A social tip which works for me

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Many Aspies including myself are clueless on what to do in social situations at times. Here is a good social tip.

Identify someone in your workplace or school or etc. who is mature, intelligent, affable, popular, and great at socializing and use them as a role model.

If you are about to say or do something which you are unsure of, or you do not know what to do in a social situation, think about what your role model would do in the situation.

There are limitations to this though. And make sure you pick someone as your role model who is at your social level. Someone at a high social status like John F. Kennedy or an alphamale can get away with saying and doing a lot of things that we cannot.

I am not suggesting that we should all stop being ourselves and completely copy others. I am simply saying that it makes sense to copy certain aspects of people if they have been proven successful.

Using this tip in moderation has worked for me. What are your thoughts?

I've done this. I tend to emulate people who have skills I admire and would like for myself, until I sort of become them, and then I integrate the bits I want, and let go of the rest.

Or you can just act like them. Play the part of being them. This is a cool too.

It also works for skills other than social ability.

In more primitive cultures, you'd just eat the body part of the guy that represents the part of them you admire. Heart for courage, tongue for skilled speech, brain for intelligence etc. I've not tried that yet. (insert wink here)

Yes you are right- it does work for other aspects too.

I've done this using some of my friends who are more mature than I am in most respects but still have some "childishness" left. (I try to go w/ people who are about 1-3 years either way (usually older than I am myself or a few months younger)). Also, for your "social level" I take that to mean same social class (middle, etc.) or student level (high schooler w/ high school model, undergrad college w/ undergrad role model, etc.). Having similar interests/situations you get in may also help I think.

Yes, I do this, and it works well. I realized a long time ago that in social settings, I would revert to mimicking my mother's behavior, because she is very social and it would help me to act like her if I didn't know what to do.

Also, I tend to act like the person I am talking to, if I'm struggling to know what to say or how to act.

Then, I recently realized that I can act like anyone I want in these situations. It isn't that I should be someone that I'm not. It's simply a good tool to use when I'm in social situations, because I am incapable of accurately presenting my true self anyway. I just don't have the skills. I glitch.

I watch a lot of movies, and they help me in this way too, because I can act like the characters or figure out how to interact with people, or understand why people behave a certain way. It helps.

It's a great tactic and a good observation. I recommend it often!

Sounds like trying to emulate the good'ol exclusive theory-o-mind. They do say that we suffer from not being able to process said trait- so pulling it off well would certainly stick the proverbial middle finger to the establishment.


Only problem tho- When I think of what my suave, charismatic, and confident friend might do in a situation - it would naturally gravitate towards acting in a suave, charismatic and confident manner- except those traits aren't exactly native to my personal boundaries, so trying to ape my friends action tend to lead me monkeying around without any semblance of grace or authenticity and just drives the other person bananas.

You see what I'd tried to do there? - My suave, charismatic and confident friend loves to use extended metaphors, but I just ended up dragging my knuckles around.

It's not about appearing to be mature and down-to-earth though. It's about being mature and down-to-earth.

In the long run....spend time/energy figuring yourself out and go with it from there (eg learn to love yourself, fix things if you care/can do so, etc).

In the medium run....identify one or two people who you feel measure up to who/what you realistically (and that's the key!) would like to be yourself and mentally mold yourself along those lines WITHOUT compromising the preceding longer run goal. There should be a lot of overlap/symmetry, though. You must guard against trading your identity for that of your role model(s)--even if you don't feel that you have an 'identity' of your own yet--and also against investing any kind of 'faith' or 'admiration' in the model(s) lest you set yourself up for a crushing fall/disappointment when s/he makes a mis-step of his/her own.

In the very short run....learn to mirror back to people their self-same speech, gesture, clothing, and behavior patterns. I don't mean to suggest blind aping, I'm talking about 'using' things that appear to be generally tried-n-true by NT standards. NT's are humorously susceptible to this kind of manipulation (sorry, even though I've used this tack for years I still giggle about it because I am so conscious of 'playing' the people around me) and it is so ridiculously easy to do. WARNING...kind of like pain medication or junk food, this short-term strategy should be employed with as little frequency and for as short of a duration as possible as it is very artificial and can ret*d your progress in cultivating a 'real' you. This is the easiest strategy to use as far as coping skills, but I find it to be the most exhausting. It feels like a game or chess or scrabble with tight time limits on your moves. You gotta figure it out quick and you gotta get it right.

Hope this helps....I've been masquerading in the NT world for quite a while now, and while I absolutely treasure the times when I get to be truly 'me,' I've found that these skills aren't so hard to learn, and if you can learn how to do it your life will be a lot easier. Too, the nice thing is, the older you get the more people tend to accept you as non-NT, so you can let your guard down a bit as the years go by and/or as people get to know the real you.