some NT's do not want get involved in a serious conversation

Post Reply New Topic

Most NT's do not want to get involved in a serious conversation. Why is this? Is it their logic? It's our trait we want to speak only about ourselves... but if we listen to them, its never about us... Its almost as if they don't want to hear what we have to say. I'm not speaking about anything personal, just about news...

I tend to do serious conversation stuff at the wrong time. LOL! I tend to talk about finances freely while my family are all hush hush (IMO EVERYONE'S money is tight in this day and age with how the economy is in America SHEESH!! !! !! !) I also tend to bring up " Oh I puked last night" while sitting at the dinner table. I remember mentioning I had to do a urine test and something sex based once and my sister said SHOOSH! I should be saying that in the restaurant. Also while haveing a family get together a relative mention a spider bite and I replied oh that's nothing (HEY I couldn't see it and I've seen WORSE on documentary's!) My sister said oh she saw something worse on tv before or something and backed me up thankfully so the whole try to have a conversation think backfires with me ALOT!

serious conversation crosses barriers between people, barriers between "public" and "personal" business, that are obvious to NT, but invisible to aspies.

could be apprehension if you talk about something they don't know about...there's so many different situations, it's hard to say.

i don't you think can generalize. i'm NT and i have an aspie friend who i talk to about 30-40 minutes several days per week. i wish it was more time but we have constraints. he always wants to talk about what he learned on wikipedia. he remembers everything, he's brilliant, and he expects me to know all this random yet interesting stuff i can't possibly remember in my deficient NT brain...
when i want to talk about serious personal matters like why he keeps forgetting to bring back things i loaned him or why he wouldn't change his bus schedule by 10 minutes to be a bit spontaneous, or why it's been 3 weeks since i told him to bring me all his dirty laundry so i can wash it for him, etc... he just stares at me blankly and changes the subject...
everyone's different...

I find most people only want small talk and with the very few people I am comfortable discussing what ever comes into my head I tend to anaylise my thoughts out loud as I go which makes other people seem exhausted or uninterested by it.

The only person who doesn't get so put off by my analytical out loud thoughts / observations or areas of current interest is my gf so luckily I get alot of air time with her and some pretty good input, which I really appreciate and I really like some of our indepth talks - even so, she does point out that my conversations are very one sided.

I get really frustrated if I am close enough to someone to talk but they try to change the subject to something more small talkish or they don't seem interested.

One element is what I call "the secret language of idiots." About 98% of the earthly population learns this as a native language, long before they learn Standard English. Some never learn Standard English at all. The words all sound the same as they do in English. The grammar and sentence structure are identical. But the words themselves are meaningless; THE ISSUE IS NOT THE ISSUE. EVER. The words are nothing but a vehicle for the actual, intended messages, which are NOTHING BUT SNARLS AND COOS.
The basic rule is: "If you like me, you must agree with everything I say or do, no matter how stupid. If you do not like me, or if you are angry with me, you are morally obligated to argue with me, even if the topic is the color of the sky."

Another element is that it's all about flow. Nobody cares what you say as long as you maintain the rhythm. It's kind of like a dance.

And that 600 pound gorilla -- Nope. It's not there. Even if it's eating your lunch.

When I read this, at first I wanted to shrug sheepishly and change the subject... we're playing the Aspies-can-do-no-wrong game, and you're messing it up. Then again... When I get in a situation that's slightly confrontational and uncomfortable, I can't think fast enough to answer both correctly and gracefully. In your friend's case, the bus thing sounds like a common Aspie thing. How much time ya got to listen to that explanation? Returning things -- I stink at returning library books. Partly genuine bad memory that I think is forgivable, partly just plain lazy. Sorry. How much is the fine? The laundry thing could be complicated. Is that a standard procedure between you? Maybe there's some element -- some personal issue that he doesn't know how to approach, and you caught him unprepared... It's hard to put a new thought together quickly enough. Now, if you want to hear one of my favorite rants...

That's what's so great about the internet. You can always find someone to share a good rant.

Last edited by Tahitiii on 21 Mar 2009, 1:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I agree I don't get the whole personal business stuff LOL! Also I do think me talking about stuff my parents don't know about upsets them for example when I was learning Psychology in College I'd come home and say I learned X and there response was oh (as if it didn't matter) and yet grade school it's mommy I can spell cat C-A-T good child BUT in adulthood the behavior of loving to learn is frowned upon. I also think questioning my Psychology teacher on every psychology topic under the sun confused her which I only found out later from someone that "the Psychology teacher didn't know how to answer my questions so she was avoiding me so she didn't have to answer my questions." How discouraging I guess just because you have a high degree I shouldn't expect you to know everything. I know perhaps I should look at people with degrees as stupid!! ! LOL! Nah just kidding!! ! But looking on it why bother questioning you if you don't know the answer and YES just because that P.H.D is on your wall I EXPECT YOU TO KNOW PSYCHOLOGY INWARDS AND OUTWARDS!! !! !! !!

hmmmmmmmmm
your fine.
We all have questions, god knows I pestered my teachers enough!

but I guess nobody can be an expert on everything.

Except me, of course, I'm practically perfect in every way!

Neither I do think NT's want much serious conversations, which makes me feel quite lonely. It's one of the barriers between me and NT's, I can do small talk, if I do my best, but I definetely don't like it. This fact makes it for me ununderstandable why NT's like it, I just don't get that.

You can say ''You see? Yet again anti-NT propaganda and hatred'', or anything (Which wasthe case some months ago). It's not true; it's just what I see when I look around, in my class but also in other occasions.

Social grooming.

@ OP: Can you be more specific? I'd had tons of deep conversations with NT's. You're probably not doing it at the right time. Like if you're at a bar and you're hitting on a chick, then mentioning that your mom died a year ago isn't appropriate. Not that you did, but it's just an example...

actually, as an NT, i'd much rather talk about mom dying than about something only an aspie can wrap their brain around (like chaos theory or 15th century economics in europe...)

^ Yeah that's another possibility The OP could be talking about some obscure interest that most people can't relate to.

95% of NT communication tends to be about topics of immediate relevance, usually in a joking or informal manner.

They are perfectly capable of 'serious' conversation, it's just that entertainment and social bonds are the underlying motivations for their interactions, and neither of which are best served by 'serious' conversation.


Just because I'd rather talk about anime, and they'd rather talk about homework, doesn't make my observations about the progression of the a particular director's style from experimental to refined, then the subsequent decline any more 'serious'.

...but it is likely to be appreciated by a smaller audience, whereas homework is applicable to all of the students in the group.



I've gotten better at smalltalk in the last year or so. My biggest goal is to gain friends, and therefore be alone for less time, and feel better as a result Being able to perform smalltalk well aids me in that goal. It's the same motivation as an NT's (social bonds), but I just don't find the means as entertaining.

LOL

Oh, dear. I just had this discussion with my Aspie b/f this morning.

What an Aspie considers "serious" and what an NT considers "serious" may be 2 different things.

I long to have "serious" conversations about how the human brain works and how to incorporate the practices of one religion into another and the Integral Philosophy of Ken Wilber and Psychology and so forth.

But he wants to have "serious" conversations about cars and computers and every single thing he did all day from the time he left the house to the time he got home.

I don't like small talk. But the topics he wants to talk about seem like small talk to me. Last night we almost had a meeting of the minds when we discussed the intimate lives of inanimate objects!

LOL