How do you avoid talking about special interests?

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I feel like this is what trips me up the most. It mainly happens when people are too quiet around me. A lot of people are for some reason. If people are outgoing enough and the conversation is flowing well, I can go without talking about my special interests.

I think I’d ideally be able to talk about them in moderation like NTs talk about their interests. But I often find it easier not to talk about my special interest at all than talk about them in moderation. I also find that the more stressed out I am, the more I’ll talk about special interests.

I think some NT interests are just as intense as my special interests. People just tolerate them more because they have reasons and justifications. NTs can talk about their job, upcoming wedding and kids nonstop. I can’t talk about studying Hebrew non-stop because I have no good justifications for being that obsessed. As a non-Jewish person I think it’s acceptable to have a mild interest in Judaism. I used to, but it turned into a special interest very quickly. I bet it would be far more acceptable for me to be obsessed with studying Hebrew if I was a Jewish person planning to live in Israel.

So my theory is when people are being quiet it's best to be quiet along with them. Make someone else break the ice.

So yes, I was unclear as to what may be happening here. Religion is not one of those topics people like to hear about, whether it's interesting to then or not. And some of them probably think you are ✡.

So I'd personally like to here about Hebrew because it's one of the more interesting languages, but again it's something I'd talk about for like 1/2 before changing the subject. Unfortunately that's how conversations go, people want to find shared interests to talk about because that I'd how friendships develop. If someone doesn't share your interest, they're only going to want to talk about for a little while.

I think that I'm lucky, as my dominant interest is in the human brain, how experience emerges from bottom up complex dynamics, and how those experiences relate to an external environment. It's not something that most people think about, but it is something that many people understand is relevant to them, so they tend to take interest when I talk about it. I just have to be really careful not to interrupt what someone is doing or talking about, not get hung up on specific details (tangents!), and avoid highly religious people who will take offense at the idea that who we are comes from an unfathomably complex ballet of biochemical reactions, and not a supernatural soul. Suffice it to say, that's all easier said than done.

When other people are having a conversation, I'll usually just quietly listen, or go do my own thing. I'm not good at the normal back and forth, so my contributions are usually made once my input is asked for (assuming I'm even able to keep up with the conversation). This has earned me a reputation of being "the quiet guy who doesn't say much" with people who don't know me well, and "the deep thinker who will blow your mind" among those who do know me well.

I've also been told that listening to me talk is like watching a PBS documentary. I'm not sure if that's supposed to be a compliment or an insult, but I choose to take it as the former.

As for how I avoid talking about them. I think about them to myself. If other people express interest in my thoughts, I'm happy to try to get them interested in what I'm thinking about.

Personally, I think both of those would be very fascinating and amusing. If you both ever start up a YouTube channel, or a podcast I’d love to hear it

PBS Documentaries are great!

I don't avoid talking about my special interests because of social conventions. I don't have nor a need to learn it.
I don't have the same urges to express it the same typical way an active but odd types do.

Because I really prefer to keep my interests to myself -- either because I deem some of it as a guilty pleasure, or because my default mode of interaction isn't me sharing my interests nor 'my world' to everyone I meet but the opposite -- by observing or asking others' interests.

And how I express special interests are largely nonverbal.
The best way I share it is by not info dumping nor show casing it, but by actively performing it out on the open.



So...
I don't know what lessons are involved "restraining" info dumping as an expression of sharing special interest in real life, other than being told off and get embarrassed or learning to read the room or whatever trial and errors involved which I don't typically experienced.

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Ever since my teens, I have always felt that it was of vital importance to find people who share my interests, and who thus would not be bored by me talking about them.

Luckily that's easier to do now, in the Internet era, than it was earlier. To find in-person groups devoted to a particular interest, one can try Meetup.com.

I learnt this the hard way. When I was 14 there was a new girl in my class and nobody wanted to talk to her, so I found myself making friends with her. But all I kept talking about was a futile crush I had on this older guy. Although it is normal for teenage girls to talk about crushes, this girl didn't know this guy at all and I also talked about his whole family too. I was just obsessed, a bit like Simon from the comedy show The Inbetweeners who had a crush on Carli and couldn't think of anything else to talk about but her. So I think that's partly the reason why I drove my friends away. I do wish I could go back and not have any obsessions, then my social life might have been a bit different.

I'm not sure I've ever been an info-dump kind of person , my special interests are mine and mine alone. I'm not a big sharer but some of the easiest conversations I've have revolve around my special interests but I'm more of a listener.

I'm hesitant because I info-dump too much and have been told to shut up so many times, I've learned to just keep it to myself and places online where it's ok to talk about them. It sucks big time but that's just how it is. Still... others are allowed to yammer on and on about sports and thats ok. ugh.. whatever.

<derail>
I hate the idiom 'break the ice'.
Neurotypicals have no idea how thick the ice is for us.
</derail>

By keeping quiet and not saying anything.

If you see an autistic person who doesn't seem to want to talk, maybe that person was raised not to talk about their special interests, so they don't say anything out of fear. I was one of those types when I was in high school. I also went to college with one of those types.