"You just gotta get yourself out there"

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I agree with what Metal_Man wrote. Simply "getting yourself out there" isn't enough to guarantee an aspie a relationship.

Sound,

No, just a couple of pages on the internet and watched YouTube videos. It has helped me soften my SA to some extent.

Jazz would be my favorite of all those. I play a little bit of it on the piano.

Making myself like things that I currently don’t care about sounds tough. What could those things be?

astaut,

It’s not that I know what to say, but can’t do it out of shyness or something. It’s that I don’t know what to say… to anyone, not just females. Have no idea what would be the right combination of characters to type in a message and send it.

Not knowing what to say is my biggest stumbling block. I am not shy and don't have social anxiety. In many social situations my brain just simply shuts off.

I understand what you mean. I'll admit that by professionals I'm not seen as extremely socially impaired, but my awkwardness (among other things) has been pointed out many times by peers. But, I've found that the best way for me to learn what to say, when to say it, who to say it to, what's appropriate, etc is by putting myself in social situations...usually uncomfortable ones. Sometimes I have to seek out opportunities for this, but sometimes it just means saying 'yes' to an invitation to something that doesn't sound all that interesting to me. (I could give some examples, but I don't think it would be helpful and maybe even boring.)

Hmmmm.... I'm not suggesting you TRY this, but maybe it will give you some better ideas...

I did a student-teaching semester right before graduating college. I once stopped in a gas station for some fuel and good barbecue. There was this BEAUTIFUL girl working there, and at the time I was in a somewhat committed relationship but still stuck on the girl I'd just broken up with. I got to where I'd just make up excuses just to go see her on lunch break and other times if I knew she'd be there. At one point I got her name, and I even found out she going into the army. EVERY SINGLE TIME I meant to ask her out, but I never could work up the courage.

My suggestion is if you have trouble meeting girls (I AM religious, but church has always seemed to me to be a kind of awkward place to ask someone out--not sure why, but it could be all the church girls were either engaged or married), stake out their place of business, find out when your "mark" has a break, and just "hang out." Figure out if she's the kind you can dig, and then figure out what common interests you have so you can get a better meeting with her (as in a date).

There are three types I'd avoid: Bartenders, Baristas at the local espresso joint, and waitresses. Being hot comes with the job, and they'll never take you very seriously. McDonald's and other fast food places are good, just keep in mind that many teenagers also take jobs there--and management/boyfriends/parents might give you a hard time over that one, so proceed with caution.

Something else that could work is a community theater. Funny story: I once met a teenager who was just an all-around beautiful person through and through, if a bit ditsy, but she was a talented amateur actress and singer. Some years later, as she grew into her early twenties, we found ourselves cast opposite each other. Even though I was married by this point, I had to convince her it was OK to make out with me so that kissing scenes in the production wouldn't quite be so weird. Sadly, she started going out with this other guy that had been pursuing her, and I felt somewhat distressed that I was being "cheated" on! My wife, of course, knew about this the whole time, and she never ceased to give me a hard time about it. The point is, it's a great way to meet other people. If you struggle socially, the great thing about taking a theater role is you constantly have someone telling you how to act, so you never have to worry about impressing anyone. Even if that's a problem, you can always be a stage hand. It might take you a while, but sooner or later you'll meet someone.

Same goes for other kinds of volunteer or charitable organizations.

I hope that's been helpful. I had the advantage of meeting my future wife in college, but I like to think if I hadn't been married then things might have been different with that theater chick. The main thing is just be patient.

I can definitely relate to this issue. "You just have to get yourself out there" is a bit of advice that has been offered to me repeatedly pretty much every time I complain to my family about not having a boyfriend... to think of dating in terms of an equation where the number of people you know matters, though, is pretty discouraging to me, because at this point I hardly know anyone. I've been homeschooled for the past two years and have fallen out of touch with pretty much everyone I used to talk to save for online friends (actually maybe fallen out of touch isn't the right way to describe it when my efforts to get back in touch have been ignored).

So for me, it's just the question of "Where do you go to 'get out there'?" complicated by my life circumstances (being a homeschooled high school student).
It seems to me, if you think about it, that the institution of the high school serves not only as a dating service for high schoolers, but one of the only available venues for high schoolers to meet potential dates. For other age groups, the bar or club is standard, but we're too young. For us, it's assumed that the high school is the meeting place, and when you're out of it, you seem to be screwed.

I may end up taking dual enrollment classes at the local community college just to meet guys. How lame, but college seems to be one of the only "getting yourself out there" meeting places available to me that I can think of.

To clarify, I don't propose deciding to be interested in something wholecloth. Instead, try new things until you come across something you like. Or perhaps give some things another chance. But no, you do not have to make yourself like something.

The point is that in the end, it helps greatly if you can find more commonalities with others. They key word there is find. There's a lot of stuff out there.


To butt in, this brings something to mind... This is gonna be kinda hard to explain, I hope it ends up understandable(let alone useful).

When I'm attempting to interact with new people, or trying to talk up strangers, there's a little method that I use that helps things quite a bit, for me. In the past, if I tried to think about what specifically to say or talk about, I'd commonly find myself stymied. There's way too many possible things to say, to the point of overwhelming me and basically shutting down my thought process. Everything therefore becomes nothing.

So the method I sorta figured out was to mentally step back in order to think about things a little more categorically, thereby shedding the details. Instead of trying to think of what to say, I think about categories of commonality, and note patterns in some of those category/situation combinations. Every conversation fits multiple potential topical categories, over-arching moods, effective purposes, interactive styles, etc. They all potentially overlap. Most of those listed categorical examples, I don't actually consciously think about anymore, but at one point, during one phase of my own social 'reboot,' I gained some benefit from thinking a little bit about all that sorta esoteric stuff. But talking with new people is pretty much what's in question here, and it usually ends up having a lot of the same, repeating thematic commonalities, such as purpose, and mood.
Er... wait, I'm digressing already.

What I meant to focus on were topical categories, not so much the other thematics. Because it's the topic, generally, that's the biggest part of the logical/social shutdown for me, although potential moods and convo style sometimes play in to a smaller degree. What I do is look at the person, and take in clues of who they are, gain a basis for assumption and stereotype, which is pretty much immediate and automatic for about everyone. But the point is to not take it for granted, and use that info. Based on that info, I consciously think in terms of what I have in common with this person.

But that's another one of those concepts that's huge in it's implication. Commonality can work on multiple different planes. Hobbies is one of the more immediate planes. But there's other stuff too, like circumstance - where you are, what you're doing, how you feel about that, why you're here. Commonalities can be found there. There's other brands of commonality as well, like perception, emotion, appreciation, blah blah blah. There's lots of different angles to take it at.

But personally, I only tend to pay attention to a handful of them, being the ones I listed - Circumstance, perception, appreciation, emotion. However, I try to downplay hobbies unless that commonality automatically presents itself - It depends on info that usually has to be given, and often times ends up as a dry conversation. But anyways, those upper-level categories is where I try to jump to as a starting point when I'm faced with the unfortunate requirement of turning on social-mode. Is the person paying attention to something you were paying attention to? What do they appear to think/feel about it? Why are they here? What's their mood like, why, and about what?

None of these are related to what you will say to them. This is just info to silently take in for yourself. However, based on those categories, and the rough answers or assumptions you come up with, you can move to the next part of it, where you hone in on a commonality(or perhaps even a contrast) or maybe a group of commonalities to work with. Based on that, you can filter downward into sub-categories of that commonality, which will tend to be much more limited in potential. You make your way down categorical tiers into greater specificity, up to the point you feel like stopping. You can keep it vague and general, or you can get quite personal since it stems from the specifics of both of you. This is why this method works for me, because it imparts a somewhat more clear direction of topic and interaction. It limits the possibilities so that I'm less overwhelmed, and can get back to functioning.

[non-sequitur]This is also why I tend to avoid acquiring new music software and equipment, in order to avoid being overwhelmed by the possibilities, and instead find effectiveness in utilizing the region within limitations.... [/non-sequitur]

On Friday night, I (grudgingly) accompanied a friend to a birthday party where I knew no one but the person I was with, who was unavailable. So that left me alone in a house of complete strangers. Totally uncomfortable, being the impersonal yet visible stranger among a large group friends. But I managed to get conversant with a couple different people by using the above process nonetheless, once I worked up the will to get the ten ton boulder rolling.

First, I noticed a couple, a guy and girl, slightly older than myself, who arrived together, and would talk between themselves. They kept to a corner, and did not appear to know anyone, especially the guy. He kinda looked around a lot, just like me. Commonality. He had nerd glasses, and a sleeve of tattoos, piercings, and sorta cool but mostly lax & comfortable clothes - He's a tech guy, by my guess(and I was right!). Commonality. Both of them were either my age, or slightly older. Commonality. I couldn't read anything from the woman, although they were sticking with each other, so talking to one is talking to both. Not having anything in mind for her was a liability, but I walked up to them anyways, figuring something would present itself that's specific to her. Sometimes you simply hope.

So, I've also got this super opening intro that I've thought about for a long time, and it might not be obvious, and is sort of exotic, so you can call me crazy for coming up with it, but it goes something like this:
"Hi. I'm Miles." Relaxed, interested, smiling. Some eye contact(it's still sorta difficult).

It worked out, and they introduced themselves quickly, apologizing slightly for not doing so earlier(there weren't many people around yet). As it turned out, the woman immediately included me in the convo, asked my opinion on some rule in Tennis. Of course, I didn't know. But the significant point here is that although we make much ado in our heads about the potential for approaching and falling flat, it's also frequently true that people will be interested in talking to you, and will extend a hand to bring you in. I think this is important, because it demonstrates that the glass is, in fact, half full.

...And on a side note, folks, always make an effort to include strangers into your pre-existing group. Spread the love.

So the intro happened, and the tennis convo did it's thing briefly, and I could only say so much. From experience, I knew in advance that if I didn't make something happen quite soon, I'd be phased out, and wither away. The moment there was something slightly akin to topical resolution, and a pause, I jumped in with one of the pre-prepared commonalities. I might have interrupted them, but that's not a big deal. In random conversation, interruption is just not an issue unless it's super flagrant. My point with this is that in order to foster your life within the conversations, you have to be at least a little aggressive with your agenda. You can go with the flow sometimes, but other times, you risk a dead end. So only go with the flow as a conscious decision.

Anyways. The commonality I chose was that they didn't appear to know anyone. But instead of asking if they knew anyone, I simply commented that I didn't know a single soul here, in an animated, rueful tone. I note my tone and animation because in these stupid idle conversations about nothing significant, what you're saying is not so important as how you're saying it. Specifically, a flair for drama can help, and that's what I did to make it conversational. If it came out as 'matter-of-factly' and dry, then it is(for reasons unknown) less engaging for others to include themselves in. Also note that I didn't ask them because that starts off the question/answer pattern. That is a dry interaction to have, and is usually better to avoid. If you run out of questions, then they, following your lead, will stop when you stop, and the convo tends to dry up instead of living it's own life. I find it to be better to state something that can be responded to without prompting, that others want to respond to on their own... Hence the importance of considering tone and animation, and looking for other evocative elements within the topic itself.

In response, as anticipated, the guy admitted that he didn't know anyone else either, spoke a bit about who they knew. To keep that thought rolling, I mined the category further: how I felt about not knowing anyone - It sucks! I talked about that, related another experience with some bit of animation. And he responded with something else.

But after I'd related that, I realized that there wasn't much left in that convo. It was going to dry up real quick. But there were categories to shift to. Rather than scrambling for more material, trying to think about what to say now that nothing was coming to mind, I simply switched categories to something else. In doing so, I place a hard limit on things to potentially say, while having a clearly defined topical category. Due to that, an idea came without much effort. As a side benefit, it also puts you in a position to potentially lead the conversation. People tend to enjoy that, when someone leads a good convo, and includes them. So it makes a good impression, which in turn makes people tend to be receptive and positive-oriented towards your chosen subjects and statements and thoughts and you in general. So if you say something stupid, it could go over a little bit better than it might otherwise. By leading, you take out insurance on your interaction.

But as it turned out, the guy beat me to the punch, and asked me a question, about 'what I do.' As it turns out, that's within the category I was aiming for, as I was going to focus on the fact that we're mostly in the same generation, and will thus have common experience in terms of life phases. @ 28, I'm in what's classically the early career phase.

Unfortunately for me, I'm unemployed(yep, I'm a loser), and it's a fact that I'm quite ashamed of. However, I have learned that whenever one communicates feelings of shame or in-confidence(either verbal or non-verbal), it has potentially DIRE consequences, although subtle, on peoples early impression of you. You teach them how to think of, and respond to you in everything you communicate. Early on, when comparatively few communications have been sent yet, instances of inconfidence can weigh heavily since they don't yet know you fully. So with that in mind, I shifted my tone to that of annoyance and exasperation to my circumstance, but still retaining a mote of confidence in my wording and presentation. In contrast, my gut impulse is to act precisely how I feel, which is embarrassed, and to exude the adjoining body language and speech patterns, like lookin down and away, fidgeting, using kinda-sorta-maybe type words, or euphemisms and hedging. They are tells, and people see right through them, read into them, and judge based on them. Nowadays, I instead come forward rather bluntly and head-on with the embarrassing bits. People's early- or mid-term reception of you could stand to be improved by doing this in particular if you're a chronic apologizer or shy or meek or otherwise low-self-esteem. IMO. That's my background, and I feel that there's a difference nowadays in how people treat me, now that I manage my communications a bit more, and particularly censor my LSE impulses. Also, as I understand it, it serves to help foster real self esteem(as opposed to fake) by decreasing negative self-talk.

After I'd said my piece, I tried to shift the focus over to his circumstance instead of mine for obvious reasons. And that provided a convenient segue to getting confirmation on my suspicion that he was an IT guy. That, in turn, also lead to accessibility into a mode of hobby, as network stuff interests me, at least somewhat. I went down the 'hobby' path for a bit because it had already been confirmed that we shared that, even though though I'd not 'planned' on using it. But the thing about hobby convos is that it's either dry, or it's really fun. It's very unreliable and shifty. This one ended up being kinda dry. But in a way that was a good thing, because that allowed me to move in another angle I'd intended to bring up: His friend. She needed to be included, and letting the convo get more 2-way at her expense is teh suck. So I posed her the same question he posed me. It ended up that I still couldn't find anything in common with her, and most of what we exchanged was a bit dry, but the important part was that she was getting included. If she feels she's included, she might volunteer topics and info that could lead to finding some commonality. If she's not included, she'll simply say nothing, and any potential convo with her dies off completely, along with the potential for feeling comfortable in re-approaching her later.
Always gotta prepare for later.

So there's an example of how I think about and do conversation. It wasn't from a dating setting, but I posit that it doesn't matter: The tactics I use works all the same in either case. It's the same, except that dating convo includes some extra bits, like flirting and comfort progression. And those are their own threads.

This all might come off as un-intuitive, weird garbage, but it fits for me because I'm an analyzer, I think visually(hellooo Venn diagrams), and I am a complete sucker for patterns and systematizing. So for me, it works pretty damn well. That said, I just kinda formulated this while I was typing just now, so it's probably pretty sub-optimal and unrefined yet, and could've probably been presented better. Which is not to say it's fake or imagined; The example is real, and I really do think in these terms, from a top-down categorical perspective. I've just never tried to detail it out before in a communicable fashion.

Er... okay, 'nuf babbling.

Quite right. This is part of why I really dislike the idea of home schooling.
I have never met a home-schooled person who was very socially fluent.
.... That said, I went to public high school, and I wasn't very socially fluent either!

The thing about bars/clubs, though... Really they're not the go-to venues that they're made out to be. Most people meet their spouse at the workplace, or college. I think bars/clubs perhaps get a bit too much attention simply because it's visible, flashy, and a cultural institution or icon, ya know? It's more like a a symbol, a brand-name that rides on it's own reputation more than it relies on efficacy. Heh.

GL on getting some college courses, I think that's a great idea. It'll still be difficult though... I took some college in HS, and I didn't talk to or meet anyone. But that's my fault, I was totally oblivious at the time. You, however, have the benefit of perspective that I did not. I think it'll help you.

And don't fret too much about your limited social environment. Dating in high school is like ... I dunno, the pre-season or something. It doesn't count.

@Sound: "This all might come off as un-intuitive, weird garbage" Actually, I think the thought process you've described is pretty much exactly what NTs do unconsciously. Very nice. (I did find the paragraphs before you actually described the conversation confusing, though).

@megan: I homeschooled in high school as well. There actually are a lot of opportunities for homeschoolers believe it or not, and I wish my life circumstances at the time had allowed me to take advantage of them more. College classes aren't bad, although personally when I audited college classes in high school I found it awkward to socialize and only became acquainted with one or two people (who were the same gender as me). People earlier in the list suggested community theater and volunteering--those are particularly good ideas if you're in high school, I think. (But be careful where you volunteer. I volunteered as a music teacher at a small private elementary/middle school, which was a great experience but not the best place to meet guys my own age. Likewise, volunteering in a nursing home would be rewarding, but probably not the best place to meet guys). Does your area have a homeschool group? In my area, there's several, and they include high schoolers. Also, I believe your local public high school is required to allow you to take classes there, so if you play an instrument or sport, you could try out for their band or sports team. Being in an orchestra or band can be a great bonding experience.

uh. . .that is what social anxiety is, Metal_Man, not having control of your mental facilities in social situations. Outside observers see it as 'shyness' and such, inside we are mostly trying to deal with minds that suddenly go blank.

your mileage may vary of course,
Merle

Never heard social anxiety described like that. I was always told that it social anxiety was accompanied by increased heart rate, hyperventilating, profuse sweating etc. but I never experience that. I just go blank. I am going to start seeing a therapist so I'll be sure to bring that up.

Think so? For me it's wholly deliberate, although I've gotten used to doing it through lots of repetition, and trial & error. I never really felt it's like how 'everyone else' approaches a conversation, because it's almost entirely derived from my analysis tendency. If I were to try and describe this to like my sister, a very social NT, she'd definitely tell me I'm 'reading too much into it' and all that crap. But I guess it's still possible that someone like her would take her process for granted. *shrug*

It's for that reason that I never bothered trying to run this by anyone til now, they'd all make un-connected, non-logical generalizations, like 'just go with the flow'....

I guess this lends some credence to the OP's point, heh.

Now that I think about it, in a way, the problem is semantics. Diamond is right, that "Just get out there" isn't good advice. Getting out there may be necessary, but without arming yourself with useful tactics and perspectives beforehand, it's about as useful as reading about it and never actually doing it. Which is to say, not very useful.

Not a bad analogy. Nevertheless, the reason they say that we should just get ourselves out there is because for most people, it's natural to be social. They look at being social as something you gain by instinct; that is something our kind simply don't have. They don't realize how different their brains are from ours. Ignorance is bliss.

Sound, I get the gist of what you’re saying. I think I’ve done something similar to that myself, but probably fell off track sooner or later, never carrying the act all the way.

Now that this has been brought up, I noticed that these are the only types of conversations I have with people I don’t know. But sometimes I’ll start one of these and it goes nowhere, and at other times the person will take that dry startup and transform it into a dynamic discussion.

I find it difficult to find that middle ground. Either I show people that I’m weak, or I intimidate them with my superior (gasp!) reasoning skills, and have them avoid me or talk to me only when they need to know something. And sometimes I’ll be two of those with one person. Boy does that frustrate them. Ha ha ha! ......

You're funny. If they ever did an ET remake...

Yeah, a lot of folksy advice presupposes you're an average Joe with the personality, tastes, and requisite social experiences of the average Joe.

Also, I'd like to add that due to having high estrogen levels I actually have an easier time talking and relating to females than I do to males. Though "easier" does not mean "easy".