Why some of us might explain things at length.

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Last edited by nat4200 on 19 Apr 2012, 4:30 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Last edited by nat4200 on 19 Apr 2012, 4:44 am, edited 1 time in total.

@nat4200 I feel the same way in a lot of situations.

Has anyone ever felt the overwhelming urge to explain something at length to someone who doesn't need to know? For me, I always want to share my diagnosis and what I've learned about Asperger's with people I know (not strangers). I don't because I know that they don't really need to know and I only explain certain flaws if they come up. Is this weird? I think it is because a lot of people are persecuted and looked down on because of their Autism and I have yet to feel that sting, so I'm more comfortable with it than others.

Tell me if you've ever felt the need to inform someone of something that they didn't need to know and how you handled it. What happened?

As a graduate student, I often have to attend numerous events and banquets. The seating at these events is almost comical. There may be seven people seated at a table; however, I can only talk to the two people next to me because of the noise level and preposterous size of the table.

I dread these situations because I must converse with strangers. I do not plan it; however, I lie in wait at any chance to segue the conversation into one of my topic of interests. I immediately expound upon one of my familiar tropes.

At the most recent one of these events, I linked someone saying they were from Chicago to the Chicago Mercantile Exchange so I could go on and on about recently proposed futures regulations. The man from Chicago listened patiently, muttered some response, and then quickly changed the subject to baseball. I ignored this attempt, and re-engaged in my familiar trope. Awkward!! I felt really guilty about it later.

So yes, I often "unload" my thoughts re one of my topic of interest on strangers. I do this with crippling detail.

I really need to work on this. Conversation should be natural and not contrived.

I do this all the time, especially when I have to summarise films or books I love. I just keep going on about every plot detail and the parts I really liked, and the fact that those parts remind me of something else, which I then start to talk about, digressing so far I don't even know what I'm talking about anymore.

I'm rather long-winded myself. It's not so bad online, but in reality...

I find people generally dont care for other peoples conditions or illnesses. My family and friends for example don't really appreciate me talking about autism (maybe if I get diagnosed that will change). Although one good friend of mine took it well and encouraged me to get diagnosed.

It would be pretty ironic if you had just explained it in one short sentence.

LOL quiet, you =P

I do all of this exactly to a tee. My friends/family know about it the most, because around people I don't know as well, a) I'm shy, and b) I KNOW I do this and ramble and people don't like it and I have "loghorrea" (which one of my teachers once defined as "diarrhea of the mouth" and I think this is exactly how it comes out . So I've learned to not talk much if I can help it in most settings. Now, get me on a topic I feel like talking about though, or if I have to talk because I'm supposed to train somebody on something, or once I get to know somebody better, and the floodgates open. I have often heard from people that they thought I was very quiet when they first met me, and now that they know me, they realize I never shut up! Unfortunately I think this means that the people who feel like they might like me because I'm quiet are in for a nasty surprise, and the ones that might possible want to listen to me talk (if such a person exists in the world) never find that out.

The "condition" is much worse if I'm happy in general or enthusiastic about anything . I really only let myself go "unedited" at such times around people I'm close to (or on WP) because even close friends/family are wont to exasperatedly let me know I'm rambling, nicely or not so nicely. And I also have the regret afterwards, especially if I've let it all out with somebody I DON'T know as well (say, a friend, but not a lifelong friend, who may have just been introduced to this feature of me).

Anyway, I do have a method of dealing with getting my point accross succinctly. I use this for things like serious or emotionally wrought conversations that I have to have, difficult conversations, trying to put an end to ongoing arguments or points of contention, any type of public speaking (especially when I used to have to manage a group of people at work), etc etc. If it's something I'm emotionally invested in, incidentally, it's even harder for me to wrap things up or even be coherent.

What I do is write. Writing, for me, is much easier than speaking. It also makes a lot more sense than when I speak. I sometimes tell people that the path between my brain and my fingers (typing/writing) is a direct connection whereas the path from my brain to my mouth has a lot of problems en route. This is exactly what it feels like. I can't tell you what it was like the first time I discovered chatting on the internet. Including to people who were within visual distance . Removing this aspect of my life... would have a SEVERE effect on quality of life and possibility of interaction with most people in it (even at work, we do most communication this way. Luckily, in my current workplace, that's the norm for everybody so it's much easier for me to do this).

Anyway back to my cure. The point with writing is, first of all it comes out sounding so much clearer to begin with. I can take my time and think. Most importantly, I can edit. In speech, I will go around and around back over the same concept over and over again as if to refine and make it more clear and make sure I've said everything I need to say, until I've repeated my point so much the other person will do anything to make it stop, and they're no longer interested in the message at all, just in ending it! On paper (or computer), I can edit. So the first "draft" of points I have to make may be 3 paragraphs restating the same thing over and over again. But then, I can pick and choose the best parts (usually by the 3rd or 4th iteration it's starting to get very good, I think, but by then of course in real life nobody is listening). I can also re-read and tweak it to make sure that all the points are completely covered and nothing is repetitive.

Then I would have this in mind for the actual real life conversation (unless I could take care of it in writing, which generally due to the nature of whatever it was that was important enough to follow this process, I couldn't... it had to be in person (or on the phone). I would re-read and re-read. The act of writing helps me remember it too, but I would go over. Rehearsing helped me get all the points, wording, and get it straight. Writing it down, however, is a very important step because otherwise I would keep going over and over the conversations in my head endlessly (including variations on the other person's part) until it actually happened. Which often meant no sleep, among other things. So writing it down also helps with this aspect. There have been times when I actually read from the paper if I was doing it over the phone, but more often the rehearsing/going over the final version in my mind was necessary, and then was available for the meeting.

Obviously, this is too time consuming to apply to every instance. For people who already know I ramble, well.... they're still there and I know it's not going to go away entirely, so I just try to watch for the glazed look or something. It helps to have multiple people to spread it out amongst in one's life so one person does not bear the brunt. It also helps to have online outlets that you won't regret later (I've tried blogging, but I always get that over sharing feeling later... and that nobody will ever read it). I still do the process for those people if it's something important that will not get out of my head. For the other people, that's more difficult, but I'm not exactly a popular person and I don't tend to initiate interactions with people I don't know very well, so it doesn't come out that often , though it's always a surprise to the other person when it does. Usually this fact is self correcting because then they avoid further conversation with me...

I do this often. Especially when I'm upset or defending myself. Lost a friend of 10 years recently and did the same thing there, which never got answered.

I can certainly empathise with you in regards to the bucket analogy; my brain has become so full of late that I feel I have lost the ability to retain information... damn succint recollection of random memories! I curse at thee!

No.

Yeah, I have this issue. I never really understood the implied meaning thing, and in an attempt to put things succinctly I used to just blurt out random parts of the information. It felt like I was speaking in soundbites. Still haven't quite figured it out.

Around my close friends it's much easier just to say it all. I find it weird that people aren't interested, Why say laddish things when you could be unravelling the mysteries of the universe? Obviously I'm aware of the reason, but I can never quite embrace it. (Think I even over-explained here)

I wrote this a while ago, about how and why to be brief in conversation:

As I kept improving socially, I realized more and more the importance of being brief and concise in conversation.

What do I define as brief and concise? There's no formula that is set in stone, but generally, it is best to communicate one or two sentences at a time, as 4 to 8 can easily be too excessive. There are plenty of exceptions to where you can discuss things at length such as when a person directly asks you to tell them "everything", or asks for advice, or asks for a detailed analysis of something.

A problem that many Aspies (and some nuerotypicals too) often talk in long-winded sermons, the kind that is commonplace and appropriate in an e-mail or a post on a message board, but not as much in the real world outside of the internet. Aspies at times lack judgment in social situations and make mistakes without being aware.

By talking at length (when no one had directly asked you to) puts you in several areas of danger.

First, you risk talking on and on about something that the other person does not care about. Aspies can be easily guilty of rambling on and on about a topic to another person, focusing on only our interest in communicating about that particular topic, oblivious to the fact that the other person is really not interested in hearing us talk. By keeping our responses short, we avoid this risk.

Second, you could be seen as suffocating the conversation. While no conversation is completely 50/50, both people should be able to express themselves mutually. If you are talking too much, it gives the other person or people less room to talk. If you are continuously talking a lot, and the other person is only able to get in a one sentence response, the conversation is not balanced. They may feel as if their input is not valued, you may be so focused on what you want to say that you may actually not value their interests, at least for that moment. They will resent the fact that you are hogging the conversation and not letting them get a word in. If you've talked to a person who talks at length, and it left less room for you to speak, I bet you didn't like that. In some cases, I bet you were painfully bored after they kept talking past a certain point and stopped listening to them (intentionally or accidentally).

Third, you risk falling into the archetype of a person who is acting like a professor, lecturing to others as if they are their students rather than their equals, a pattern so common to Aspergers Syndrome. That can easily be viewed as arrogant, condescending and even pretentious. By being conscious of how long you speak, you can be informative without breaking the boundary and becoming professorial.

Fourth, it would overload the other people with too much information, similarly to how we Aspies can be overwhelmed with stimuli at times. If you spoke about so many things at once, how would they know which one to respond to first, assuming they have not forgotten half of what you said already? One cannot expect a response to everything you say, especially if you say it all in one breath.

The more you say, the less weight is assigned to each word. The important things you say get mixed in with the least important things you say and might be forgotten. If you give someone too much information, it will be difficult for them to remember all of what you said. But if you talk less, each word has a powerful weight to it. It is easier to remember a concise sentence than a full paragraph. Limiting your speech to one idea at a time will make the other person able to respond to each of them over time. When I practiced improving on this, my two sentence limit was a verbal straitjacket which trained me to be concise. What once took me four sentences to explain I learned to express in two.

Why do we at times want to be verbose in our speech?

My personal belief is that we fear being misjudged or misunderstood by others, so we decorate our speech and include as much details as possible to pre-emptively shoot down any possible questions, misunderstanding or objections before the person could even say them. Essentially, it is preparation for contingencies. The problem is that each person is different, so it is impossible to predict how a person will react to a situation. You may be increasing the length of your speech to include caveats, elaborations, and such, all prematurely, when the other person may already be aware of them. Every once in a while, you will get questions from people who misunderstand what you are saying. In that situation, which does not happen frequently enough to make it worthwhile to include all those premature details, you can elaborate.

In fact, having the other person ask questions is a great thing. It lets them tailor the subject to a specific point of their interest. If you and another person are talking about the vacation you went on, it would be much better to let them choose which part of your vacation to focus the discussion on rather than you deciding what parts of it they have to listen to. Also, being brief gives you a way to detect if you are boring or annoying the other person.

If you start on a topic and the other person doesn't ask questions or respond after your brief opening on a topic, end it there. They are not interested. If they were really interested, you would hear something along the lines of "tell me more" or "did you feel ____ when that happened?" or something along those lines. Maybe they may be interested, but only in talking about the topic for a short period of time. So when they stop responding to what you say, that is a good indication of when to change topics.

What you have to say to the other person should not delivered all at once, but like a wrapped gift that the other person should have the fun of unraveling, or an enigma that you want the person to ask to discover more about. Of course, if they are not interested, there's nothing you can do about it, but if they are, this approach will make it more interesting. No need to take away the fun of the other person to enthusiastically learn more about what you are saying. Your words should be a like a delicious meal, savored and eaten slowly, rather than forced into another person's throat.

15 words are much more descriptive than 7, but 30 can be verbose. Adding more words makes what you say more clearer, but once you get past a certain point, the gains of each additional word start to diminish to the point where adding more words contributes very little to what you say.

Being brief and concise sacrifices a little accuracy and clarity in your description, but the benefits are even greater.