Intelligence, Social skills, Cynicism, Self importance

[hoggy]

What I was wondering is, how much do you see yourself as being apart from other people, do you think you're better than others, and why? Do you find it difficult to get along with people and do you often think that they just don't understand things in the way that you do?

 

I often feel unable to understand people, maybe the trouble is that I try to - it's a bit intrusive maybe? I was always led to believe I am intelligent but maybe I'm not as smart as I thought, how about you? Are you intelligent, and how do you know? Is it a good thing?

 

A friend of mine often seems to mention 'social skills', what are they, and do you have good social skills? The notion of social skills is quite ineffable I find - maybe it means something like being able to set the tone or something? Putting people at ease? In some situations I cope quite well, but when it's something like a night out, I sometimes find myself being weird and then instantly regretting it, can you relate?

 

Maybe social skills means knowing when to share your thoughts and when not to? Or does it just mean having empathy?

 

And lastly, do you think you're better than other people? I think deep down I sort of do, and aspire to be admired by people - but it's something like an old habit or an unconscious thing, I know it's a total bummer to be around people who think they're something special. I never intended to think I'm better than other people, and I hate it about myself when I realise I'm doing it. Maybe I'm just spoiled. How about you? Have you experienced this too?

 

Ok so I count 15 questions there, I hope that's not too many

 

 

This might be a mistake.. am bracing myself for derision

[MisterE]

i think the main hurdle in life that every human being ever had on the way towards being able to fit in with society, is the fact that you experience things from only your point of view. if you think about it, it's pretty easy to understand how people can be selfish when they are all that they ever really know on that most intimate of levels. i think from being an infant on through childhood probably every kid has at least a minor god complex. probably most people think they are smarter than the average person but this can't be the case mathematically. so i think asking about yourself and who you might be is a good thing. but also sometimes i think you shouldn't 2nd guess yourself so much. it's hard to know when and where to do which.

[VIII]

your electronic music resource, and therapist

[andihow]

What I was wondering is, how much do you see yourself as being apart from other people, do you think you're better than others, and why? Do you find it difficult to get along with people and do you often think that they just don't understand things in the way that you do?

 

I often feel unable to understand people, maybe the trouble is that I try to - it's a bit intrusive maybe? I was always led to believe I am intelligent but maybe I'm not as smart as I thought, how about you? Are you intelligent, and how do you know? Is it a good thing?

 

A friend of mine often seems to mention 'social skills', what are they, and do you have good social skills? The notion of social skills is quite ineffable I find - maybe it means something like being able to set the tone or something? Putting people at ease? In some situations I cope quite well, but when it's something like a night out, I sometimes find myself being weird and then instantly regretting it, can you relate?

 

Maybe social skills means knowing when to share your thoughts and when not to? Or does it just mean having empathy?

 

And lastly, do you think you're better than other people? I think deep down I sort of do, and aspire to be admired by people - but it's something like an old habit or an unconscious thing, I know it's a total bummer to be around people who think they're something special. I never intended to think I'm better than other people, and I hate it about myself when I realise I'm doing it. Maybe I'm just spoiled. How about you? Have you experienced this too?

 

Ok so I count 15 questions there, I hope that's not too many

 

 

This might be a mistake.. am bracing myself for derision

only child?

[KovalainenFanBoy]

That's a lot of questions dude

[Verdant Hickies]

If I'm honest, for a big portion of my youth I spent a lot of time judging other people, but the root for that was the judgement held against myself, as I felt rejected by a lot of people, had poor self-esteem and let that out on others. For a little over a year I've tried accepting everyone unconditionally and just imply that no matter how they seem they have some quality that's worth finding out. Very often that was true.

I think I'm more intelligent than average at least, but what does that mean? Nothing. Statistically, everyone thinks they're more intelligent than average. I think intelligence is unimportant as long as your personalities match on some level, let it be taste or similar views on the world or whatever.

I still have very few friends, since I don't do well socially, because no matter who I'm with, I always nervous and anxious whenever I'm around people. Then I think about wether they know that I'm nervous and that just worsens it. I'm just very socially awkward.

 

I hope that changes some day when I find someone that has the same interests as me, at least a similar taste in music. To date I've never been able to find people that knew how to have fun, but with whom you could still hold decent conversations. I've always seen myself as something inbetween, which is much too rare in my opinion, that doesn't mean I am superior though. I don't look down others, I just wish I knew more people on the same wavelength as me, which I think is exactly the right word.

 

Might be talking a lot of stupid shit now, but who cares.

Your post was a little confusing, so I hope I could give some decent answers.

[Bechuga]

Yep, everyone pretty much feels that way. Part of the burden of having self-awareness, I'm afraid. If you didn't think at all about inferiority or superiority or other things of the sort that come with talking to others and dealing endlessly with public mingling, you'd be a psychopath. And yeah, everyone thinks they're better than others. The trick is to not verbalise it and just do self-satisfying grins on the sly. Unless you're Aphex Twin, who quite happily tells everyone he is the tits.

 

Social skills are merely the toolbox of responses and actions that allow us to be around others. Trying to explain it or think on it anymore is a waste of time man, just talk to people, judge whether or not you're offending people, apologise if you have, and don't worry any more if you haven't.

 

tl;dr: you're overthinking things.

[ambermonk]

At this point my primary concern is separating the nice folks from the cunts. But I think in many cases there are external factors that make people ornery to begin with, such as occupation, environment, and treatment by others. Same principle applies to wildlife and domestic animals.

[AAAAh]

Yes absolutely all that stuff i empaphise with.

 

I dont understnd, and feel threatened by most people, i also tend tto think i am better than about mayb 75% off them. but at the same time i have extremely low self cnfidnse and can no relax.

 

I really hate being around other people, and when i was little the stress of a social situation would overwelm me and id get violent.

nowadays I just turn inwards and stay silent, i have become very adept at shunning pepople away with bodylanguage and words. maybe they think im rude?

maybe I am rude, i dislike most people and want them to leave me alone and i dont hide that.

 

i can only be myself when i'm alone, no one gets to know the real me. I am unable of showing any personality around people other than my direct family, i panic if someone asks any personal questions about me.

 

sometimes i dream of a life where i could completely shun all social interaction, but i did that for about two years as a teenager and i was not happy.

[Klopjob]

Most people suffer like this to a degree up until retirement, ego concerns.

 

But it does get easier, there comes a point in life when you realise people give 95% less of a fuck about you than you thought; then you can finally get shit done.

[spratters]

there comes a point in life when you realise people give 95% less of a fuck about you than you thought; then you can finally get shit done.

 

I find this to be very true.

[AJW]

Good thread. I am certain there are many subgenii here at watmm

[Danny O Flannagin]

I don't think i'm particularly smart but I may come across as smart to some people because I have decent grades and I don't talk like a fucking idiot. I think there's a vast array of different "intelligences." Like if you had someone who's able to ace every test in college they might not have any creative energy to write a song. And there are a lot of people who come across as really dumb in a classroom setting but have great social intelligence.

 

I'm not quite sure how intelligent I really am but I do know that I'm more open minded than the average person because I deliberately go out of my way to experience different art, music, movies that a lot of my peers don't seem interested in

[beerwolf]

When I've been at my most confident and happy and therefore more at peace with myself I have far more time and concern for all those around me, and more patience/humour with those who I dislike. When I've been at my lowest ebbs, I've been at my most judgemental and cynical towards others.

[AJW]

I wanna be a dog

[muttering mouth moth]

I used to believe that I was better than everyone else when I was little but that wore off by the time I got to college. My social skills are still terrible and I have a hard time communicating with people in general. I can communicate with my family and my boyfriend just fine, but I sometimes feel like I'm walking on eggshells when I'm talking with friends or people that I've known for a while but haven't spoken to in ages. I do find it generally easy to get along with people, just smile and nod a lot. I've learned how to make several expressions to match certain situations when someone's talking like 'surprise' and 'sympathy'. Even if I do genuinely feel particular emotions, I still feel like I have to contort my face into the matching expression. But yeah, getting along with people is easy. I just don't like doing it that often.

 

I think having social skills basically means having a self awareness of people around you and knowing how to react to a given situation, whether you're faking it or not. I work in retail so I have to pretend to be sociable even when I don't feel like it. Small talk is my worst nightmare and I easily stumble over words but I smile and power through it until I can go home and collapse into a spent husk of a human being.

 

Do I still think I'm better or smarter than anyone else? Nope. I outgrew that after I got out of college. Parent's used to reinforce the notion that I was a 'special, intelligent, and capable of doing anything with my life' growing up and now I have cripplingly low self esteem and stunted social skills. But that's just me. I know it's different for everyone else but that's my two cents.

[fenton]

The only people worth bothering with are those who you can sit in silence with and not feel awkward.

[muttering mouth moth]

The only people worth bothering with are those who you can sit in silence with and not feel awkward.

 

That made me think of that thing from Pulp Fiction. "That's when you know you've found somebody really special. When you can just shut the hell up for a minute and comfortably share a silence."

[xox]

What I was wondering is, how much do you see yourself as being apart from other people, do you think you're better than others, and why? Do you find it difficult to get along with people and do you often think that they just don't understand things in the way that you do?

 

I often feel unable to understand people, maybe the trouble is that I try to - it's a bit intrusive maybe? I was always led to believe I am intelligent but maybe I'm not as smart as I thought, how about you? Are you intelligent, and how do you know? Is it a good thing?

 

A friend of mine often seems to mention 'social skills', what are they, and do you have good social skills? The notion of social skills is quite ineffable I find - maybe it means something like being able to set the tone or something? Putting people at ease? In some situations I cope quite well, but when it's something like a night out, I sometimes find myself being weird and then instantly regretting it, can you relate?

 

Maybe social skills means knowing when to share your thoughts and when not to? Or does it just mean having empathy?

 

And lastly, do you think you're better than other people? I think deep down I sort of do, and aspire to be admired by people - but it's something like an old habit or an unconscious thing, I know it's a total bummer to be around people who think they're something special. I never intended to think I'm better than other people, and I hate it about myself when I realise I'm doing it. Maybe I'm just spoiled. How about you? Have you experienced this too?

 

Ok so I count 15 questions there, I hope that's not too many

 

 

This might be a mistake.. am bracing myself for derision

 

i just wrote a 2k words respond to you and accidentally pressed something (i really don't know what happened) on my keyboard and closed my browser before posting it! fakn shit fak fak me!

 

in short:

 

- your a good guy afaik, not intrusive at all afaik, but be careful in real life with intimate questions (if that's what you meant)

- i always knew how to behave with people, instinctively... but sometimes i can move well thought out moves too. sometimes it can take as much as a week of thinking before i'm sure that's the right thing to do about some trivial things. i just can't stop thinking until i'm done with it, mentally. maybe that's the chess player in me which does that. but i can be reckless, reckless to ones i love too. the reckless part of me is the one i hate the most! i'm trying to eradicate it more and more by each day.

- i had several iq testings in my life with results: iq >154 standard deviations of 24, iq 160 s.d. 16, iq >149 s.d. 15 and yes it's great to be intelligent but it's just a potential. i chose to be a procrastination freak instead. be smarter if you can! i hope one day i'll be too. also, creativity is far more important above an iq score of 130.

so, am i intelligent? tests said yes but i sometimes feel so stupid and i say and do such stupid things every day that i'm ashamed for.

- i measure ppl and i'm finding my friends only based on their morality and i can say that i always felt very lonely and it's the story of my life. yes, it's great to know someone that's on your level of intelligence but if he/she is not moral enough i'd said/thought: sorry...i do think i'm better than you in some proprieties that are very important to me and you're just below the threshold what makes you in my eyes not human enough so, continue with your life without me. i'd rather be alone. am i being an arrogant prick by seeing myself as better? not an easy question to answer but i see ppl all equal in all things except in morality. what can protect us from arrogance is acknowledging our own weakness and mistakes. in that way we can stay in equilibrium.

btw, lots of great ppl here. moral and intelligent and creative! <3 watmm

- read about empathy, everyone should. empathy is the only thing that can save this world.

[YO303]

I wanna be a dog

 

are you kidding me?

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJIqnXTqg8I

[Guest fiznuthian]

I am extremely self-critical and have really bad self-image issues.. at this point in my life I by default assume most people I meet are in some way better, more successful, more attractive, or interesting than I am. I know it isn't rational, but often feel defective and inferior anyway. I'm just sick of suffering like this. I don't enjoy conflicting with other people, and as best I can just try to be gentle and understanding with everyone. I don't expect much out of people and want to be friendly but often am struck with anxieties, paranoia, and insecurities that make me come across as shy, distant, aloof even.. It's impossible not to feel like there's some seriously terrible, shitty people on this planet but most are okay.

[goDel]

Some of the things which have helped me getting out of my egomaniac hole:

- other people can worry about this stuff as well, and perhaps even more than i do

- the way i measure up people says just as much about me, as it says about those people. Possibly more about me. The act of doing so is most of all a product of my emotions and experiences at that point in time.

- never blame others for your own emotions. I'm responsible for my own emotional state in the first place

- if people tend to be boring, it's probably because i'm bored. Which says more about my personal emotional state. And being bored can be a pretty useless state of mind (unless you're alone, dreaming away in nothingness. That's the only good sense of boredom i've experienced)

- i tend to be amazed about all the stuff that's different in other people and similar at the same time

- intelligence is highly overrated. It's one of these things people tend to worry about. Stop wasting your time about intelligence. The neural network between your ears isn't that much different to the one in other peoples heads. Just make sure to improve yourself at any point in time.

- rationality without emotional intelligence is useless

- my personal worries are essentially all about myself and whether or not i will be loved. Just like everybody else worrying. It's the situations where people don't worry which should be worrying!

.... Also, if you don't feel stupid, odds are you really are.

 

And emotional life hack #1: always be able to think the opposite of what you're thinking

[may be rude]

am i better than others morally? not a vegan. worse than vegans (who are morally good in the rest of their lives also)

 

do i find it difficult to get along with people? we get along, but it's not like we really get along

 

do i often think others dont understand things the way i do? yes

 

i dont think its intrusive to try to understand people. i think it's good to. if i dont understand what someone means, i dont act like i do, i ask them to clarify, it would be insincere to act like i understood, and why? i hate how people pretend to understand things they dont, or even pretend to hear things they didnt hear. they are afraid to be seen to not understand the person they are talking to? incredibly lame

 

im smart in some ways and not in some ways. i think that's the case with most people. real dolts can be astute with certain things, and geniuses can be knobs in some ways.

 

what are social skills? idk, yeah, what you said. being able to guess what people want to talk about? being able to entertain? being considerate? being weird is not necessarily antithetical to having social skills. some people require prepackaged norms in order to function, fuck them

 

having empathy and knowing when to share thoughts i would say are part of social skills

 

i don't mind being arrogant, i think it's funny, and i think egotism is kind of inevitable, so why not make it lush and entertaining. do i really think im better than people? no. if i was someone else, i would be that person. if someone else were me, they would be me. i give credence to the idea that free will is, maybe not a farce, but misunderstood. do i think i have more strengths than other people? no. i think i have some cool strengths, but i'd like to have some strengths i dont have.

 

not too many questions

 

not a mistake thread, cool thread imo

[may be rude]

just looked up farce, guess i didnt know what it meant. to clarify what i was saying about free will since i cant edit my post above... i see why we need to act like free will exists... but i cant say i absolutely believe it exists. it kinda seems like an old monkey trick that was so good it got perpetuated to the extent that it's now part of the architecture of the mind and society. do choices exist and should they be thought about? of couse. but once made, could a choice have been made any other way? maybe not. i think invoking quantum uncertainty into this is kind of grasping at straws. sure, maybe quantum physics counteracts psychological deteriminism, but is there any evidence to indicate that it does?

 

so, how this ties into the question of being better than people, idk if you can really judge people. if you lived the exact life to the last iota and had the same body and brain of some shitty scumbag, you would make those scumbag choices. yet i completely see the need to treat scumbags like shit for making bad choices. maybe i should make a thread about this.

[Glunk]

the trouble comes from having isolated interests like you lot