How did you learn Social Skills?

Post Reply New Topic

This doesn't refer to really making friends so I thought the friends/social skills board wouldn't work out so I posted on here instead. How did you learn Social Skills? Did you keep making mistakes until you forced yourself to change? Give up trying to fit in (Introvert/no job/etc.) I let my guard down start feeling comfortable at a job/college and that's when I've made mistakes looking at my past. The whole past in the past IMO is BS. Aren't you worried of making the same social mistakes? saying/doing something not normal? Landing you fired/kicked out of College? Sure I can't have fear forever I have to come out of my shell and be happy/me sometime but if that comes at the cost of upsetting people I sadly feel I rather stay in my little bubble closed up. Do I want to NO! but IMO that's better than upsetting more people out in the world.

When I learn some I'll let you know

Practice. Memorization. Lots of failure.

Oh, and patient friendships, one at a time.

Of course the therapy sessions, too.

Practice, practice, practice

The thing with social skills is its soooo wieerrdddddd, the way u think, is like a haze of pictures and feelings, words mix into these thoughts so overall i dont socioalize well. I tried for many months going hard about social skills so i can be normal and cool, the main problem is not showing emotions at the right times and voice tone and pitch at the right timing for what you are going to say or socialize or joke about, it can be complicated, this and your own self esteem and agenda all take part in place and then you get a stress overload of thinking 2 hard and you just like shut down and my mind goes blank and i look stupid. So thats what i go through with trying to socialize, Dont forget the most important part wihich i really cant do without choking up EYE CONTACT AND SMILING, so F*cked.

Learning from experience and other peoples, reading online and reading about AS, they always point out social errors aspies do so I learn it's a no no. Also learning to fake eye contact by looking at someone. Chest is a no no if it's a woman and I wouldn't even look at their crotch, same with males.

Also reading a book on social skills also helps but social skill books for people on the spectrum are expensive. When I went to the autism conference last summer where Temple Grandin did her speech and Tony Atwood, I read this book about social skills and I learned when you are talking, look at the person you are talking to and if they aren't looking at you, it means they are bored and it's time to change the subject.

Trial and error. Expect mostly error.

Working retail for the last few years has helped me immensely. However I still have my days of being utterly socially inept.

Structured activities. For me, being in plays and choirs. For many others, sports or service clubs. Things where you get to interact with people around a special interest. That way, I feel like I have something to offer, and it's almost always okay to talk about a shared interest.

But, boy, I relate to your message. Please let's keep figuring out ways to be ourselves and not shut down because other people would be more comfortable if we did. I've learned a lot of things around this, and I don't have the same urgent despondancy you have anymore. But I still just want to die after I've violated some taboo I don't even understand.

I wholeheartedly agree. The combination of low expectations (at most retail stores) + constant customer contact means you can sort of "practice" contact with others. The good thing about working in a big chain store is that when you can sense the right time, enforcing the store policy is the right thing to do (as opposed to always, or never, enforcing it). It takes a kind of judgement that most Aspies have to master with practice (I'm always working on it)

In terms of social skills, the other way I learned it was from my mother. She realized by the time I was 12 or so that I was not able to "fit in" socially with my peers at school, and she started "training" me on how to talk to them. This included role play ("Hello, how are you today?" "Fine thank you, and how are you?") to literal phone instructions ("Say 'Hello, this is Alex_M. May I please speak to....?' and so on"). Due to nonverbal learning disability, it took me ages to absorb all this stuff. At 25, it comes naturally now, but that was with a good 20+ years of painful social sacrifice!

I just learned another one here. In this thread:

http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt142964.html


When there is a death in the family and they tell you to not come, come. They want you to come but they just want you to do the opposite what they tell you.

See? This is how I learn by reading. Thanks internet.

learning body language through a book, Lie to Me and observation.

Sometimes being way too polite and way too quiet.

I'm not sure how it happened but I don't come across as rude as I once did. I suppose practice, exposure to social situations and learning from my mistakes helped me.
Putting your past behind you is not BS. Just forget what happened and work toward improving yourself. If you keep worrying about what happened in the past then you are more likely to make the same mistakes. Just watch how people interact and try to mimic it.
It's best to get any anxiety under control. And stop thinking you'll mess up. You may but you may actually prove to yourself that you can get better at socialising.

I'm a bit like that too - a few decades ago I started trying to improve myself. By the mid nineties I felt I'd come quite a long way - communication courses, leadership courses, personal development... Then I worked my way through an MBA. Then I discovered there was a thing called aspergers.

That was 2004. I'm mostly over the shock now, although there are still times when I can't believe I was quite that ignorant for so long. There's a race on now for whether I become mildly competent as a social human being or die of old age before I've managed it.

The hard way.

I did a customer service course. That may have helped. I once told somebody that they weren't following the rules properly. I know that it's not socially acceptable to say that but I was happy that learnt something from that course.
Now I find I'm more polite than the people I talk to most. My friends are between 19-38 and have a bit of a mouth on them. Always swearing or saying inappropriate things.

What you can learn Social Skills?

OK I do have them there just not very good.

I call every one trees. so it's like talking to trees that talk back to you.
and some ppl do not like me thanking there just trees.