Social Effort

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My Dad said to me that I need to make an effort socially.

So I tried socialising with the carer of this supported housing and one of the other people living here.

I ended up rambling about infinite parallel universes, meteorology, hexadecimal colour codes and visual impairments, all sequentially.

I found it really interesting, but they said they didn't know what the hell I was talking about and the housemate walked off. The carer interrupted me several times.

I don't get it, how does one socialise??

You have to get the people you are talking to talking about themselves as well. There has to be a level of give and take. For a start, talking about your interests may not have been the best effort you could do. but you really need to get the people around you interested in having a conversation with you by allowing them a chance to open up to you as well. You need to show interest in others as well.

Last edited by aspiemike on 21 May 2013, 3:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

It's difficult. It is difficult because, well, look at it from your perspective--your attempt to socialize was you imparting information that you find fascinating to the other person. So, imagine how you would feel if another person was just talking "at" you, and you were not really able to talk about any information that you had. Your mind would kind of wander off, probably. I imagine that this isn't how most people feel in regular socialization, because most people seem to like listening to other people? But, in a situation like that, with specialized information, I think other people are going to get lost and have their minds wander, if they're not given an opportunity to offer input.

So, instead, you would say, "something something something, infinite parallel universes......" and after making a point, offer the social cue of, "What do you think?" or, "Have you heard of this?" Then, they say what they think, and you respond with something relevant to that. Such as, "Oh, I think I saw a news report on something something something parallel universes. Like that?" and you reply, "Well, not exactly like that. Actually, it's more like *blah blah blah*"

It doesn't feel natural to interrupt your train of information for someone else, I know. But the only way to make it "conversation," at least I've found, is to deliberately add these "okay, now it's your turn to talk" social cues.

Socializing is not talking about what interests you ... it is about listening to what interests others and pretending that you are interested.

I think NTs actually are interested in other people's minutiae, but I'm not sure why.

I think we have a hard time with conversation because, much of the time, we fail to fully understand it's purpose, and therefore tend to not give a s**t about it. I find it helpful to try to frame small talk in a way that makes it interesting to me personally. This is pretty simple to do for those close to me. I care about them. They care about what they're talking about. By extension, I care about what they're talking about to a certain extent. It doesn't really bother me too much to do this, because I know they do the same for me.

This is a little bit more difficult with strangers and acquaintances. However, they both enjoy and derive comfort from it, and I usually don't mind indulging them. I consider it my small kindness to them, even if they don't necessarily see it that way. Just express an interest in what they care about. They do put up with our narrow and obsessive interests, after all.