Quite honestly, you very well could blame social skills on your "incompetence" because it directly affects your performance in a given situation, especially if you are being watched or working in a group. For Most of us our social skills would be fine if the fear didn't get in the way.
This is so true. Back when I lived on campus, I enrolled in a self defense course hoping that it would be fun and I would gain confidence from it. Actually the opposite occurred. There were about 20 students in that class, many of whom were social and highly talkative. I was one of the few quiet ones. When we were practicing the moves, I feel so retarded because I couldn't keep up with the instructor. I was so nervous when the instructor told us to perform in front of each other. I didn't do my best and felt like hiding. There was a girl from my dorm whom I didn't recognize at first, because I never spoke to her. THe girls in my dorm didn't like me, so I tried not to bump into them as best as I can. That girl looked at me with venom in class, but I thought I must be imagining things. When I got back to the dorm, I heard someone yelling something like "I'm gonna beat you up" outside my door (it's been 5 years so those may not be exact words, but it was something along those lines). This girl also said something about kicking me. As if I wasn't already anxious enough.
And in self defense class, she kept telling people to ignore me. One time, her friend lent me an equipment and she got angry. SHe told her friend to not lend anything else to me. Then when I got out of class, she told people negative stuff about me. So when I needed equipment to work with, people wouldn't lend to me (except for 1 girl who was really nice).
And the worst part was during the individual performance. Everyone has to perform in front of the class. I didn't feel confident at all, nor did I give it my best shot. I was anxious and couldn't wait to get this over with. All our performances were recorded.
When the teacher played back our performance, everyone clapped for everybody, except me. When my performance aired, people were laughing. I heard someone said, "She didn't even try" and someone else said, "yeah..." The girl who told people to ignore me turned around and smirked. At that moment, I feel angry and depressed. I was red as tomato, ready to cry.
It's not that I didn't try. I have SA, performing in front of people makes me feel even more anxious so I mess up more. Plus there was that bully in class which only made things worse. In the end, self-defense course sucked majorly for me. I don't want to be around this many women ever again.
