I think this desire to want to know what people are thinking about you is a double edged sword. On one hand, learning how to make sense of how you affect other people is a good thing, especially if your relationships are not all what you want them to be. I found when I examined how I communicated around getting together with friends, I could appear to be difficult to schedule with and not take my fair share of initiating contact. So then the person on the other side reduces her willingness to reach out and initiate time together or now has a more restrictive schedule. So then it feels like she doesn't want to get together with me when really she's just reacting to feeling like I don't want to get together with her. This is one example of what psychologists mean when they say "self fulfilling prophesy." Often anxiety around social relationships amps everything up. Lots of times I end up feeling pushed away by people when they feel I am pushing them away.

This reminds me a lot of my spouse and it came out a lot in his parenting. He wanted to be close to our son but he did things that made the kid push him away. And his biggest fear was not being the parent he wanted to be. It seemed like it had the potential to be very self destructive in the sense that something he wanted so much was messed with because he wanted it so much that he created the exact opposite of what he wanted.

But the other side of wanting to know what people are thinking may not be as useful in everyday life. It strikes me as a major unknowable because you can't really know unless people tell you, and this question asked a lot can be really annoying. I think your friends or whoever want you to feel secure in the knowledge that they like you and love you and think you're great. For me accepting myself had the side effect of being more confident that I am loved by others.

I think many people want to know the unknowable, and it can be frustrating and diversionary from being present in everyday life. If you're distracted by wanting to know what people are thinking, it's hard to listen and respond and really show up for your friends and family. So they might disengage and that disengagement (even if slight, if you're good at picking up on people's nonverbal and body english cues) makes you feel bad.

My personal unknowable relates to things that don't make sense to me. It doesn't really apply to individual people, as I presume that most of what people do makes sense to them. I can't stand it when I can't figure something out, particularly as it relates to social systems or families or organizations. So of course I'd develop a career helping people through the most frustrating of social problems within a goliath of a system.

As usual, this may be not be useful to you but that's what pings for me in your words. I think you are moving towards something very positive in your therapy but I have found the discomfort of doing so is rather strong. I am someone who likes stability and finds security in things remaining the same. Once my T said during a time when I was starting to move from my more stubborn ways of thinking about things, "You're taking big risks." As if I were skydiving or starting my own hot air balloon business or something. I was like, wtf are you talking about? And this is what he said, being willing to be uncomfortable and open to change and what that means.