Practice. Practice practice practice. Which sounds daunting, but…
…now, I realize it’s unfair to map physical appearance to awkwardness, but…let’s take a look at me in 2008 versus 2021. https://imgur.com/7sR0qKt Can you infer I might have been awkward? Because I was awkward. Always had been, and in a lot of ways, I am still am.
But I am vastly better than I used to be. And it was practice. Slow, slow, slow practice. I started at the gym. Built a little confidence. Got a job where I was required to be in more meetings. Built a little more confidence. Moved to a new city. Built even more confidence. Joined a sports league. Built yet even more confidence. It’s a slow process of leveling up and being out there and exposed to the world and learning to live in it.
And as you get older, I find for me it’s gotten easier. People in their late-20s and 30s are not the back-biting den of snakes they were in high school—everyone begins to realize they have their own faults and foibles, and you begin to accept that other people are always going through things too. And, conversely, you begin to realize you’re never the star of anyone else’s internal story. People are paying far less attention to your awkwardness than you think. So…roll with it, find some hobbies you like that involve other people, and just keep practicing.
Just to build upon the Practice element you mentioned, any time you want to change something, then do exposure therapy
Can you go to the bar, speak to 50 people, make 5 excellent business contacts and conquor the world? No
Can you go to the bar and speak to 50 people? No
Can you go to the bar and speak to 3 people? No
Can you go to the bar? Yes
Ok, this time go to the bar, if you're not ready to speak to people then just observe others interactions. Then go home, that's enough for today.
Next time go to the bar, and speak to one person. Practice. That's enough for today.
Next time go a little further.
That's how I started at the gym. I realized I was avoiding the gym because I didn't know to how to go to the gym, do an excellent workout, and not make an idiot of myself. But that's too much at once.
I started by just going to the gym. Just show up. Stand there, look at the equipment and go home.
Next day, go to the gym, lift 1 weight 10 times. Then go home.
Next day, a little more.
Now I easily do an hour in the gym.
Expose yourself to the thing you fear in a reasonable way, repeated exposure with increasing intensity is what people say when they say "Practice, Practice, Practice"
This is a meta-skill that many would benefit from. Find the smallest step towards your goal and try. If it’s too much, back off. If it felt comfortable, try a bigger step.
In general I would agree to your advice of taking small steps, but with the concrete examples, my former self would think "but then everyone remembers me as the creepy guy, who just comes and looks at everyone. I could not go to step 2 then"
Another thing that can be much easier while traveling if you have anxiety is dating. Like you said, there's the comfort in knowing that you'll never see any people there again if you so choose. But if there's also a language barrier, it removes any expectations of witty banter and flirtation that usually relies on familiarity with your local culture and social norms. And there's less pressure to be interesting -- just being a foreigner will often make you interesting to locals without even trying, at least a first.
I agree about practice, but going into a bar and making business connections is pretty different from going to the gym. In five minutes of googling you'll find excellent training programmes, so detailed that a child can follow them. But there is no manual for social interaction, it's much much harder to learn if it doesn't come natural to you.
i love the gentle approach described here. it's the best way to make incremental progress in what seems at first glance to be an insurmountably difficult problem. thank you!
Ah, that makes more sense. I was thinking OP went from the larger man in the middle to the fit guy on the right - and was thinking, "Well sure! Lose 150 lbs and you'll gain some confidence!"
That was my thoughts too, which led me to assume that the transformative moment was related to some sort of sexual awakening (which comes with a whole slew of positive outcomes like inclusion, belonging and empowerment, particularly if you’ve been in repressive community or mental state). The comment doesn’t mention this all though, so it’s pure speculation.
What a transformation! I'm speechless. It's like seeing a caterpillar turning into a butterfly. The second pic screams confidence and personality. Thanks for sharing your progress, you are an inspiration.
I don't really care about social awkwarness, but I'm annoyed that I used to be really good at presentations and training people, and I suck right now, because of lack of practice.
And I didn't even actively practice before the presentation, I just jotted down a few ideas and was really passionate about the subject matter. Nowadays I find a lot of times that I stumble mid idea, forget what I was trying to show and generally break my flow a lot and find myself in "oh, snap, where did I lose them exactly?"
A couple of years of working as a contractor, changing jobs more frequently, the lockdowns and I didn't do a lot of presentations/idea sharing.
So yeah, practice and remember if you don't use it, you lose it.
Practice for sure. One thing I noticed with covid was just how out of practice I got. I felt vastly more critical of myself in social situations that would have been very normal pre covid (for example, being the first one to a social gathering and needing to make small talk with the host). Isolation really compounds awkwardness, since awkwardness (generally) leads to more isolation.
I think that social skills really are muscles that need to be developed and maintained. Have you ever tried brushing your teeth with the wrong hand? No amount of thinking and focus will get you the same fluidity as using your usual hand. Instead, you need to just suck for a while and practice until the muscles passively develop. Others have mentioned going to bars or the gym, but I'd also recommend joining a hiking group, a book club, or even attending a church that matches your beliefs. Basically, any sort of activity that has a somewhat consistent group of attendees and where the main focus of the event isn't talking. That way you can still feel successful even if you say very little, which can hopefully reduce the overanalyzing and self doubt that comes from awkwardness.
Give the man a break. He’s displaying his social skills by calling attention to his physical and stylistic transformation in a way that nods at plausible deniability. This is how you do this. Get hot and wear clothes that show you care about clothes is part of self-presentation. Becoming more attractive leads to better social skills almost automatically. People treat you better and you become more confident and both feed on each other.
The cold hard truth that I realized I long time ago is what I call the “two strikes rule”. When you are short (as am I), you already have two strikes against you in society.
You can’t be “short and” - short and broke, short and mean, short and shy, short and fat (which I was until I was 18).
Not denying your experience in any way, just want to remark: I heard (and felt) similar takes regarding a lot of "negative" properties from a lot of different people. Height, weight, race, gender, hair color, stutters, country of origin and even really specific stuff like big ears.
Might be helpful to consider that most people feel like they have two strikes against them already (some of them being more right in their assumption maybe).
I am a short male in my mid twenties and I am also getting to the same conclusion. If you're short, you need to work harder. There is no chance you can be unfit, fat or awekward. You will be screwed. But honestly, sometimes I feel like it's a good blessing. It pushes you to improve many aspects of your life. You want to be successful in your career, you want to work harder, you want to excercise like there is no tomorrow, you want to read more, you want to be more social, etc. It pushes you to become a better person. But the height deficiency is always there and it's an unfortunate tragic event and a very hard truth to swallow. Life is unfair.
I feel for short guys. Apparently it's ok for women to put "swipe right if over 6ft" on dating apps. I doubt I'd get much success with "swipe right if over 36D and you can deep throat"
I've noticed the best dancer in a club is a short guy. Tall guys can just coast, but a bit of time in the gym definitely helps.
As a tall guy, I've always assumed that there is a reason most good male dancers I can think of are average height or shorter. Tall people just don't have the right body proportions and/or fluidity of movement. There's just something that looks gangly and weird when tall guys are dancing.
Maybe that's just what I tell myself to feel better.
So, I normally stick very hard to tech topics on HN, but this (dance and tall folks) is so close to heart I have to chime in:
Have faith! Don't feel bad, lankiness while dancing is just "the emergent property" of what happens when a tall person is learning. Short dancers (of whom the 2 of the best footwork-heads in my old crew were) have their own pathologies to get over, it's not all free lunch, they just look differently when they do. And similarly, as they improve, they can gain a really distinctive style of crisp, clean, fast, small motions. HOWEVER, tall dancers aren't precluded from mastering styles that works with our body either, it just, tall as for short, takes practice. Have a link to one of my favorites, Kapela [0]. I can only hope it inspires others like it does me :) (Going to go do my footwork practice now, in fact, as talking about this got me excited.)
I'm sure this is true, I've noticed a lot of the best football playing kids in my son's circles are short, and often immigrants.
> There is no chance you can be unfit, fat or awekward
This is just as true if you're tall. You don't get away with being fat or awkward if you're tall. The only thing is that, ceteris paribus, it's more desirable. It doesn't really cancel any other shortcoming.
I’m by no means an incel. But things might have turned out differently if I did have the “third strike”.
My wife of 10 years would and has been with me through thick and thin and I’m 100% confident that she will be no matter what. But I doubt she would have given a 36 year old (at the time) the time of day if I had been 5 foot 5, 350 pounds, flipping burgers at McDonalds and yelling at her “hey shawty, give me dem digits”.
And before the woke police chastise me for picking on “urban Black culture”, not only are “some of my best friends Black”, so are my parents and all of my family.
> 36 year old (at the time) the time of day if I had been 5 foot 5, 350 pounds, flipping burgers at McDonalds and yelling at her “hey shawty, give me dem digits”.
Are you arguing then that she'd have swooned over all that but 6ft tall? Sounds like a real catch.
I am not talking about you, just saying that if you're charismatic height is not relevant, any tinder girl that says she only dates tall guys will forget that if a short rock star shows up.
No idea why you'd say Gabe is famous rich and talented. I'm talking about the character, he's none of those things. No girl would ever look at him, tall or not.
> Napoleon was routinely bullied by his peers for his accent, birthplace, short stature, mannerisms and inability to speak French quickly. Bonaparte became reserved and melancholy, applying himself to reading.
…now, I realize it’s unfair to map physical appearance to awkwardness, but…let’s take a look at me in 2008 versus 2021. https://imgur.com/7sR0qKt Can you infer I might have been awkward? Because I was awkward. Always had been, and in a lot of ways, I am still am.
But I am vastly better than I used to be. And it was practice. Slow, slow, slow practice. I started at the gym. Built a little confidence. Got a job where I was required to be in more meetings. Built a little more confidence. Moved to a new city. Built even more confidence. Joined a sports league. Built yet even more confidence. It’s a slow process of leveling up and being out there and exposed to the world and learning to live in it.
And as you get older, I find for me it’s gotten easier. People in their late-20s and 30s are not the back-biting den of snakes they were in high school—everyone begins to realize they have their own faults and foibles, and you begin to accept that other people are always going through things too. And, conversely, you begin to realize you’re never the star of anyone else’s internal story. People are paying far less attention to your awkwardness than you think. So…roll with it, find some hobbies you like that involve other people, and just keep practicing.