Over-thinking social interactions

Hello, fora. I'm new here, so pardon my awkwardness. I have a question for you guys:

Do any of you over-think what others say (or don't say) to you? For example, I tend to be pretty socially awkward, so sometimes I make comments that temporarily disarm others. Their responses to my strange choice of communication semantics range from a confused face and a laugh to an abrupt change of topic or uncomfortable silence. Some people think it's funny and cute that I'm eccentric and others...don't.

It wouldn't be an issue for me if I could discern what people are really thinking based on their reactions, but when I'm talking to someone I really care about, I remember every awkward, bizarre thing that I say to them (and their responses) and constantly question what their reactions really mean. Ironically, I feel like I've spent my whole life making people feel uncomfortable without meaning to, but I try so hard to make them feel at ease...and when I can't tell, I think about it over and over again and worry about it.

I have a professor whom I really like and care about. She is extremely intelligent and fascinating...and because I care so much about what she thinks, I remember every little thing I've said to her. I'm simultaneously extremely comfortable around her and extremely nervous. Her open, accepting, and considerate nature make me comfortable, but my awkwardness and self-consciousness make me nervous. When I get nervous, I say awkward things. When I say awkward things, I think about it over and over again...which makes me more anxious. It's a bad cycle.

I was wondering if anyone else experiences something like this on a regular basis. If so, has anything helped you? Do you have any suggestions?

Thanks, everyone.

Welcome! I'm Teal. =] Nice to meet you.

I do this a lot. Seeing as I don't really interact with people I don't plan to see more than once, most people who get to know my personality know I just have a sick sense of humor. Some people like that I say what I think, some people just adjust. Most times I don't realize i've said something socially awkward until I get a weird reaction - I then tend to just change the subject all together and in the back of my head think of better things I could have said. I've decided i'll probably always be a little awkward in conversation, so sometimes I just don't care if people get turned off by it - chances are it will happen again, so they just need to get used to it or leave me alone all together.

Story of my life. The solution was to focus on really listening and understanding the person, where they're coming from, being receptive. You won't have anything left over to be self-conscious. You get to a new level of responsiveness.

Hey Teal, thanks for your reply. See, sometimes I feel the same way, where I think, "Well, yeah, I'm awkward and people will get over it". But usually when I'm around someone I really care about, I worry about what I say. In the case of this professor, it happens just about every time I talk to her. I really look up to her and wish that I could talk to her without feeling totally weird about it. Maybe I try too hard. I'm sure she can tell. Others certainly can.

I guess I'm caught between trying to make myself less socially awkward and accepting that it's just part of my personality. I want to connect with people, but I'm afraid that I just scare them away...and that makes me NOT want to connect. I'm weird.

Thanks, H3rmit. I appreciate that.

Story of my life too. I am notorious for overthinking social interactions, things I say, things people say to me, no matter who I'm talking to - stranger or someone I know. I feel like I live too much in my brain and it's exhausting. The problem really gets bad when I'm meeting a new person. That's when I agonize over what they must be thinking of me or what I said. A therapist I used to see called it "mind-reading." Trying to discern what others are thinking and making assumptions about it. From time to time, I think about the quote that says something like "What people are thinking is none of your business." I can't take that to heart though.

H3rmit, I like your strategy. I think I focus too much on myself and not enough on the other person, really listening to them and understanding them. Polyphony, try this the next time you're in a situation where you find yourself overthinking. I think I will too.

Thanks, everyone. Mommy, that "mind-reading" thing sounds very interesting. I guess that's exactly what I'm doing. I should probably try not to worry so much. It's just hard for me because I've spent my whole life constantly protecting the feelings of the people around me. I don't want anyone to feel worried or upset or uncomfortable; I just want things to be okay...but that means that I've acutely tuned myself in to their emotions. Ironically, I feel as though I can tell when others are uncomfortable, but I also think that I have a tendency to project and misjudge the situation. I usually feel uncomfortable around people, so maybe that's why I worry all the time that they feel uncomfortable around me. Does that make sense?

Or maybe I am just focusing too hard on myself and not giving the people around me enough consideration. I try to be considerate of others, but I'm sure I fall short.

I overthink things too sometimes, I usually worry about how awkward I look or overthink what I want to say (usually to the point that I don't even say it) I worry about about my words coming out jumbled and stuttering and sounding stupid, appearing awkward/nervous/uncomfortable/cold and making people feel the same... because of this I usually avoid talking all-together (this is in group situations though, I will talk to people in one on one situations and how I feel and whether or not I overthink depends on who I'm with) if I do talk and make a mistake then I definitely overthink it about afterwards and feel very anxious and beat myself up and will want to avoid similar situations in the future.

I have the same thing and I avoid it the same way as poptart - just staying silent. It's hard though, because my mind is always racing. I agonize so much on what I'm going to say next that I just don't say anything, but then I feel like I'm being rude if I don't respond. I remember being introduced to someone and I was so unsure of what to say that I ended up staring at them silently until they walked away. I was bullied in elementary school because I had a "big mouth," but now I feel like I'll be bullied again if I try to talk. This has made me very shy, and I'm still scared after nearly 10 years. I was able to talk to an old classmate (online) and he said that everyone thought I didn't talk because I was stuck-up! The life of someone with social anxiety... I certainly wouldn't say any of this in person. I'd probably stare at the floor since I feel too intimidated to look anyone in the eye.

It took me a few weeks of arguing with my therapist about how much I hated the idea of 'over-thinking' before i realised that in every social interaction I evaluate the situation, try and imagine what people want from me, and respond accordingly. It is so draining to be on edge when I talk to anyone - and I didn't realise I was even doing it at all.

Thanks, everyone, for your replies. I think I'll bring this up with T the next time I see her. Our relationship is fairly new and I haven't really spoken with her about this topic. We mostly talk about how I feel isolated and disconnected from people (again, ironically, as I think I'm pretty good at gauging their emotional reactions to situations) because I'm eccentric and strange and I have a lot of trouble with trust.

Anyway, I'm glad to see that I'm not alone...selfishly...because it sucks that we're all going through things like this. I wish we weren't...but I'm also glad I'm not as alone as I think I am.

Well include me in the camp of over thinkers. Maybe we should start a 12 step program and call it OTA Over Thinkers Anonymous
Worrying or ruminating about social interaction and other things plays a huge role in my life. Leading to anxiety, depression and insomnia.
I started seeing a new T a few weeks back and today she told me that ruminating and over thinking about future events feeds my anxiety. And ruminating and over thinking about the past feeds my depression.
Pretty obvious when you think about it but I never have had it explained in such a basic way.
We started talking about how mindfulness (living in the moment) can help us over thinkers and ruminators. She also pointed out that the practice is more challenging for over thinkers and not to be over critical of myself if the new skills are slow in coming.

peace

Oh yes, I do that all the time too. I keep asking myself at the end of a day if I said something wrong, rude, stupid or all of the above, and I struggle to remember the exact things I did and said and what were other people's reactions. I think I said something awkward to every single person I know - and this makes me feel really ashamed everytime I talk to that person.
The thing that sucks most is I don't think awkward things pretty often, but what comes out of the mouth is totally different from what's happening in my mind...that's way sometimes I wish we could communicate through telepathy.

'What other people think of me, is none of my business." ~Catherine the Great!

Love that quote, and it's really something to contemplate in life. Her biography, resounded with me, that quote summed up, so much of her life story, moving from one country to another and becoming a young bride and eventually Empress.

Hello, poster child here. I am terrible that way.

I have improved when it comes to time with people I really look up to or complete strangers, but I still over-analyze other relationships- those with my friends and family. Probably because over the past few years I've made huge mistakes with those closest to me.

What caused my improvements with my nervousness around people I admire? To that I credit my college professor, I'll call her Mary. I adored her. I wanted to grow up to be this amazing woman, and would get nervous, jittery, and do stupid stuff in her presence. You know what happened to Mary? She ended up having a nervous breakdown and was hospitalized for mental health issues. She missed two quarters from work. Leave it to me to look up to and want to be someone on the verge of a complete nervous breakdown. Well guess what? I've succeeded. I'm just like her.

This is an interesting one for me.

When I am manic (I am BP2) I am the utter epitome of charming, gracious and funny, seemingly effortlessly to everyone.

When I am low all I can think is 'why do you hate me?'!

I would love a happy medium. And I'm not talking about Whoopi Goldberg in 'Ghost'!
Fluey x

i think its because when you go low you have more of a tendency to be anxiouis so u can relate to the posts. im also bipolar and ocd and am very scared of social situations and will try to mind read and it gets so bad sometimes i cant even stand to be in teh situation...

Like a mirror post...I was nodding the whole time....are you ever so awkward that you try so hard to interact people mis interpret you in a bad way.....drives me crazy....

Almost as if someone else has control over your mouth other than you....

Similar problem here, except I tend to focus on what I say, have said, will say, as well as them. I very much overthink social crap.

Wow, glad you posted as this is exactly the form my social anxiety takes.

I get terrible anxiety when I say certain things to people and it's far worse when it's someone I like and respect. It's not so bad when I stick to talking about safe unemotional topics but then I feel like I'm boring and don't have anything to say. As soon as I express an honest opinion, I start to ruminate and convince myself that my opinion is wrong or unacceptable. I can hear my words echoing in my head and imagine what they sounded like to the other person.

I'm currently working on low self esteem by reading a book by Melanie Fennell recommended by one of my Ts when I was doing CBT. It's making a lot of sense so far and explains how people with low self esteem become convinced that others focus on their negative points as much as they do and forget about the positives. By paying more attention to the good things we say or looking for any possible positive interpretations of the bad things we think we said, the anxiety can lessen.

One helpful thing I've been doing recently is thinking of the people I really like and reminding myself that they often say things I don't agree with or sometimes even think are plain wrong or offensive but it doesn't change how I feel about them overall. I think if we like ourselves more we'll be more forgiving over things we say and accept that maybe others see it as part of the bigger picture of who we are.

Wow, Harmacy, that was a really thoughtful post. Thank you. What book are you reading, if you don't mind my asking? I might have to look into that, as I struggle with low self-esteem as well. And I totally get what you're talking about when you said that your worry about talking to people doesn't bother you when the topic is trivial or unemotional. I feel the same way. When it comes to this professor, I can talk to her about silly, simple, or educational topics very easily...but I have also told her about aspects of my life that are of a more personal nature (as she is an adult that I trust, which is rare) and later on worried about whether or not she was bothered by it. She doesn't act as though she is, but I worry anyway. I still struggle with this. I haven't gotten up the courage to mention my anxiety about it to her because I don't want to seem like I'm freaking out or unstable or incapable or something...

See? That's what happens.

Thanks for replying. Yeah, I can totally relate to not wanting to discuss my anxieties with the people who are causing them as not wanting to freak them out or make things worse.

The book is called Overcoming Low Self-Esteem. I'm about half way through an intial read and then will go back and do more of the exercises and re-read the relevant bits. So far though it's a revelation. I've done CBT for social anxiety but it didn't focus specifically on low self esteem which I'm now convinced is the major trigger for me. It's really well written as well. Some CBT books are quite heavy handed and go straight in with asking you to do assignments and write things down. This one takes it's time and you can choose to do the exercises in your own time and still feel like you're getting a lot out of it.