I feel immature, yet I get along with older people better?!

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Amajanshi
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27 May 2009, 8:37 am

By immature, I mean like emotionally. I have lots of trouble understanding why people say certain things, or why they can make the conversation flow about "fluff/crap", tiny things and fooling around when most of the time they don't have much in common. Yet they are the ones who are able to have boyfriends/girlfriends, flirt and fall in love etc.

I feel like I'm immature in the sense that I can't understand them and form romantic relationships. I rarely laugh at the silly things which they say or do, as in the I don't get it and/or I don't find it funny. And I find it much easier to talk to people who are at least several years older than I am about more worldly issues.

Is anybody else the same? How do you feel about this?



deadeyexx
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27 May 2009, 10:22 am

I've noticed this too, but not just differences due to age, but race, religion, lifestyle, economic status, etc... I call it a distancing factor. When someone is similar enough to you, they have expectations that you should think and act as they do. The more someone is different from you, the fewer expectations there are.

Fluff talk is what people that are similar to each-other do. It's a way of bonding & becoming close. I'm terrible at bonding & becoming close. Therefore, I associate with people who don't expect me to go there.



Brusilov
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27 May 2009, 11:34 am

I've already talked about this, but I get along better with people outside of my generation. Millenials already have preconceived notions of how I am supposed to act socially and the types of pop-culture things I am supposed to like. But I much prefer the company of older people and getting to hear about their life experiences. The things they say seem much more substantial than bubblegum topics that kids my age like to talk about. Guys in their early 20's think only about work, cars, and being a playboy, and that stuff turns me off very quickly.

As a little boy I much preferred the company of teachers and whatnot, but they would usually get aggervated when I would try to talk about advanced material with them and they would just blow me off. The teachers at my school, for the most part, were just going through the motions and were annoyed with some kid pestering them wanting to know more about certain things. I found the interests of schoolkids my age to be incredibly base, silly, and naive, and I was uninterested. I mentioned this before, but as a little boy, I felt land acted like an old man. Even other kids and teachers would call me "Little Grandpa," or "Little Old Man." I hated roughhousing and teasing and such things. I much preferred reading, studying, and playing music.

I still feel much more in sync with older people as I am 23 years old at this moment. It is a common AS thing to feel more comfortable with people outside of your peer group. I have very conservative political and moral values(for the most part,) and I am repulsed by the raging, hormonal liberalism of today's youth. I could easily be transposed to the 1920's and fit in with no problem. I am basically an elderly man living in the body of a young man. I have even been called out on it by older men who can't believe how genuinely conservative I am and how out of date my social values are. They even comment that I act like a young man from the Great Depression Era.

What I wanted, as a boy, was to be a respectable middle-aged lawyer who wore a suit and tie and was dignified in all facets of life. Unfortunately, at that time, I was a pathetic little boy who commanded no respect and was spat on by everyone. All I wanted was to be grown up and be respected. People would not treat me with a dignity commensurate with my maturity level. It felt so humiliating, as a teenager, to be treated as a teenager when really I was much smarter and more mature and responsible than my peers. My parents demanded of me that I "act like a kid," which was impossible. I hated being a kid and I was bad at being "fun." I guess I have no close friends because I am not "fun" to be around.

I don't understand the concept of "fun."