Hey guys, this is my first time posting here after lurking for a while and I just want to say how good it has been to see that these problems are something that we can work and improve on together. I (20M) have been quite a socially active and personable person for most of my life. At school I was never the most popular but I always had a good chat with people in my relatively small year, and have made good friends who I still see now when I can. I went travelling in my year off before university with a friend from school, who I would now consider to be one of my very closest.
My problem has become apparent in the year since starting university. Although I have made a group of friends who I appreciate very much, I feel as though our relationship has mainly remained somewhat skin deep. I find it difficult to start conversations about anything other than what is immediately in front of us or happened in the near past, and I have found it very difficult to establish close friendships beyond those whom I live very close to. While a year ago I was able to just start “shooting the shit” with anyone who looked interesting, I now find myself avoiding social situations simply because I feel as though I won’t have anything to input which anyone besides me or my close friends would want to have a conversation about, and I have an overriding feeling that nobody wants to hear me talk about myself, so have apparently stopped even trying.
I have made an effort to get more involved in organised activities for the next academic year, but I worry that I simply will not be able to establish the same kind of trust-based relationship that I could in the past. I have a suspicion that it comes from a drop in self-esteem but find it difficult to imagine how I may be able to gain it back again without the skills I used to have, which allowed for conversations to flow so freely. I apologise for the massive wall of text, and appreciate you for reading, I would love to hear any advice, or simply laugh about similar experiences.
3 comments
Best tip I can give you is that enthusiasm is the opposite of boredom.
Yeah… it does sound like you have become introverted. I recommend that the energy you have saved not striking up conversations should be used on further enhancing your life, making yourself happy. Whether that be learning something new or traveling to a new place. You’ll find that you will have a renewed energy for talking! Good luck and have fun!
You’ve got a plethora of things you could talk about and it would take all day to list them… here are just a few:
Music – what are their favorite bands, songs, artists, lyrics, album art, producers, stage show productions, best, worst, and best t-shirts
Restaurants – favorite type of food, dessert, what’s good for breakfast, where to get lunch, who had what for dinner, where’s the best hamburger/hot dog/sandwich/salsa/taco/Pho/yakisoba in the area, what’s the best decor for a restaurant
Books – who’s read what lately, best authors, best title, best cover art, worst passage written in a book, worst book title
Cars – fastest, slowest, prettiest, ugliest, worst made, most reliable, best to customize, should everything have an LS engine, how many turbochargers can you put on an engine, carburetors or fuel injection, manual or automatic transmissions
Sports – football teams, baseball teams, cricket teams, hockey teams, basketball teams, olympics, college sports, high school sports
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And so on. All of this you can talk about. It’s current. It’s past. It’s future. People LOVE to talk about themselves. If you’re in a country with a car culture, “What’s the best car you ever had?” and “What’s the worst car you’ve ever had?” can be good conversation starters. Or anything of what’s listed above or even more like movies, web sites, shoes, and on, and on, and on.