I am really frustrated, I’d consider myself rather intelligent, and truly genuinely believe I am. but this perception only applies when I’m alone and isolated from people.
I suffer from social anxiety and have for the majority of my life. I could possibly be a little bit autistic, and I wouldn’t be surprised if I was. Because I always struggled with social interaction and social activities. Mainly for the reason that I get too anxious. The anxiety obscures my cognition, or in other words my “common sense”. This manifests itself in me missing social cues, having awkward and silly body language, having the inability to concentrate on the task at hand, and making irrational decisions. Resulting in people perceiving me as dumb and maybe even borderline retarded. which isn’t the case at all, or at least I hope so. I just get too overwhelmed from the anxiety to the extent where it compromises how mentally composed I am. I’m focusing on other things and not “common sense”.
I also have trouble with verbal communication, I just can’t form proper sentences because I can’t think of the right words in the suitable time frame, out of pressure. I am better at conveying my thoughts via text or physically written. Because I am alone and not influenced nor disrupted by people’s presence, so I have the capacity to think thoroughly and regulate my thoughts more efficiently. which is why I say I feel the most intelligent whenever I am alone, it’s the intervention of people that influence my competence.
I am sick of feeling like an idiot whenever I’m around people, I want to be articulate, I want to be perceived as smart.
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( I also forgot to mention I have adhd which just coincides with this whole mess)
6 comments
I don’t know what to do but MY GOD its like you’ve articulated my feelings as well as your own.
Are you me?
I guess it’s cuz anxiety uses ‘resources’ so there’s less left for other things?
This used to be me exactly, I was a quickly developing child, uninterested in most school subjects because I either already knew the material, found it super easy to get or sometimes just thought it was plain boring and a waste of my time. I never had friends either, I was a major outcast. The thing is, sometimes you have to understand that you’re not the problem AND neither are they. You don’t need to constantly prove your intelligence or fear being painfully average, sometimes that’s all you can be. You seem to be pretty insecure, trust me, if you’re genuinely as smart as you think, people will get it. Work on your social skills, no one in the room is better or worse than you are.
To me, it seems like you just need more mentally simulating conversations, that’s normal, find that, but don’t expect everyone to be able to provide you with that.
I think it might be because you don’t know how to cope with losses, indeed society is borderline, hardly ever having a good solution for your failures.
of course it’s also because you don’t have enough exercise to articulate and express your thoughts
Social anxiety solution is medication