Social Woes

[unspeakablehorror]

I have the frustrating situation of knowing exactly what some of my social difficulties are but not knowing a good way for me to remedy them. 'Just don't do that' is, for many reasons, not helpful. Like, I know my confrontation avoidance can cause social issues, and I also know that my apparently contrary disposition can cause social issues too, but in fact moving away from enacting one of these simply moves me closer to enacting the other and so instead there is a careful balancing act I must engage in if I actually want to be holding up my end of the social contract.

Comments

[unspeakablehorror]

The confrontation avoidance may prevent negative interactions, but it also prevents positive interactions, because the basis of it is that the less I interact with people, regardless of whether the interaction seems positive or negative to me, the more potential confrontations are avoided. And I think there is some valid reasoning behind that. But it's also true that it prevents adequate positive interactions. So I can't just apply that across the board to fix my socializing issues.

Likewise expressing things besides agreement can be important when I do not, in fact, agree. And often, I do not have unqualified agreement with any given position. I am not a single issue person, and I feel different issues are intertwined in ways that make it difficult to effect a positive change in one area if one does not care about any others. So I tend to have definite opinions in a wide range if areas. At the same time, it's simply infeasible to properly address every area of disagreement for me for this same reason.