It’s also possible that she was being entirely truthful and sincere; but wasn’t in a good position to provide advice because she had never actually run into the problem as a serious issue.
That’s the trouble with cheery people-people who just want to help. Their motivations are good; but their knowledge of what not being a cheery people-person is like can be pretty tepid. It seems to be a problem that catches the ‘empathetic’ types all too often.
It feels exactly like empathizing; but if you can’t stop yourself from projecting onto the target before you start empathizing, you basically end up ignoring them entirely and just basking in the warm glow of your own internal state. Comforting; but minimally useful.
About a decade ago I shaved my beard and a 20ish guy at work literally stopped dead in his tracks and stared. I said, “yeah, Jean, what?” and he said - I kid you not - “You look so different - you look… young”.
This can be a LOT of fun, by the way. And shockingly, you will often get smiles back. But then again I’m mostly smiling at women, and I’m WICKED cute, so I mean…
Whoa. Perhaps I overloaded the phrase. Drop two for reasons, but let’s just say twenty something of us would jump on a plane at a moment’s notice to help and comfort each other. We have, and will continue to.
Still feel lonely as hell, but I’ve relegated that to the same realm as feeling hungry or anxious.
In a way, I also sympathize with the cheery people-people in this situation. They see you feel bad and honestly want to help, but lack the appropriate tools and often just can’t grasp what the basic problem even is. Which leads to another classic line, “sometimes I feel sad too”. Yeah, when I’m lying in the hospital with two broken legs, it doesn’t really help to know you stubbed your toe once.
My dad, now in his seventies, has a mustache ever since he could grow one (mostly to piss off his own dad, supposedly). A few years ago, he shaved it off just for funsies, and it looked so… odd. Like “not my dad” odd.
I’m a bearded guy myself, and whenever I ever shave for some reason, I don’t look like myself. Like in the babyface meme.
Not knowing when to speak. I moved around and switched schools a lot as a child, so I never developed long term relationships, or a proper sense of how to approach someone I didn’t already know. For a while this meant that I jumped into other people’s conversation to give my two cents as soon as there was a pause, because I was that desperate to talk and be heard. This did not end well, as I was 1. an interloper, and 2. a bit of a know it all. Realizing that my two cents were unwanted, and in many cases unnecessary, so I stopped myself from inserting where I felt it would be impolite. However, without a direct way of connecting to people, I turned to indirect contact, to singing through the halls of my high school. I wasn’t terrible, but I wasn’t great either, and soon it attracted negative attention, which I felt, so I stopped. Lacking any outlet, I turned to captive audiences, teachers; often talking to them about an interest that I knew they had, the topic of their instruction. I had a way into a conversation, and I probably talked too much, but leaving school I found myself in a situation where there were no teachers; there were professors, and I talked to them a bit, but they are quite busy people, especially adjuncts. Still I had no way of knowing how to approach my peers unless we were in forced proximity (room mates, neighbors, etc. etc.)
Then came the phones, the damned cell phones with texting, good lord, TEXTING. If ever a person is bored, they can pick up their phone and have a conversation with someone they know. There’s no pause, no ‘in’ for a conversation, no way not to interrupt. I feel like you build up a pool of friends growing up, and then you have them forever, with no reason to reach out ever again, but what if you never had any? Are you doomed?
2… Not knowing what to say. Supposing there is a moment where a person isn’t on their cell phone, what does one say to them? How does one find out someone else’s interests when you can’t just say, “what are you interested in?” without sounding mad. How do you hold someone’s attention long enough to make a connection if they have the option of walking away? Without clubs or discussion topics, how do you breach the silence?
I am not always talking about something that I am passionate about. But I can talk in public because I am supposed to be there and talking to people. I am not having to validate and justify why someone should listen to me rather than speak themselves. I am not showing off: I am on the timetable, and I am getting my time-slot like the others.
Conversations with your peers: there are no rules in the arena. All bets are off.
I blush every time I speak (and post) anything. I’m not sure if it is fear of judgement or anxiety or shyness or whatever. It doesn’t stop me from speaking and I’m not self conscious about the blushing, it is just something that happens.
I think I come off as aloof to most people, but that could be because I have moderate face blindness and I can’t recognize a person without context other than appearance. I usually have listen to people talk for a bit before I even know who the person is. I don’t approach people or start a conversation with someone who knows me because I may be talking to the wrong person by mistake. I end up making friends with the strangest person in the group, mostly just because I can differentiate them easier and they are much more interesting then the rest. It ends up just being too much work to figure out who is who that I mostly don’t bother anymore.
Anybody thinking that shyness is some sort of social disorder that a person needs to fix is irritating to me. I think if one is not able to communicate with anyone then that is a problem, but otherwise I prefer a world where not everyone is metaphorically shouting “pay attention to me” all the time. I’d rather have a meaningful conversation with one person than string platitudes together to be able to fit in with a group.
