note well: I am saying this to point out that I think that you don't actually operate in agreement with your statement here. I think that's good, because I think that your statement here is mostly wrong and often harmful. I say this because I'm actually trying to help, not because I'm out to get you.]

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide (2012)

#200

Post by JimboOmega »

altonzheng wrote: post #163

Another perspective (I learned from a therapist), is that we might already possess the innate ability to be great conversationalist, it's just performance anxiety that gets in the way. So for me, as someone who consumed loads of self-help material without much improvement, it wasn't about learning more skills or anything, it was about giving myself permission to be dumb, boring, lame, and still accepting myself at th…

It's important that this applies to virtually any endeavor, from coding to being social or dating.

You are going to be dumb, lame, awkward, etc at pretty much anything you haven't done before; the only path to not being that way is to just tough it through that awkward phase.

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