Unable to socialise, little in common

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Hi,

Not sure really how to start making friends with other people irl. I've always been told to "make friends" but I can't seem to do this. Yes I have been to places where you meet other people and then what? I'm having a problem getting on with other people as I don't think anyone will like me.

I keep being ignored. If someone starts saying "hello" to me, another day they'll blank me as if I wasn't there, if I say hello to them, they tend to look away. It seems everyone distances themselves from me after the first contact

For this reason I can't make friends or give a good impression. People don't know anything about me. I guess they think I'm weird. I have interests very different to most people's, I like astronomy, UFO's, conspiracy theories and so on. This is what I love to talk about LOL and I know how ppl will react to this and guess what, I don't raise the subject. Everyone that has got to know think I'm mad. I also feel hated by everyone. There's no chemistry happening between me and other ppl. They look at me like dirt. It doesn't help especially cos I haven't got the latest smart phone! Even old ppl have got one!

What do you do if you're like this? I also come across as a moron because I have little self esteem. Don't know what to do. Feeling as if I'm better off living in the Arctic. I've nothing in common with ppl and I'm paranoid of ppl who share similar interests as they're highly extrovert.

Btw I've been like this since I was a kid.

Hi Ragnia, first off, every Aspy goes through this. It's not actually important.
It's a stage that we go through of realising that we can't compete socially.
The next stage is to leave that behind and to realise ourselves as whole individuals that just have a different perspective.

I have actually made friends a couple of times myself and yes, you guessed it, they decided that it wasn't worth their time and blanked me.
I must confess, I have also made some friends and decided THEY weren't worth my time, so I blanked them!
Is that a little hypocritical? No, it was honesty. I was honest to myself.
and they were honest with you, abeit in a derogatory and soul destroying manner.

Your post is rather painful to read and is full of self defeating absolutisms.
My heart goes out to you!

These stand out to me:

Ragnia, is not untill you rant and rave about your loves that ppl will get to know you!
Don't be afraid
Voice your concerns
engage with the mindless and the heartless
your voice maybe dismissed
but your soul will be exposed

and then, only then, will like minded individuals come forth and reveal themselves,
and say
"I agree with you, man!"
"You said what I wanted to say!"

None of your listed interests are uninteresting to me.
If we met at random, I would love to talk to you!
Your potential, is, at the moment, unrealised.
Do not let that hinder your growth,
as a little professor,
as an aspy
as a human being
as a contributor to the wealth of human knowledge
to the fulfilment of your own hopes and dreams,
wherever they may lead you

the way i read your post, i think you are taking the wrong approach, although it is the one almost every aspie takes, at first.

to make friends, especially with uncommon interests, you should not go purely to "places you meet people", even though you might find good friends there, it is not the only place you should search.
a good other place is at interest/hobby clubs; in your case, there might be an astronomy club somewhere nearby; the members there already share one interest with you, and likely some more then that, so you already have common ground to make friends

Just keep trying with people, you can't befriend the first person you come across. Some people just misunderstand and some people are just prats. eventually you'll befriend people who'll understand you, it's just harder for people like us.

This is the same problem with me.

I work for a company and none of them want to sit with me during lunch time i work with a group but
they seat separately whenever i attend meetings in office
Strange I am quite good with this group even i help them but yet when it comes down to friendship
they dont consider me one.
They keep me as a colleague not a friend.

Even i dont share the common interest that they have
I like things like tarot, occult, book, paintings, spirituality etc.

The best way to connect with people you have common interest are
through groups but there also chances are you wont make friends
because they maybe liking painting or books but they maybe not aspie's they will be NT's

So i stopped joining similar interest groups like tarot etc....i could not befriend anyone there.
and my money was going waste

Everything boils down to one thing that Aspies are poor with social skills and cant make friends.

i have the same social difficulty sometimes. my interests are extremely eccentric, difficult to make friends. i don't know how many times i have gotten 'you are the strangest person i have *ever* met' (their emphasis every time lolz).

the strategy that works for me, and it's easy when you get the hang of it, but it takes a bit of practice:

1> identify someone you are interested in interacting with. it's not always as easy as it seems. you don't need a 'why you are interested' just anyone that catches your attention for any reason will do.

2> carefully observe the person without saying anything. this also takes practice, because at first you may tend to be too intent and freak people out because you are staring. the trick is to do it softly and not be noticed. if you get them talking it is easier, because everyone likes to be listened to when they are expressing their own feelings and emotions, etc. (including you, if i read your OP correctly, but that's hard for people like us because we are very different or eccentric)... so again, get them to start talking and observe quietly, nod your head if that helps. you are just trying to observe...

2a> what is it you're trying to observe? well, what is it about them that interests you? then combine that with what you hear they are interested in, from your observation of them.

3> following step 2a, you have a thread in your mind, a mixture of what interests you about them (from 1) and your observation of what they are interested in (from 2).

3a> wait for a pause in the conversation. it is not impolite if they are a rambler to create one... with some people this may take you being quite determined, i have a neighbor who is like this; he *just will not stop talking* ... you may need to clear your throat or yawn.

3b> when they stop, or if after a long time they haven't just go ahead yourself....

4> express yourself, but from 3> using the alchemy of what interests you about them, what they are interested in, and what you are interested in. try to roll them all together. this is really difficult and takes a lot of lot of lot of practice.

but when you begin to get it down, you will be an adept of the art of conversation.

i am myself but a novice, but i am getting better, and this strategy works for me pretty reliably.

hope it helps.

oh, i'm a big ufo buff too. spent years chasing ufo's. found a few. it's fun stuff. there's a lot of us out there!!

oh and conspiracies, and astronomy, and stuff. you sound really interesting too, as i think someone already mentioned, and i would love to talk to you.

you are not alone!

Hi,

All your replies are really helpful. Thanks so much for the kind feedback, and for what you said. I really appreciate all your responses. I feel a bit better now and less weird.

It's nice to find out I'm not alone out there feeling like this.

I'd like to talk to ppl interested in stuff that I find interesting. I've seen a lot of UFO's, which is one of the reasons I like astronomy

Ragnia! Oh cool, yeah I started watching the stars as an offshoot of being interested in UFOs too, my mom saw one even before I was born and so I was always interested. I don't even know how many I have seen. Depends if you count ones you see in dreams or not. Sometimes, freakily, those seem more real than the ones I have seen in 'reality'. What types of UFO have you seen? Do they scare you / comfort you / feel very intelligent to you? I have experienced all of those. When I'm awake I don't get the same sense, I think we are more aware of psychic senses when we are dreaming, but I feel in some way that dreams are just as real as reality, just a different way of looking at things. I don't know where people talk who meet on websites. The forum? Chat client? But that is the same as irc I read... I may get back on irc soon, but I'm pretty sporadic as a conversationalist: like I wrote before, still a novice to communication skills, at least as people tend to use them. Bounce back if you feel like chatting sometime, or just write in the forum, I'll get around to a reply sooner or later. --Chris

I used to have the same problem, about asking why I can’t have any friends, any relationship. I had such a low self esteem and confidence especially at the time when I lived with my parents. I never been diagnosed with any ASD, I don’t know if I really have it or if I want to go for a diagnose. I never had a connection with my family and all the time I tried to hide everything from my parents. They have succeeded to make me feel bad because often they had been told me to go outside, to have friends, to have fun... I was thinking that I have fun the way I am and it must be something wrong with me. After I moved far away from my parents, I started to feel more comfortable in my world with the way I am and there is nobody to tell me what to do and how I should behave.

Very recently my therapist asked me a really interesting question: Do you really need other people around you? I was quite shocked when I thought about it...because I realise that actually I don’t need anyone. This is the way I am and I managed to do such amazing things on my own. This experience helped me to develop in a person that I’m now and I’m starting to be proud of. Well, this is my point of view, I’m sure that you have different one but I just want to share my experience. Just a simple question make me realise that is nothing wrong with me, this is who I am and I don’t need friends around me to function. I mean I’m very able to do my job and work in a group but is nothing more than work.

If i was asked whether i really need friends the answer would be yes

Because friends tell us so much about the social cues, social behaviour etc and while talking with them we exchange so much information whether its about the colony we live in or about the organisation we work in.

from the one friend that i have it helped me to learn so much about being assertive or how to purchase a flat the way the builder can fool us.
Without her company i would be lacking in so many things..........

So yes i would prefer to have friends and people around me.

I understand your point of view and like I said this is only my opinion. I'm sure that there are many other people who relate to you. But instead to feel bad that I don't have friends and make my life a nightmare I just accept the way I am. I looked back on my past life and I realise that I managed to do so many things all by myself. Why shouldn't be proud of this? And if I managed to live like that more than 26 years I'm pretty sure that I will do it in the future as well. I know many times is hard but this is live, an adventure... If everything will be easy belive, will be so boring...

All the best!

I find it hard to make friends, but I don't think it has anything to do with my interests. It's because I know I am not a very good speaker, and so I stay quiet and obviously people probably just look at me and think, ''what is the point in her being here?'' and not bother to give me a chance or even say hello to me, whether I look at them and smile or not. I always do look at people and smile when they enter a room, which is what I was always told is the right impression to make because I always thought eye contact + smiling = a friendly impression. Even if something about it ain't ''proper'', which I can't see why it shouldn't be, I would have still thought that making some sort of friendly acknowledgment of other people is better than looking down all the time with a permanent scowl on your face.

But I think I have a fear of looking stupid. I must admit, my social skills have improved in the last few years, but my Social Anxiety has raised, making me worry constantly of what other people are thinking of me. I know people here can say ''oh don't worry about looking stupid or being different'', but that's easy to say for some. But I think I naturally have the same sort of extent of self-awareness as NTs do, which makes life harder when you're an Aspie because being on the Autistic spectrum increases your chances of doing ''social faux pas'', and also being afraid of what people are thinking of you at the same time makes it even worse. So that explains why I am afraid of making friends.

When I was a bit younger I joined a club which was for teenagers with special needs, and my mum said that I would make friends there. I knew I would too, but for some reason, I didn't. I gave it time, but I still didn't. I was shy, and the other teens there had severe disabilities and so couldn't really make friends, but they kind of still took up all the attention, and me being quiet and kind of ''normal'' compared to the others, I just got forgotten. So I didn't make friends there at all.

Then I joined an art club, because I liked art and so was bound to make friends with other people with the same interest, but I still didn't make friends there. I did have a few conversations with a few of the people, but I didn't seem to build up any proper friendships with anyone. I think it was because everybody there seemed to already know eachother (even though we all started at the same time) and I seem to find it harder to meet people when they're all chatting amoungst themselves. I think I would be able to fit in more with other people with high-functioning disabilities, who are as eager to make friends as I am, and nobody there knows eachother yet and so we are all feeling a bit shy, and the tutors gives us little tasks to help us build our confidence and improve communication skills. That's where I think I would probably be able to make friends easier.

The strangest thing is - I've got friends now, and I really can't tell you how I made them. I must of somehow.

Joe, I feel very much the same way oftentimes. I realize I am not very good at speaking or conversation, so often I stay quiet which means a lot of times I'm just ignored. I try to be polite to people and speak when they speak to me, and I don't think too many people specifically dislike me, but it's just very hard for me to actually make friends. I have rather obscure interests and some not so popular beliefs. I also tend to worry what others are thinking of me a lot, I can be self-conscious around people I don't know very well, and because I know I'm naturally prone to make social or conversational mistakes I often try to avoid many social situations altogether. I tend to act withdrawn, especially around people around my age with similar interests, because deep down I probably long for friendship with them but am too afraid to make a fool of myself somehow. I don't really care what most other people think of me, like people I have nothing in common with, most adults, etc. I don't feel the need to feel like I fit in with them, because I wouldn't want to anyway. I just find it difficult to make friends even among people with similar interests. I often feel like I'm an outcast even among similar people and don't fit in anywhere at all. I'm only 18 and I realize I have a long time to continue learning and growing in all of these areas, but I get very lonely sometimes. Most of my friends are online, and while I'm not nearly as socially awkward through text and often prefer writing, I've realized that just isn't the same as having a few good friends that I can go places with and hang out with, etc.

Okay, this is kind of a cheat way of going about things that I began implementing. This is kind of similar to what misterwackydoodle mentioned above.

I found two quotes that I like that I think might be relevant:
"I'm going to look back on my life and wonder why I spent so much time looking for love, instead of just living."
"Don't find someone to love; just find someone interesting."

I know both of these quotes involve "love", but the idea is the same if you substitute "be my friend" for "love".

I started implementing the second one with casual acquaintances. I found that I didn't have to talk about myself or worry about what others thought of me in order to show interest in them first. Next thing I know I have had a nice, pleasant conversation with someone that leaves me feeling better on the whole self-esteem front. I don't require that other people find me interesting. If they do, that's great. If not, that's great as well. I don't expect my personality and interests to be one-size-fits-all.

As an example, I have to go to the bank almost daily for work, so I started talking with the tellers when I went in. I know that I will most likely never call one of these ladies "my friend" because they are business acquaintances, and I know it takes quite a lot of outside-the-given-social-situation interactions to develop friendships with people. Given their jobs, they are always nice to me when I come in, but I rarely said anything to them to create an ongoing conversation. I started to make it a point of listening to what they were saying and trying to find out something interesting about them. One teller would say something like, "I'm looking forward to this weekend so that I can get out into my garden." Before, I might say something like a disinterested, "Oh," and it would stop the conversation, because I wouldn't respond beyond that. Now I try to follow that up with a question related to whatever they just mentioned that will allow the other person to tell me more about themselves. "Do you spend a lot of time in your garden?" or "What do you plant in the garden?" or "Do you like gardening?" I am not interested in gardening, I don't have a garden myself, and if two people nearby were talking about gardens I would find the topic of discussion boring as ever. Instead, I realize that I'm finding out more about this person that I didn't previously know two seconds before. Instead of worrying about finding the discussion boring or the other person finding me weird, I'm happily concentrating on learning more about the person themselves and finding them to be interesting. It's like a cheater's way of doing small talk.

I don't ALWAYS find the other person interesting, and it doesn't mean I'm instantaneous friends with the other person, but I am practicing a new way of looking at conversations with others that helps me get more out of my own head and relating everything back to myself (something that I'm otherwise really bad about doing).

NT's are most interested in talking about themself rather then listening when we start listening to them raptly and ask questions they seem to be happy.
but when we start talking about our things they seem to change the topic