fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2998 ]

[ SECRET POST #2998 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2998 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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[Archer, linked for cartoon nudity/sex]

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30. [ SPOILERS for Kingsman ]

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Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 000 secrets from Secret Submission Post #428.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 1 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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Obviously talk to people and whatnot, but are there any sure fire ways to de-awkwardify yourself?

Because I'm pretty damn awkward right now and an adult.

Find other awkward people.

I already have and it hasn't helped much.

That's because it's a terrible idea.

yeah deathtoll is an idiot, you shouldn't listen to him

Be more casual. Or less intense. If you're approaching someone to say hi and feeling the fate of the world hinges on whether or not you mess this up, they can tell. Learn to laugh at yourself.

I don't have social anxiety though.

I should have specified that it's a lot of small quirks like I have difficulty looking at people and I lose my train of thought and my conversations topics tend to connect weirdly.

Be more casual. Or less intense. If you feel like your difficulty looking at people or losing your train of thought is the end of the world, they can tell. Are you confident in your mannerisms? Are they merely part of who you are? Then either people are comfortable with that or not. You're the one making it awkward.

Re: How do you fix awkward?

(Anonymous) - 2015-03-21 02:36 (UTC) - Expand

Practice.

Remember that habits take upwards of two months to be replaced.

I figure I can either be that awkward person who complains about being awkward and avoids doing things that might draw attention to it, like going outside and talking to people,

OR

I accept that I may never be a smooth operator, and go about my business like everyone else does. It's likely they won't notice or care, as they're more worried about how they come off to you.

Practice and Fake It Till You Make It.

Most people are, generally, polite at first. Just try to project happy and calm and hopefully they'll respond.

A quick "cheat" I've found is ask them about something they're passionate about. Then they'll do most of the talking so you can nod and take a more passive role. Don't do it all the time, but good for practice.
(or if you're like me and talk more when nervous, try and dial it down by doing the above and forcing yourself to listen)

Try to focus more on the other person when you're talking to them, and less on yourself.

People like it when you listen to them and ask about their opinions on stuff and remember little details like something they mentioned last time. And most people will readily offer their opinions when asked - look at general comments, it's full of people replying to stuff.

That way it keeps the focus on them, and off of you, and you'll start being less conscious of yourself, and less awkward. And that's basically what small-talk is - asking people little casual questions.

Also, being smiley and optimistic helps, too. Like turning the convo round to the positive side of things. So people start to associate warm fuzzy feelings with you.

What belladonnatook mentioned up there- most people actually don't care or notice that much. Not every convo is life-or-death (though it can be hard when you have anxiety and your brain's constantly telling you that lol.)

(I'm pretty awkward as well but I'm slowly starting to get over it.)

Honestly, I'm fairly awkward. The best thing I've found is to just roll with it and - as long as your brand of awkward isn't creeping people out [and what you've described doesn't sound like it would] - just make jokes about it when it comes up. Most people are pretty forgiving as long as you keep it light-hearted.

Figure out what you're doing that's awkward and practice methods of working around it or avoiding it. After that it's mostly practice and occasionally faking as if you're more comfortable in conversation than you feel.

Treat social interaction as a complex academic subject, like in school. Practice it. Do drills.

Haha, I don't know if that would work, I can't be arsed myself.

But it probably would work.

Wait, that may not apply in your case.

I...can't tell if you actually have anything to worry about.

Yeah, at this point, I'm not really sure either.

While I really do appreciate the advice and resurrance, I feel like it's much more 101 than I was looking for. I have, however, come up with couple of alternatives in the mean time and wouldn't mind some additional thoughts about them.

First one was to maybe take some acting classes or join something like Toastmasters to up my conversation skills, though I'm not really sure if this would be the best to go about things though as they're less about basic conversation and more about a preformance in front of a group.

Second was to video record myself in a conversation so I could analysis the awkward. Seems reasonable enough but who would record and will I die from first hand embarrassment?

Here, I found one with a list of specifics.

http://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/brand-how-to-be-less-awkward/

Haha, looked through this and only thing I think I have a real issue with is eye contact and a little awkwardness about conversation (though not much in the way of what the article mentioned, like my stories aren't very engaging and my thoughts connect weirdly sometimes); everything else seems really obvious. Guess I have less to worry about than I thought!

Thanks a bunch for the link! : )

Don't record your voice. You'll only obsess over it and it'll make you even more nervous when you're out trying to be social next time.

Just accept that you're going to say weird things or make social faux pas from time to time and that just about everyone else on the planet isn't going to hold it against you as long as you can laugh it off and it wasn't mean-spirited or excessively racist or misogynist. Everyone, even the most social people out there, say weird things from time to time. Hell, the most extroverted person I know says some of the weirdest things out of anyone but she's still the most successful at making friends because she laughs at herself whenever she does it.

Learn to chill out and not worry too much about being perfect at holding a conversation. People are human, so we tend to give each other a bit of slack in that regard.

I'm sure it's been pointed out before, but like anything being social is a learned skill. It's performance, on some level. The more you do it the better you get at building a public persona, and the more you practice the more comfortable you feel about doing it. Just get out there and get some practice.

I gave speeches at a Toastmasters club for a while, and the practice helped me lessen my stage fright.

But. I stayed at a small club, so the audience was always small. And I had a hard time crafting speeches both I and the other members would care for. I guess table topics (where you talk about a topic given on the spot) can help for conversation, but it's still very much presenting.

I have some videos of myself half-acting in a conversation for a school project (a counselling role-play), and wow that embarrassment. But it made it very clear what kind of mannerisms I need to get rid of when I'm nervous.

For real conversations, I always "replay" the awkward moments in my head afterwards. I know it's not accurate as to how others see me, but I can analyse whether things that just popped out of my mouth were good ideas in hindsight, and how much of the conversation I carried.

Hope this gives you some ideas.

Yeah, your reply was especially helpful!

Seems like Toastmasters isn't quite what I'm looking for then, but I'll give the video recording a shot sometime!

I do a some "replaying" already, but breaking them down and analyzing them on how to improve would probably help me out better.

Kinda late and don't know if this will help, but vinesauce posted a video about awkwardness yesterday, it might not help you but it is pretty interesting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o268qbb_0BM

Oh, neat!

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[ SECRET POST #2998 ]

How do you fix awkward?

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