Social situations:

    • Social situations:

      I can deal well with social situations, like meeting new people, debates in class, groups at parties, but I have this ridiculous obsession with analyzing everything I do afterwards. Even if I haven't done anything stupid/absurd, I still regret some little thing I may have said and obsess over it for hours on end.

      Like calculating and going over what I said to people and how I could have said it better. It frustrates me to no end.

      Anyone have this same issue?

    • Re: Social situations:

      Yes. I believe it's partially my personality and partially my upbringing. If I didn't say something the right way to someone like I wasn't smiling when I said hello, my mother would reprimand me. It is part of my personality as well because I strive to do better in everything I do, and thus I look for areas to improve upon. It seems to be a fairly common occurrence.

      It helps to recognize that A) you are thinking this because you have a desire to improve yourself and B) the other person is probably too busy thinking of the mistakes they may have made rather than the mistakes you made.
      "The point of philosophy is to start with something so simple as not to seem worth stating, and to end with something so paradoxical no one will believe in it"-Bertrand Russell

    • Re: Social situations:

      I've found myself doing this recently. I tried to ignore it t the start by distracting myself by trying to think about other things but now I find the best thing to do is to have a good long think about the situation when I'm not doing anything else and there's no distractions (like in bed), and think what I could have said better and how it would have improved/altered the conversation and the other person's reaction. Then conclude that it was probably a totally trivial conversation and that the other person will probably already have forgotten what I said so it dosn't actually matter and I can put the whole issue to bed.

    • Re: Social situations:

      I experience the same thing it sucks, like one day a popular girl waved at me in her car, and my hands we're full so I made a big nod back at her and the whole day after I was wondering..

      Did I look stupid when I nodded like that?
      Should I have dropped my stuff and waved?
      Did she wave at me so I'd drop my stuff?
      and again...
      Did I look stupid when I nodded like that?
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    • Re: Social situations:

      isitso wrote:

      Yes. I believe it's partially my personality and partially my upbringing. If I didn't say something the right way to someone like I wasn't smiling when I said hello, my mother would reprimand me. It is part of my personality as well because I strive to do better in everything I do, and thus I look for areas to improve upon. It seems to be a fairly common occurrence.

      It helps to recognize that A) you are thinking this because you have a desire to improve yourself and B) the other person is probably too busy thinking of the mistakes they may have made rather than the mistakes you made.


      I don't really think it has much to do with my upbringing. It's just something I do, I feel, for no reason at all other than to harass myself, haha.

      I really like what you've said about the other person also thinking of the mistakes they've made. Sometimes it's hard to realize that, I guess.

      Gengar wrote:

      I thought I was alone with this.


      Not alone at all, I'm afraid. :)

      amando96 wrote:

      Yes, i do it all the time, i don't know why i do it, but usually people simply disregard me, like they ignore me after meeting me, and i analyse what i said/did to find a reason for the hatin' on me.

      Sorry for not capitalizing the i cba.


      I do that alot! When someone stops talking to you for a little while and you start wondering what the hell it is that you have done. And then sometimes it turns out to be absolutely nothing.

      It's terrible. :(

      darlingdeanna wrote:

      yes i do it all the time, it aggravates me but it helps when you're reassured that nobody thought badly of it. or just thinking about it so much will eventually make it seem insignificant to you :)


      Thanks for that bit of advice. :)

      Just thinking about it alot tends to make me even more frustrated. But I guess I just have problems with letting certain issues go. I guess it more depends on the situation and how important it was to me. The more important it was, the more I fret about it.

      P1234R wrote:

      I've found myself doing this recently. I tried to ignore it t the start by distracting myself by trying to think about other things but now I find the best thing to do is to have a good long think about the situation when I'm not doing anything else and there's no distractions (like in bed), and think what I could have said better and how it would have improved/altered the conversation and the other person's reaction. Then conclude that it was probably a totally trivial conversation and that the other person will probably already have forgotten what I said so it dosn't actually matter and I can put the whole issue to bed.


      I like this. Next time I start thinking too much, I need to try and implement this idea. Thank you.

      Dayved wrote:

      I experience the same thing it sucks, like one day a popular girl waved at me in her car, and my hands we're full so I made a big nod back at her and the whole day after I was wondering..

      Did I look stupid when I nodded like that?
      Should I have dropped my stuff and waved?
      Did she wave at me so I'd drop my stuff?
      and again...
      Did I look stupid when I nodded like that?


      HAHA, that's exactly it! I don't mean to laugh at your situation, but it's precisely like that. I calculate the situation to the most illogical levels and I know it's ridiculous but I can't help doing it.

      In your situation, perhaps this is a crush and that's why it weighed down on you so much?

    • Re: Social situations:

      I do this A LOT and to add to that I usually worry about what the person thought about me at that moment if I made a stupid comment or did something else stupid in front of them. Plus I usually plan out the conversation that I am going to have with a person, if I know that I'm going somewhere important, even for small talk.
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      The post was edited 1 time, last by Midnight ().

    • Re: Social situations:

      I used to have that problem, and I'm not entirely sure how I got over it. Embarassment? Regret? What is that? :p I guess people are often more forgiving than you think they are, and likely don't even notice the things you analyze later.


      I have a friend kind of like that too - she'll say something and then be like "OH! But I didn't mean it like..." and go on a long spiel about all the possible ways what she said could have been taken the wrong way and how that's not what she intended. It's kind of endearing, it show's that she's a really, really kind person. :)

    • Re: Social situations:

      Zen wrote:

      You are definitely not alone in this. I think everyone does this at some point, some more than others. Its a common thing for teenagers to do.



      Agreed. It's like a phase in most teenagers lives. When I was a few years younger, i do it all the time. Now that I'm 19 and starting to realize things about people, it's not as worse as before.
      [CENTER][SIZE=4]Love is a serious mental disease...[/SIZE]
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    • Re: Social situations:

      I do the same thing sometimes. I don't obsess over it for hours, but I think about it right after and sometimes later on when I'm alone. Like "ugh that was such a stupid thing to say, this person probably thinks I'm a moron. I should've said it like this or that."

      It makes me feel better to know I'm not the only one who does this tho.

    • Re: Social situations:

      Yeah I always do this.
      What makes it worse is that in the time of the social situations, my mind is winging it and just going with the flow, not even acknowledging what I am doing. But right after I think about it and it grates on my mind. You could say that the absence of thinking during the situation is made up double-fold afterwards.