...blech...

[felis_ultharus]

Kind of depressed the last couple of days. Part of it is post-semester depression -- the simple feeling of all the stress dissapating at once.

Part of it, though, is that I'm finally coming out of my shell after 3.5 years of walking around in a daze after my breakdown around the beginning of 2002. I'm looking to have a social life after so long being numb in my shell, but I'm not really sure where or how to begin. Other than the D&D group on Sundays, my social interaction is usually limited to the Internet.

Worse, after all that time, my social skills seem to have atrophied. I was never a very social person, but I frequently find myself unable to respond to even ordinary things in a conversation.

I'm not really sure how to deal with this :/

Comments

[seal7.livejournal.com]

The answer, unfortunately, is 'go forth and practise'.

What seal7 said....

[em-fish.livejournal.com]

... but it's not as scary as it sounds. You have more than a couple of people in your life who are very fond of you, and you can practice with them, before you move on to socializing with The Outside World (Hint: one of these people is rather short and has a name with vowels on each end and none in the middle).
One of the great things about interacting with people who geniunely like you, is that there is virtually no risk of being rejected or humiliated, or any of the usual pitfalls of opening your mouth and making words come out.

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

I know. Thank you, guys. It is hard, though. My recent attempts, hanging out with classmates and such, have not been too successful.

I'm going to the Queer Montreal meetup in about 15 minutes, and I sort-of know some of these these people, so we'll see how it goes.

And we really should arrange something social. Outside of D&D. It's not enough, only seeing people once a week, and only for a few hours, and I'm always too wiped to be social afterwards because DMing takes all my energy :/

[jenjoou.livejournal.com]

Well, if you ever want some company, I'd be happy to oblige.

Although me helping someone be more social is like the blind leading the blind...

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

I don't know about that.

I'm looking forward to Friday, by the way :)

[jenjoou.livejournal.com]

I'm just saying my room in the basement is no stranger to me ;)

I'm looking forward to Friday too, it's going to be fun. :)

[jc2004.livejournal.com]

Nothing wrong with socializing on the Internet - I've met some great friends and gotten my best relationship off the net. Sometimes the net is just better. When I go out with people, it often ends up being noisy parties or bars where it's hard to have a good conversation. On the net, you can have better interactions.

Your other friend is right as well - practice. If you have 50 social interactions and 49 of them suck but 1 generates a really good friend, it was worth it.

I find it hard to respond to ordinary things in a conversation; extraordinary things are no problem but ordinary things make my eyes glaze over. Maybe you need to find people that inspire more lively responses.

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

The net is easier, and I have some good friends I would never talk to -- or even have met -- without it. But the skills I practice here don't seem to carry over into real life, and I'm a person who needs real-life contact as well (though I realize not everyone does).

I also need social skills for more practical reasons. I can tell that my silence creeps a fair number of people out -- unfortunately this includes teachers at school and highers-up at work. This is not good :/

It is easier to respond to extraordinary things. Part of it, I think, is the lack of pressure -- knowing that there's nothing you should say means you don't have to worry about saying it :)

[jc2004.livejournal.com]

I only met you recently, and I have to say that I thought there was absolutely nothing wrong with your social skills - you came across just fine. Something I've always found is that I get along better with people who are capable of being silent; the people I'm most comfortable with are those who don't mind being silent, and aren't awkward about it. No-one can talk all the time, but there are always some people who feel they should. They end up irritating me pretty fast. :)

[jc2004.livejournal.com]

Oops - this is Kay. I didn't realize Jen was still logged in on my PC. :)

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I guessed :)

And thank you, by the way.

[scottevil.livejournal.com]

There's always me. There are two big problems with the show: one that has to do with the structure of the first act, and the other with how to engineer the evil female lead's downfall. Perhaps you'd have ideas. (I'm not adverse to adding another name to the credits.)

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

I'd be honoured to help. Just pass me the information by email, or if you want to get together to discuss it in person, let me know when't convenient :)

[scottevil.livejournal.com]

I'm trying to figure out how to do this. I'm not sure whether you'd need to know the show inside-out or not, or if I could just explain the story and the way it's told, but more fully than the synopsis I included with those scenes a while back.

I could swallow my pride and send you the last version of the script, even though it's full of stuff I want to turf and has big chunks (mainly lyrics) yet to be written. Or we could talk about it while I'm in the process of rewriting the thing, and then I could give you this new version.

The thing is, with this new draft, I want to really push through the parts for which we had previously just left placeholders due to lack of ideas or frustration. Basically, make myself write something in those spots even if it sucks, because sucky parts can be turned around. I just don't like the huge gaps.

What I'll be working on first will be the book (dialogue), and hopefully I'll be able to fill in missing lyrics. I really hate writing lyrics.

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

"I could swallow my pride and send you the last version of the script, even though it's full of stuff I want to turf and has big chunks (mainly lyrics) yet to be written. Or we could talk about it while I'm in the process of rewriting the thing, and then I could give you this new version.

Probably best to talk about it as you rewrite. Just let me know how you want to do it (in person, by email, etc...)