Social skills are for monkeys!! !!

Post Reply New Topic

How do you feel about learning social skills? Do you think they can help you in your social life and making friends, creating intimate relationship and being happy??? Or do you think that aspies ate wired differently and can not learn them at all???

social skills are for popular, rich monkeys.

Social skills are over rated. My attempts to socialize just make more more stressed or distracted.
Tact is another thing - something which does need to be learned. Not even NT's are born with it.

They were harder for me to learn than for most people, but I'm very glad I put the effort into it. I was able to have friends, get married, have kids, have a normal life because I learned them. If I hadn't, then I would probably still be living at home with my mother and a bunch of cats, afraid to speak to people or leave the house. After a while, social skills start coming pretty much naturally. Then again, I learned them in my teens and I'm in my 40's now.

I'm not rich, I'm not what most would consider popular, and I'm far from a monkey.

It takes a lot of work, but it's worth it.

It depends on the social skill.

Some examples of social skills that we struggle with, but should learn:
- Looking at people when they're talking to us. This lets them know we're paying attention. I've found that looking straight into the eyes is not necessary, so don't take "eye contact" literally.
- Refraining from expressing things that will hurt feelings without doing any good.
- Finding different things that interest us.

Some examples of social "skills" we're better off without:
- Most lying and deceiving. Pretending to have more friends than we really do, getting one-night stands, and relationships just for the sake of being in a relationship (or for the sex.)
- Acting loud and obnoxious at parties. Sure at some parties (particularly at college or among teenagers) this may seem like the norm, but they're about the worst kind of party there is if you ask me.

I don't think my problem is so much lack of social skills as it just being an introvert in an extrovert world (or at least an extrovert country).

i guess it depends what you want from life.

i dont want necessarely to be like a NT.
I dont need to be a party animals. Although i tried that for a year.
I dont need to have plenty of friends. I prefer to take care of couple friends than having 20 that i dont know what to do with them.

for me social skills are mostly to have a good job. and even then, it all depends what type of job you are into. for now, i am a secretary in a chiropractic clinic. I have to smile and be sweet to everybody which i find difficult on my bad days. but it is also good cos i meet nice people and they are nice to me etc.

i think empathy is a skill we must learn. cos if you want a good relationship (lover) you have to be empathic.

as for the rest, its up to you!

I'm not interested in social skills. Even if I had them I wouldn't use them much because I don't like people.

i can understand in some ways, but can you say why you dont like people ? and if you dont want to have interaction, what is your plan for your future job wise?

I have no plans for work. When my mother is gone if she can't leave me any money I'll be screwed. In a way I'd like to make something at home and sell it online. Then I wouldn't have to leave the house or see people except for the occasional trip to the post office to mail things out or trips to the store to buy stuff.

I prefer to stay home most of the time and when I go out it's almost never to socialize, it's just to buy stuff or do things like laundry. I probably have social phobia but I don't really feel any need to go out and socialize with people in real life.

how old are you?

dont you feel lonely?

I'm 37.

I don't feel lonely. I live with my mother and I have a cat but I don't have any friends, at least not any that live around here. I'm not interested in sex or dating.

I don't really see any point in socializing or what I would get out of it. It's just tiring and stressful and not worth the trouble. I do have a friend that visits for a week or so every year and do stuff with them but once they leave I'm glad to go back into hiding and rest.

i understand your point. i dont like spending much time with people normally unless im very close to someone. and i feel tired after a long interaction too. especially if people are talking all the time...