Note to self.

[randomness]

I should remember that shyness can look like disdain or conceitedness. In any case, I should avoid taking offense.

Comments

[coraline]

i'm apparently one of those people to a lot of people... i've had a couple of interesting threads in my journal about it:
here's one, here's the other...

(also, hence my journal name "unintentionally intimidating"...)

[klingonlandlady.livejournal.com]

yeah, i was talking with someone about this recently... i have trouble knowing what to say to people sometimes to make conversation, even though i want to connect. So i kind of sit in awkward silence, occasionally go "glub" and wander off, or smile lamely. Others do this too and have found themselves thought of as stuck up or disdainful.

1) Really everyone is their own worst enemy
2) Never put down to malice what can be explained by lameness
3) Everyone is too busy dealing with their own shit (see #1) to take that much of a dislike to you

[dianec42.livejournal.com]

Words to live by! Especially (2).

[jendaviswilson.livejournal.com]

I would much rather be accused of malice than of lameness, however.

[holmes-iv.livejournal.com]

I take exception to number three, actually—there are plenty of people who will take time out from their own shit to take a strong dislike to people. Usually the people who have the most of it to deal with, unsurprisingly enough.

[klingonlandlady.livejournal.com]

Hah, that's true also- but then, it's really about their shit and not about you...

[holmes-iv.livejournal.com]

Quite so. Can still be a touch unpleasant, though.

[dirque.livejournal.com]

Never fear. From me, it's always disdain and conceit.

[contrariety.livejournal.com]

I worry that I do this *all the time* (project unintentional conceit, I mean.) I find other people very interesting once I understand enough about them to sort of have a place to start, but I'm bad at figuring out how to overcome the activation barrier of getting there, so I often feel like I'm either failing to try to talk about the other person as one is supposed to, or doing it in an obnoxious interrogatory manner.

(Though there is also a specific conversational pathology issue that's particularly bad with people who are also shy, because sometimes I'll be trying really hard to keep a conversation going, and I'll get to a point where I give up and I'll mentally say, "okay, that's all the topics I'm throwing out there. It's your turn now, or this conversation is dying." And that... well, sort of is disdain and conceit. :\ I have trouble imagining having that experience with you, though, because, you know, you're not particularly bad at conversational reciprocity. :) Speaking of which, you should come to the west coast sometime (presumeably when not in the midst health crises--I don't know the details but hope everything's going okay?))

[stolen-tea.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I try to apply the "they're more scared of you than you are of them" principle. But still, it was a shock when it was pointed out to me that some of my bizarre relations with certain other people were probably because those other people felt intimidated by me. I can only just *barely* conceive of that...