Why talk to people and when?

Post Reply New Topic

No time ever feels right to initiate conversation with anyone for any reason. Unless I'm in person, in which case I just play it by ear if that makes any sense.
This is not to say that I never initiate conversations by messaging people. But it's rare. Just a few times a month. But even then it's more me picking kind of random times to hit up a very small number of people.
I struggle to enjoy conversation, I never know what to talk about, I hate talking about myself, I hate being perceived, I feel like I am interrupting whatever they are doing, I feel like I am bothering them, I feel like I have nothing to say, I feel hollow always listening and never sharing. But I'm so alone so I can't just never talk to anyone or I'll go crazy from being alone with my thoughts.

Would shareing a hobby help talk?

I share hobbies with people. It doesn't mean I know when to talk about it and it doesn't mean I always want to talk about it

As I talked to people more I learned that there is no real "right" time to initiate conversations. You initiate a conversation, the person replies, and then through their tone and body language you tell whether they actually feel like talking or not(still practicing on that) or online the length of the reply and how much they are contributing to the conversation.

I also started looking up ways to start "small talk". I hate small talk but, it's how people communicate and make friends so I just prepare myself and do it. For instance, how their day was, what they are doing, what they did over the weekend, etc.

As for why? Humans need social interaction of some kind. If not we get depressed, lonely, feel isolated, trapped in our own thoughts, etc. Maybe for some people they don't need it but, we would be talking about maybe less than 1% of the population.

This is what I do to. Small talk is a bore, but if you have a couple of small points to use in conversation, such as the weather or some comment about a movie. Then you can lead onto other things if you know the person.

I hate texting. It doesn't do anything for me or help me feel less alone. If you're lonely, nothing beats in person communication.

Sounds like you have a low self-esteem. There are plenty of good websites that can help with that.

Most people talk about things they enjoy. If you don't have any interests or enjoy anything, you may be depressed. That's the problem I had. I was depressed because I was lonely but couldn't think of anything to say to help find friends because I didn't have any interests due to being depressed. What helped me was finding something to do with other people.

Part of the thing is that I would rather not try to initiate conversation than risk initiating a conversation someone doesn't want to have. I am very capable of telling when people are uninterested after I've actually started the conversation.



Texting has the disadvantage of being unable to read body language and tone. But in-person talking has the disadvantage of being difficult to escape if I tire of it or don't know how to end it. In-person talking also isn't feasible when I don't have anyone I can really do that with where I live except the people I live with.



Yeah man, I reflexively keep my self-esteem down. And am majorly depressed. I have interests that I still enjoy, but I'm either insecure about them or I am insecure about my knowledge of that interest when discussing it with people who share the interest. I have trouble gauging how much I know about something relative to others with the same interest and I aggressively avoid online fandoms like the plague.

I feel this.
I will share with you a strategy that worked unbelievably well. For a time I was working in a very aggressive and very male sales environment and I am a reasonably attractive woman so often my social oddness can just register with people as me being stuck up. The men I worked with just had incredibly overwhelming energy and interacting with them usually just felt like a distraction from me being more productive in my job. This one feller was particularly keen on me, and was always trying to strike up a chat. One day at the end of my day he asked me how I was feeling, and wow I don't know how or why exactly but just that one question made me feel like chatting.

I don't know if I'd feel comfortable asking a person how they're feeling now that I think about it. I would probably feel self-conscious that it was an invasive question. This might not have been helpful. I hope it's helpful though to hear that I completely understand what you're saying though