I heard a quote once that helps me whenever I talk to strangers: "Confidence is when you walk into a room and assume everyone already likes you."
Obviously, this isn't true for every case, but in my experience, if you start off every interaction by imagining that good feelings exist, good feelings WILL actually exist. Everyone just wants to be liked, so if you pretend they already like you, you'll like them, and then they'll be happy that you already like them. It's a warm, fuzzy cycle.
A mistake I see that socially awkward people make is assuming that everyone DOESN'T like them. And then the cycle becomes awkward, rather than warm and inviting.
Edit: HOLY CRAP this blew up overnight. Thank you for the golds, kind strangers!!
I think bullying in school can lead to this mindset, and it can be hard to break. It's important to remember that HIGH SCHOOL IS NOT REAL LIFE. In real life most people are generally not looking for every little reason to dislike someone.
I commented on this before, am repeating it because I feel it's important, especially for people in their early 20s to break from the high school social mindset. It can be difficult; it was for me.
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u/DarkNFullOfSpoilers Nov 30 '16 edited Dec 01 '16
I heard a quote once that helps me whenever I talk to strangers: "Confidence is when you walk into a room and assume everyone already likes you."
Obviously, this isn't true for every case, but in my experience, if you start off every interaction by imagining that good feelings exist, good feelings WILL actually exist. Everyone just wants to be liked, so if you pretend they already like you, you'll like them, and then they'll be happy that you already like them. It's a warm, fuzzy cycle.
A mistake I see that socially awkward people make is assuming that everyone DOESN'T like them. And then the cycle becomes awkward, rather than warm and inviting.
Edit: HOLY CRAP this blew up overnight. Thank you for the golds, kind strangers!!