understanding WHY theres a vicious circle

[Marie_knowsbest]

I posted this on a topic and thought some might find some insight in this post.


The truth is. that although sometimes it feels we have no control over anything in the outside world, we actualy have 50% control of what is going on around us. how we percieve events and how we react to them is our control.

What i find with alot of social phobic people, is although i understand perfectly well what its all about and the reasons why they find every social tasks difficult (although half this site will swear blind that im full of shit lol). what i find with social phobic people is that they dont understand the rule of what u give out comes back in, they also dont understand 'the game' in which all of us as people play, which is the u scratch my back and ill scratch urs game. human beings...are users. people have family. they maybe have a few best friends. but everyone else in convieniant, like people who buddy up at work because then they have someone to walk into town with and buy lunch with, its not something planned, it just goes like that, or atleast thats how it starts. maybe u become close, woteva, maybe ya dont. social phobics generally miss the pleasure of that relationship structure, because they are too busy hoping for more, and because it litteraly is a convienience thing, you end up hurting urselfs.

the what u give out comes back to you rule, is all about people treat u how u treat others. if you dont talk to people, people wont talk to you. period. how many people starting a new job have had people introduce emselfs, saying 'hi r u new?' (bit of chit chat) uve replied yeh.. and social phobia kicks in and you sort of aviod contact..and ur reluctnant to approach them at anytime for similair chit chat? then you find after awhile, people have asked u if ur new etc, but people dont talk to you anymore? its because:

1) if you avoid them, or only aswer back one word answers, ur saying to them i dont want to talk.
2) not initiating chit chat with them tells them you dont want to know more about them, ur not bothered. so they in turn think fair enough. and dont bother either.

this is why social phobia is difficult. becuase its a vicious circle. because although you long for love, your actualy sending out the totally oppisite message, that you dont.

It is so important to work on your self esteem when having social phobia, self esteem helps u to learn what YOU want, rather than what you think yu should want. and then allows you to make convienient relationships and meaningful ones, and know the difference.

i know this is not quite what u were on about weatherby, but i thought i would add to it anyways.

 

[TAMPA-BAY]

hi

Hi marie wonderful post but I would like to challenge your view with a response from my point of view.

Most of us probaly know we lacking social skills. We know we should not do this or that. We would not be on this site if we didnt think there was some kind of problem.

So my conter arguement is that We already know about the rules you mentioned. The problem we are realy having is up stream before we get to the conversation with others.

How does one replace old outdated perceptions with newer more efficent perceptions?
How does one replace old way of thinking?

 

[krs2snow]

I agree. SA is about relationships. And relationships start with you. The individual. I can't tell you how many posts I've read on this site with titles like: "I don't like talking to people!" "I think everyone hates me!" "I think I hate everyone!"

To some degree, I understand.

However, my thoughts are: If what you're giving is less than zero, How can you expect Anything more back? And... Why would you?

What do those around you Owe you? Really?

They owe you nothing.

If you can not give.... You should not expect.

Easy enough "Rule" to follow but, it's true. I've noticed in myself that I expect an Awful lot back from those around me.

Is it logical to expect so much back? When I actually give so little??

 

[Marie_knowsbest]

krs2snow - i think u summed up what i was saying 100%. If you put nothing in, you shouldnt expect anything back. Like saying you hate people, then saying why do people hate me? your answering the question with the first statment.

Tampabay - to your questions:

'''How does one replace old outdated perceptions with newer more efficent perceptions?
How does one replace old way of thinking?''

I guess the first thing would be to ask yourself, am i prepered to give 100% into changing? am i prepered to take every knock back until a achieve my goal? like not achiving your goal is not an option. if you answer yes. you have a your starting point.
Then, and i know this is very very hard, would be too start today as if yesterday never happened. its basic psychology to know that we interprete new expereinces using your old expereinces. but try your hardest not too. when a situation arises, use your surroundings to interprete, rather than letting your mind or emotions. try to use logic to begin with. if anyones ever had cognitive behavioural theropy ull know they are really into the term 'whats the evidence'? for example your colluege walks in the room in really bad mood, looks at you and puffs and carrys on walking. you automatic response is to think 'oh god what have i done?'. instead use your logic. well she arrived into work in that mood, ive been IN work...so something must of annoyed her on the way in! this way, ur not feeding into your emotions.
that sounds really simple i know...but be suprised the things u dont hear ur mind saying to u sometimes.

I think secondly, is to occupy your mind with things to think about. i guess alot of you may spend your working day examining the room and atmosphere. dont. think about thing. what shopping do i need? whens this due? what about this? when you fill your mind with purely YOU, your not so occupied with THEM.

Once you get the ball rolling with these things, and u get into it without having to remind yourself, then your ready to move on to trying other things, btw u might realise your ready when u suddenly laugh at something out loud that your thinking about or doing eg when u forget yourself!!! its a great feeling, and thats because your centred, you havent got your head over there where those 2 girls r talking thinking 'r they talking about me'...tbh u probs ent noticed they were there!

once you do all this, and your feeling abit more comfortable in your own skin, which comes back to the self esteem thing and why its imortant, then you can try out striking up some chit chat or looking strangers in the eye, because all else failed, u have ur self esteem to fall back on.

its all reprogramming your mind, i like to think of it 'going back into a mind of a child' because your learning everything again.

ya know. u might never be the life of a party, or the joker of the office, not because theres anything wrong with you, or your shy, but because it ent your style. but atleast you will feel good inside, and know who u r!

 

[TAMPA-BAY]

exellent

First of all I want to say excellent response. I am not going to lie. Its a bit dificult for me when my view point is challenged but look at the result. We are having a friendly disagreement and I also learned something new.

This is what I wish we had more of on this site instead of Me too me too. We all need to vent but its gotten to a point where its like the venting is just takeing us in circles.

Actualy we are realy in agreement when you take a closer look. We all believe that the only path to change...lasting change is by developing or borrowing new wayse of looking at things. The only way to do that is to identify our old rules and beliefs and replace then with a new perception.

The extrovert loud mouth speaks his mind and moves on with out a second though and what do we usualy do? We might say one sentence and spend the whole week analizing it.

The good news tho is that forums like this will force us to at least questions our old rules and standards.

 

[Marie_knowsbestt]

Im really delighted you found something, even if one line that you found useful in my post
when you look at it as a massive picture it looks really complex, if you break it down its systematic.
i agree with the me too you, because it almost reinforces your insecurites listening to other peoples.
i hope if you try this out you see some change in your life.
ive used all these methods myself by the way, it worked for me, but over a very long period of time, of it getting better...worse...better...worse. all in all probs about 3 years? but dont let that put you off. its worth it in the end.

 

[krs2snow]

Aww! Nickie! That is sooo sweet! If only we could believe a word you posted! Perhaps then it would make a difference. As it stands now, you are a habitual liar, so I don't know how much credit I can lend to any of your posts....

Maybe if you go on Chat under MY name things will change??!!

I wish the best for you!


~Krs2now~

 

[Marie_knowsbestt]

your pathetic you know that? how would i be lying about stuff like that? its pretty fucking detailed to be a lie. again, you stalk me!!! everyone here is my whittness.
i already PM'd you back you loser. sayin my name was krs2snowisaslag......lol...everyone knew it was me....lol....sorry how very wrong you are, i was winding u up u gulable cunt.
yes its a lie because u dont like me...that makes it a lie....ok love. good one.
you cant see the good in my post at all can you? you hate me that fucking much that.....your sad old lady...fucking sad.

im 20...your 30+? and ur stalking me around like a little kid saying 'lies all lies mwhahaha'....your fucking sad!!!! u cant even piece together a decent arguement, ur last one was 'woof woof'....honestly like a child.
you proberly havent even got SA, its just the fact that no one fucking likes ya out there, because your a twat. lol.

 

[estelle]

^ seriously, what's with u 2?
8O

 

[MrDooBee]

Thankyou Marie_knowsbestt for the post. I agree with everything your saying and it made me think about a few things .

My problem is that im just scared of people in general so because of that i send off the wrong vibes. Like when a stranger talks to me i am very scared, i have to constantly re-assure myself that everything is alright. A normal person isnt going to understand my reaction, i definately dont look comfortable around them.

My 2c ^

 

[DannieCleo]

I know for my part the reason i sometimes give one word answers isn't because i'm not interested or because i don't want to talk. its because i literally get tongue tied. my words come out wrong or backwards. even just speaking to family, i know i can just stop and start again. i worry if i do that with others they will think i'm stupid or whatever. Plus its alot of pressure to try to think of "interesting" things to say. Alot of the time when people ask how my weekend was, i have done nothing, so i just say "fine" or "ok".

I have only recently got into the habit of asking people the question back (like how are you, how was your weekend etc) because before i was so worried about what my own response would be and what the other person was thiking about me it wouldn't occur to me to ask them until about 5 minutes later. And its the same story with any kind of "small talk". i thik of somehing funny or clever or relevant to say too late. or it is in my head to say it, but i worry it will come out wrong so i don;t say it. To you i may be saying "yes, no fine ok" but in my own mind i am having a full and flowing conversaton. it is exceptionally frustrating.

Its not because i'm too stupid to know the social rules and its not because i'm not interested. A big part of SA and AvPD is constantly worrying about being judged and how you are coming across to others.

Not to mention the countless times i have smiled in greeting or said hello and been ignored. Now fair enough people may not have heard me or been paying attention or had things on their mind. Intellectually i understand that. But my SA/AvPD says they don;t like me/want to talk to me then the whole "rejection" thing kicks in.

Its all well and good to say persevere regardless, but that fear of rejection can be crippling, particularly if you don;t have a positive experience to build on.

Like i said in another post, i will make more of an effort at my job in the new school year. However, i know how some of my colleagues are and i just worry that i will get a negative response, like "she never spoke to us before, why is she bothering now?"

I WISH there was some way i could put the knowledge in their heads that i have SA and AvPD. as it is i am parnoid that if they did know, they would think it was some kind of psychosis and think i was mentally ill in the "real" sense. its not something you can just "announce" until you have built up that level of confidence and trust in someone. Which, for folks with AvPD takes absolutly forever. By which time most folks have given up on us.

I understand what you say when you say people think we are not bothered with them, hence they don;t bother with us. But sometimes i think it is obvious when someone is shy/quiet/itroverted and when they are just rude or don't like people.

I don;t necessarily think its fair for non SA/AvPD people to "give up" on us just because we take a lil more effort to get to know. I mean, if they find it hard to talk to us, how hard do they think we find it to talk to them? And that is just talking about somone who is basicaaly shy, never mind with SA or AvPD.

So yes, i do know it will take some work and effort on our part. But i think its unfair for people who don;t have this problem to simply give up on someone completly just because they are not the life and soul, or assume negative things about someone they don't really know.

 

[Locco1988]

hi its marie, ive exceeded my post limit.

before i start im going to say i am NOT attacking you, i feel i need to say this now, its just how i put stuff accross i guess.

you say its unfair for people to give up you because your shy and your SA, because they dont understand, it is if its purely for this reason yes your right. but one could say its not different than say what your doing. because of SA that you have, you make a negative judgement on others and how their going to behave towards you. we are animals and we sense alot of what going on around us, through intuiation. you cant expect people to be understanding towards your behaviour, when it appears you dont understand theirs. People dont like to feel there thought to be judgemental and unforgiving, if you put this judgement on them (by ur words and body langauge) then there not going to care how they behave towards you, because of how your negativity makes them feel. does that make sense? its not your fault, dont think that i am saying that at all.

But what im doing is taking it outside of the box, im taking the situation out your mind and your perception, and looking at it almost as if were a fly on the wall. how human dynamics work. when examining yourself in society as a social phobic, its more than easy to potray yourself as the victim, rather than a co-memeber of society who is responisibe for ones self.

To free youself from any type of cognitive/anxiety disorder, is to free your mind from a mind of a cognitive/anxiety disorder, which has control other everything u do, and your perceptions.

If you understood the social rules, you would not of said half the stuff u did proceeding that like for example people should ntgive up on those who are shy because your just abit more effort to get to know.
Its not their responsibiliy to make u feel included, its your own to get yourself included. people will only work so hard, and will only meet u half way, other than that, ur concidered 'more hassle than its worth'.
thats not horrible, its social dynamics. people r more inclined to lean towards those who give them more, rather than those who they need to give more too. thats not horrible, its just painfully true.

But i think maye this is something u need to take up with a CBT theropist, because i think u beat yourself up alot danniecleo for things you cant control. i say that as a friend rather than a criticism.

 

[DannieCleo]

7 post limit is stupid(!) i don;t know of any other forum that has it!! At the very least there should be some kind of "countdown" timer that tells you how many posts you have made/have left! ANyone know why that "rule" exists? or is it something the admins have no control over?

anyway, back on topic, and i can only speak from my own personal experience, so what i am about to say will be about me, not generalized in any way.

You make the assumption that the non SA people have made an effort with the SA people in the first place (and now i make us sond like two different species), gotten no or little response and given up.

I still maintain that it is uch easier for a non SA person to ake that little more effort than for someone who is shy (as a on sa person would perceive us to be if they had no knowledge of sa or avpd)

But what i am about to say now relates to my own personal experience. some stuff i say will really identiufy who i am so i pray no one i know is reading this lol (though to be honest i kidnda hope they are!)

When i first started my job in october of 2006 i was replacing someone on materity leave. i did not know that until i started. it would seem that the staff member i replaced was well liked among the other TA's, from what i educed of their interactions when she visited. But i am jumping ahead.

Anyway, people were a basic level of frindly and welcoming when i started, but not in any way i could "work with". For example, when we were all in the staffroom together, they wold be having conversations and not bring me in, either with that "group eye contact" thing or by maybe asking my opinion or whatever. I am not the type to jup into a convo that is nothing to do with me, so i would just sit there grinning into my sandwich like an idiot waiting or someone to address me. never happened.

Another example of how i was ot made to feel part of the team was when we had a little remodelling work done. This meant the medical room being moved to a different saller location. The TA's were upset about that as they considered the medical room their "unoffical" staffroom. This was something i didn;t even know. Surely when yo get a new colleague, you show the, the "lay of the land" and let them know all te little "unoffical" things. I now that seems a rather trivial example, but it was just a symptom of the bigger picture in general. I was not told things like what order the classes went in for lunch and just other general things about the day to day running of thigs. I am the type of person wo doesn;t like to ask (fear of lookig stuoid again) so alot of stuff i just had to figure out myself.

Now there were two TA's in particular who i got the distinct impressin they did not like me. I didn;t take it persoally at the time, because i figured they just missed their mate and would be that way towards anyone who replaced her. Throughout all of this i continued to go to the staffroom and continued to be ignored and treated as though i was invisiable.

At the beginning of this schol year i made the decision to stop going to the staffroom becaue it made me feel so bad to be in there. And we are a small school, so it was a pain to keep finding somewhere to go.

Even though i was ignored when i was there, i got the feeling i was being talked about when i wasn't. (gossipy atmosphere)

Anyway, there are various "politricks" and strata of pollitricks. I am emplyed as a TA but i am a qualifed teacher. I went form a part tim classroom assistant to being put forward as a HLTA (higher level teaching assissstant, which is the higherst a TA can go) very quickly. So i feel like i am straddling two strata.

I persoally feel i get on better with the LSA'a and teachers than i do with the TA's. I also feel like the TA's feel like i am not really "one of them". I wouldn;t say i am "big mates" with the teachers, but at least they don;tmake me feel "pushed out".

Anyway, the poit of my ridiculously long diatrbe!() is that far from them making an effort and giving up, i feel the effort was never made in the first place. I think it should be pretty obvious to them that i am not mean or rude because i smile and say hello ad am helpful and get on with my job. But fro the day i started i was never made to feel like "oe of the team" by any of them by any stretch.

now when people talk to me "normally" (ie not walking on eggshells or treating me like i am suoer sensitive) i am alot better. still quiet, but better. Once i am comfortable i can really open up and be mysef. I always figured that i would have gotte to that poit by now, but i have just never felt comfortable enough.

The children are y saviours as they are the only people i can be my true self around andnot face "jdgement". and hell, sometimes they will tell me to myself that i'm acting the fool or that they don;t like me anymore(!) but i'm cool with that. At least they aren;t gossiping behind my back and at least they accept me asi am without judgement.

And its bad enough to SUSPECT you are being spoken about. To an extent you can dismiss it as paranoia. But on two seperate occasion i heard two different sets of colleagues talking about me. Why don;t they just speak TO me instead of ABOUT me?!??!

I apologise if any typos made this difficult to read(!) but its too long for me to be arsed to go back and correct them!!

 

[Argamemnon]

I think secondly, is to occupy your mind with things to think about. i guess alot of you may spend your working day examining the room and atmosphere. dont. think about thing. what shopping do i need? whens this due? what about this? when you fill your mind with purely YOU, your not so occupied with THEM.

I totally agree! It's strange, but on some other site they were claiming the opposite; that your attention must always be external. Weird..

 

[Locco1988]

i think maybe that was a different thing, maybe to not spend do much time looking inwards, and look more outwards. its wierd because you can be thinking about ur own stuff, but still not be think inwards, like a extrovert whos just in deep thought basicly!!!

well then it sounds like to me that its just unproffesional place to work then? i dont really know how u go about that one. i suppose the only thing u can do is just dont let it bother ya.