I’m a very socially awkward person just entering the second year of college. Over my first year, I made very few friends and nobody I really had a good connection with. Over the summer I’ve read How to Win Friends and Influence People, Conversationally Speaking, as well as watched many hours of Science of People and other such YouTubers. Will I come back to University as an entirely different person? What are your experiences before/after learning these skills?
3 comments
I was very socially awkward myself growing up and in my early college years. Honestly putting myself out there and forcing myself to attend social activities and talk to new people helped me more than consuming content. It will take time to change to be honest and it is important to practice the skills as well as consume the content.
I feel our core personalities are always fundamentally the same, but we are able to make adjustments overtime. I feel it’s difficult to go from very socially awkward to extrovert since a lot of social situations are without a concrete blueprint or guideline (many are different from each other) and much of the behavior that makes us seem “awkward” is really subconscious. One of the difficult things about socializing to me is that you are not guaranteed an outcome if you do “xyz” and it is purely unscripted alot of the time.
As I got into my later college years and adulthood I got better at making friends. I’m undergrad I was luckily able to fall into a social circle of similar people and had a decent time platonic friends wise. I force myself to go out to bars and clubs on weekends to meet and interact w new people. I am still working on dating but I’m sure that will follow eventually. I have a mild form of Aspergers so some awkward behaviors are inevitable for me but I just see it as a pebble in my shoe and force myself to continue the journey.
Life can really improve a lot after you’re able to get good at socializing. I will say this, though, that ‘getting better’ is not just a matter of KNOWING what to do. (the info you got from books/videos) It’s a matter of taking that info and PRACTICING it routinely.
So you want to practice those skills with EVERY interaction. (Ideally all summer long before you got back to college.) But I’m sure you’re in the middle of it now, so just go with the flow.
Pick a skill or two and use it EVERY time you’re out. Not just on the people you’re trying to meet/make friends with, but also the people you bump into like food service people, gym attendants, resident advisers, even professors.
You will gradually become a much stronger socializer. It doesn’t happen overnight.
Good luck!
You do need to implement what you learned in those materials.
My experiences were that once things clicked, I made acquaintances/friends too fast for my own good, though that is obviously a luxury problem to have at that point.