Are You Socially Awkward?

Because society is a certain class of people, and there are heaps of people that do not fit into any class. If you do not fit in, its going to be awkward for you socially. People are going to overlook you treat your differently, even ignore you or mock you.

thats the basic thing. Have you never encountered this?

God however, does not see class. eg the Good samaritan, did not ignore the jew. But the levites did.

methinks anyones whos ever been a minority can speak up and say what it means not to fit in and be judged on appearances.

Which happens all the time, unless you happen to be in the majority. some people arent even aware of their bias.

I would say all of these examples applies to me, but I would question if I had a higher intellect as I still prefer books with pictures in them. LOL!

There are a plethora of books including classics and manuals on etiquette which say otherwise. This is a modern problem. Intelligence doesn’t minimize social or conversational skills. You’d need insight on their environment, parental involvement, and childhood experiences.

More importantly, those who suffer with these challenges often attest to sadness, loneliness, and a longing for acceptance and connection. Many have difficulty finding partners and friends.

Intelligence is no different from physical beauty. Some rely on it as their calling card and others view it as an aspect of their person but not the whole. We can be ruled by the mind, heart or flesh. Imbalances yield problems at some point.

The bible tells us knowledge puffs up. Or as Professor Snape would say, “insufferable know-it-alls.” Hermione is a good example of social awkwardness. It was not on account of her intelligence. It was the incessant need to prove herself and a desire to be right that was off-putting.

One of the hallmarks of good conversationalists is the ability to tailor your discourse to the audience. We all benefit from unbiased feedback from those willing to tell the truth. Job seekers role play interviewing and this is no different.

I would test the theory before readily embracing it.

How does the existence of social classes validate your remark? Would it be equally appropriate to make a similar comment about those with lesser means with the requisite tropes? How does either exhibit a Christ-like spirit?

No, I don’t struggle with fitting in. My parents were very intentional about our upbringing. We were expected to work to our capacity. Irrespective of challenges. Defeatist attitudes were not allowed. We were shown the value of perseverance and a positive mindset.

We weren’t reared in an atmosphere of fear or imbued with rhetoric that promotes limited thinking or a scarcity mindset. They gave us the tools to thrive and it was our responsibility to utilize our gifts and talents. Worrying what another has is counterproductive and distracting. I keep my mind on the task at hand.

Seems like you had a very stable and sound upbringing. It would be hard not to succeed with such an upbringing. But that certainly isn't the case for everyone and I think that plays a major part in how adults fare in society. My father was kicked out of the home at 16 yrs old, left to fend for himself. While he has a very outgoing personality, and almost everyone in town knows him, he has a terrible lack of self confidence among other issues. Most people who know him would consider him overly confident, but he hides it well. It's been a lifelong struggle for him which he passed down to his children. So the home you are raised in has a huge influence on your self esteem and how you fit in socially.

I would say all of these examples applies to me, but I would question if I had a higher intellect as I still prefer books with pictures in them. LOL!

For all my socially awkward friends. Social awkwardness, social anxiety, and poor social skills is often linked to higher intelligence. So if you struggle in these areas then you are probably more Intelligent than average. The world needs your thoughts, ideas, and opinions.

The foolish of the world often do not know how to stop talking long enough to learn. We need the wise and knowledgeable to speak up and let your brilliance be heard. So dont worry about what others think.

Proverbs 16:16 New International Version (NIV)

16 How much better to get wisdom than gold,
to get insight rather than silver!

Proverbs 1:7 New International Version (NIV)

7 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge,
but fools despise wisdom and instruction.

Highly intelligent people can lack social skills more than others, and there are good reasons for it.

1. They overthink responses
Intelligent people tend to care what they say in conversation. They place more importance on their words than others, and this can mean they overthink their responses. A lot of casual conversation takes place spontaneously, on automatic pilot. Once you start thinking too much, it gets more difficult to speak without seeming awkward.

2. Ordinary topics might bore them
A major reason why intelligent people can have poor social skills is that they can’t summon up the enthusiasm to join in everyday conversations with people. Men may understand this feeling when listening to women discussing cosmetics, and women may understand it when listening to men analyze a football game.
Some highly intelligent people feel this way about most of the conversation topics of both the sexes.

3. They can find it tough to find common ground with people
Most of the interests of a highly intelligent person will be of limited interest to those of average intelligence. This can mean that subjects that would make the highly intelligent person engaging and enthusiastic in conversation are off bounds because the other person wouldn’t be able to relate.
Two neuroscientists might be very animated when discussing neuroscience, for example, but totally unable to respond in a conversation about celebrity gossip.

4. They’re more self-conscious
One of the disadvantages of higher intelligence can be a higher degree of awareness of oneself and one’s behavior in social interactions. Highly intelligent people may be super conscious of themselves while socializing.
Imagine if you always had critical eyes watching and judging you while you speak. You’d feel like you were on stage and you’d be unable to act naturally. For many highly intelligent people, that critic is in their own heads.

5. They’re more conscious of you too
Another character flaw that can afflict the highly emotionally intelligent is that they can be extremely aware of other people’s responses in conversation. A person with a high emotional quotient can spot the micro-expressions and subtle body language cues in other people, which show when they’re impatient, bored, or not really listening.
This can be crippling because people don’t really listen to others and aren’t genuinely interested in them at least half of the time! Once you’re aware of this, it can be almost impossible to continue a conversation with someone.

6. They’re naturally more anxious
Many correlations have been found in research between higher levels of intelligence and increased levels of generalized as well as social anxiety. Anxiety is a major cause of poor social skills.
The reasons why this might occur are open to speculation. But it could be argued that ignorance is bliss and someone who is really conscious of what the world is realizes that it is a dangerous and unpleasant place. This naturally gives rise to feelings of fear and anxiety.

7. They’re uncomfortable with revealing personal info
The more intelligent a person is, the less comfortable they may be with revealing too much about themselves to people then don’t know well. This is the logical thing to do in many ways, as we all know that there are people around who might use personal information against a person.
It’s reasonable to want to know a person enough to trust them with details about your life that could place you in a position of vulnerability. This has a cost in terms of social skills, though.

8. They hide their vulnerabilities
Following on from the previous point, intelligent people may be extremely cautious about revealing their vulnerabilities. This kind of self-protective behavior may be learnt rather than innate in intelligent people, but intelligent people are more likely to learn from mistakes and change their behavior in response to failures.
The problem with this cautious attitude is that it robs them of essential social skills. People can’t warm to people who are unwilling to reveal their humanity to others. It prevents others sharing with them too.

9. Their impassioned responses about intellectual matters can alienate them
The problems that highly intelligent people have with social skills are not restricted only to the times when they hardly open their mouths. The real damage can occur when they do get talking.

When an intelligent person gets involved in a conversation that happens to interest them, they can become so heated and enthusiastic that people think they are aggressively opinionated, or even that what they’re expressing is anger.

This couldn’t be further from the truth. Intelligent people enjoy a heated debate and aren’t easily offended, nevertheless others mistake impassioned responses for aggressiveness and take offense easily.

10. It’s hard for them to avoid conflict at some point
A highly intelligent person often ends up in conflict with others because it’s difficult for them to let throwaway remarks about things to pass by unnoticed. Intelligent people are highly aware of the importance of ideas and how a bad idea can have terrible consequences for the human race.

For this reason, they’re not likely to let you get away with saying something you haven’t thought through properly like most people would. People tend to take personal offense to being corrected in this way, even if (or especially if) they know they were wrong.

How would a conversation about cosmetics even start?

You could start with "You look a little washed out". Here's an idea".

I'm socially awkward, but it has nothing to do with intelligence. I just suck. That's all.