My wife is also autistic, and we both marvel over how, for the first time ever in our lives, our home is our sanctuary where we can just relax and be completely ourselves with all the weirdness that entails. All previous romantic relationships were stressful and ended badly because it felt like I was walking on eggshells, and couldn't understand why my SO kept getting upset. My wife had similar experiences in past relationships.
Just so you know, this is not an uncommon complaint in any romantic relationship.
Human relationships are hard. Being "neurotypical" doesn't suddenly make them easy.
It's worth so much to be able to just ask, and the other party examines the issue and their feelings and simply tells you.
https://www.fbi.gov/file-repository/hig-report-august-2016.p...
https://www.fbi.gov/file-repository/hig-report-interrogation...
Obviously you're not entering an interrogation, and you also want to level the playing field by sharing information yourself.
I think it's an evidence-based guide to how first impressions are formed, and what people often get out of social interactions.
Sorry, but this is the funniest thing I've read on HN in a while.
Um, seriously, all effective communication techniques are based on basically the same principles; there's a book by a former FBI hostage negotiator Chris Voss (Never Split the Difference) where he describes hostage negotiations with terrorists, and it all works in the workplace too. These two are significantly better than How to Win Friends and Influence Friends, which is mostly about sales rather than negotiations.
In context reasonable, show it elsewhere and derision would follow.
Funny.
The difference is that she keeps relationships hot by constantly messaging them (Whatsapp, etc), calling them or arranging hangouts. She's also a really good listener. My phone calls (e.g. with parents, sister, friends, etc) last for 5 minutes tops, her phone calls last for 30+ minutes :-)
In other words if you want to keep friends, you have to be the one that contacts them (though careful not to creep them out).
On the other hand don't feel bad with a high churn rate. This happens to everybody.
First thing is the way you look. People like you more if you're good looking. First step is to make sure you're in excellent shape. That means lean to the extend that you can see your cheeks, abdominal muscles and veins on your forearms are prominent. Get yourself a pull up bar and start doing chin ups and press ups every single day.
Then once you're in shape you find a clothing style that works for you. Stick to classic. Don't dress like a child. Wear smart and expensive shoes. Aim to always dress slightly better than you should be at any event, but just slightly. Groom well. Smell good. Grow a beard if you can but keep it very well groomed. Shave your head if you're going bald.
You might think this sounds silly so far, but looking good is very, very important.
People will compliment you on your appearance. Take the compliments. Thank them. Do not automatically compliment them back.
Second thing is to work on your personality. You will be smarter than 95% of people you meet. There's no doubt about it. You will know more and care more about most subjects that come up. Do not under any circumstances use this to "one up" people. The number one rule you need to keep in mind is to be positive. Do NOT tell people they are doing something wrong. Do NOT tell people you don't like something. Always continue a conversation in a positive way. If they mention a band you don't like, mention a band you do like. If they mention a technique that is suboptimal, mention a technique you have found works for you (not "is better").
If you employ this positive outlook along with a broad knowledge and range of interests you will be a person that people like. Hope it helps.
Also, if you are willing to try drugs, MDMA might help you. I wouldn't recommend alcohol or cannabis to anyone, but MDMA is worth it.
> The number one rule you need to keep in mind is to be positive. Do NOT tell people they are doing something wrong. Do NOT tell people you don't like something. Always continue a conversation in a positive way. If they mention a band you don't like, mention a band you do like. If they mention a technique that is suboptimal, mention a technique you have found works for you (not "is better").
I want to push back on this a little bit. it's important not to turn every conversation into a debate, but you can go too far with the positivity as well. it's okay to disagree with someone and say so from time to time. if you never disagree with someone, they will probably find you pretty boring.
Not wanting to offend but "sociopathic" is the word that comes to mind for me. Like "I'll do this to manipulate people and induce this response". I'm not going to say you won't be successful, just that your approach sounds very clinical and lacking in warmth and personality.
You do you, I guess.
There are social rules that many people get told in childhood, or learn by observation. Those who didn't learn them, for whatever reason, may benefit from being told explicitly now.
Also, don't worry. Out of 100 people who read "make sure you're in excellent shape", 99 won't. And the remaining one is probably not a sociopath, and will not become one by following this rule.
How to Win Friends and Influence people is also a masterful book for socializing. It basically teaches you what naturals do automatically.
Some people have many shallow friendships, others just a few deep ones.
Some people extend the hand of friendship early, others take years of persistence to become friends with.
Some people value time spent together on shared experiences, others value talking, others value gifts or help in times of crisis and others value being told how good a friend they are (once the friendship is clearly there).
Many people are friends with individuals they have known since high school and it is generally harder to make new friends after that point. It's also pretty easy to lose friends as you age due to differences of opinions or beliefs.
Perhaps the biggest skills in making and retaining friends is finding common activities and experiences you can share with them (outings, games, sport, dining, interests, topics of discussion, etc.) and finding the right time to invite them to engage with you in such things.
Very often there are logistical hurdles to overcome and that is all: do they have a car, is there a convenient bus, is the venue you are meeting nearby, are you available when they are, do they have a babysitter, is the suggested date suitable for them, have they currently got some other crisis or deadline to deal with, etc.
I find that if I ask to spend time with people too often, they may think I am "clingy" or "needy" and push me away. If I ask too little, the friendship never really gets established. It's a balance that is different for everyone.
Reflecting, I don't require people to have any obligation towards me, and if they don't want to spend time with me that's their call I'm not going to force myself on people, so when people just sort of drift past; that's just what happens. I feel like I could have friends if I was happy to play the part of someone who cared about TV celebrities, fawned over politicians, or idolised sportsmen.
Perhaps one has to be more assertive and demanding to some extent?
There focus here isn't me, and I'm trying to keep it that way: I mean to say that these things may help but shouldn't be viewed as sufficient.
There's something else needed, for sure. IMO only people who you spend time with outside of the original context are really friends - like someone you have as a colleague might become more than an acquaintance when you, say, go to a (non-work directed) event outside work together. There needs to be some sense of choosing to be with one another, not just happening to be in the same location because you both like volleyball, say.
Don't use "friend-finder" sites so much; you talk about using one elsewhere in this thread, but that's not where it's at. They contain the worst of in-person friend-making and the worst of online friend-making, with few of the benefits. Hanging out at events happening near you with people of similar interests & just throwing an anime avatar on yourself and talking on microblogging websites will both do you far better: Get yourself to where the conversation's happening, don't get yourself to where people are looking for conversation.
Make sure to contact others first, too, at least sometimes. Many times it becomes one-sided (X person is always calling Y person but Y person never calls X person) and that's enough to make just about anyone feel bad & alone.
Make sure to keep things varied; talking about the same thing in a loop kills a lot of the enjoyment that comes with knowing people. Everyone has a lot of things they're interested in; try and scope out who you're talking to, and occasionally just throw in things you're interested in that you think align with their interests. This gradually expands the things you can talk about, and keeps things interesting for everyone in the long-term.
Talk at least as much as you listen. "Being a good listener" is great! At least on paper. In reality if you just act as a soundboard, people find you dull. Contributing to the conversation is important!
Don't let every conversation feel like it's the most important thing in the world. If every conversation feels important, most people (there's an exception with a certain academic type who live and die by this experience but they're few and far in-between if you're not intentionally seeking them out) will interpret it as stressful, and that'll eventually be enough to get them to back away.
Make sure to maintain more than a handful of friendships at one time; almost no people will be able or willing to throw energy at you for the twenty hours you're awake in a day, but five, ten or twenty people allows you to fill your day with it while also not depending on any given person an unrealistic amount.
Do you have anyone in your life that you could ask for feedback? If not then you could look into Autism support services. There are people who specialise in exactly this kind of thing, and they will probably to be able to point you towards things quite quickly as they will most likely have seen the same things before.
It's also worth considering if there are other groups of people that you may not be coming in to contact with who might be more interested in the same things as you. I know some people who now have a very strong friendship group who initially struggled simply because they grew up in an area / environment where there weren't many people like them.
Unfortunately, I don't. It's a catch-22.
> It's also worth considering if there are other groups of people that you may not be coming in to contact with who might be more interested in the same things as you.
I'm really interested in philosophy. Since January I've been using Bumble to try to find people who share this interests, but I haven't had any luck yet.
Interests: anime, programming stuff, reading, startups, playing bad guitar, debating about empathy and being a pedant sometimes. Currently just trying to be productive and improve myself - many shortcomings I ignored for a log time and need to change.
Current reading list includes - some jap novels, how to win friends, statistical rethinking and logic theory.
Current projects include - rewriting my site, start a blog series where I post about everything I am going to do or did to get a product from 0 to first paying customer. That includes all the bad crap I came up, all the bad ideas and absurdism which people don't often share.
(email is in the profile)
On the subject of social skills, there have been many books on the subject, traditionally titled under Asperger's: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/12108.Top_social_skills_...
Friendships, like all relationships, must be nurtured to survive. A lot of neurotypical people are kinda crap at nurturing friendships naturally but they try to do so often in subconscious ways.
If your social skills are below average you may not pick up on the subtle clues, so you'll have to make more explicit efforts to maintain the friendship, and explain to your friends what kind of gestures go toward nurturing it when it comes to yourself, ie you mostly consider time spent together, or chats, or phone calls, gifts, what have you.
I'm not a psychologist but I'm a neurotypical person with a few high functioning autistic friends if you want my opinion on anything.
For me at least, I found that watching comedy series helps a lot to figure out social transactions. As a positive byproduct you learn to make jokes, which can also help in your pursuit to become socially appropriate.
I also find that if I stay away from computing for a while, I tend to get more normal.
Putting an effort into dressing acceptably (clean, fitting clothes), getting regular haircuts, figuring out how to chit-chat, generally smiling and nodding are my current strategy to fit in.
From my observations and what I read it seems that most people when they are adults actually have very few friends and there aren't many opportunities to make friends as an adult.
Just as a baseline to compare to I guess...
Tell them about what made you smile that day. Neat moments that you appreciated, but they weren't there to share it with you.
Food and drink. Whatever you're eating and enjoying, share it with that friend. Either invite them out or bring/send it to them.
Text, pictures, and video. Funny and positive, no drama, politics, etc.
Experiences. Think of something you like to do that can be shared, and invite them out to do it.
Share your time and effort. Offer your help, once, maybe twice. Don't be pushy with it. If they accept, help them like a servant, doing exactly what they ask you.
The basic idea is to consistently repeat the combination of "spending time together with you" and "day is improved".
If you do one of these daily with five people for a month, I can almost guarantee you will end up with at least one friend.
After that, you can focus on that one person more for a month to deepen your friendship. After that, add a few more people, but maintain friendship with the one person.
* The kids that were probably more heavily on the spectrum in school seemed they got teased often. They were targetted for being very defensive. Simple things become heated emotional arguments and especially when things are taken personally. The more someone would react emotionally, the more bullies would use them as a target. If something doesn't make sense, doesn't seem correct, or could have a negative connotation, it's best to not react with negative emotions immediately. Sometimes this is just part of word play or sarcasm that just isn't caught. Give the benefit of the doubt and try to clarify. Avoid arguing, and avoid people or statements that are just trying to get an emotional response, the actual things they say are just a mechanism to trigger that.
* Catch up with people and see where they're at, try to understand what their goals and challenges are and how it's been evolving. Ask them about things they're passionate about and what's new in that space. Remember to think of them when you come across something they may find interesting. You may be passionate about things they're completely uninterested in and it may be worthwhile to skip those if you don't feel much resonance on particular topics. Try to find activities where you can both be really engaged.
In general, show you care about people, teach them, help them reach their goals, be there for them when they need someone to listen. Fire your friends if they don't show some reciprocation, are always negative; self obsessed; pity seeking; complaining, only contact you when they want to offload, etc.
That's an interesting question.
I'm reminded of the "3 compatibility questions" some university worked out for asking someone you were considering dating:
- Do you like scary movies?
- Have you ever traveled to another country alone?
- Would you like to ditch it all and go live on a sail boat?
I wonder if there are questions that would scientifically predict compatibility with an autistic person.
Personally I have both (extended) family members, some friends and some coworkers who have (or I suspect have) autism or aspergers.
I enjoy the quirkiness, but I also really enjoyed the big bang theory.
It’s easy for my wife to do. Hard for me, and the kids to.
Basically after some time its kinda normal to share deeper stuff, be vulnerable(both you and him, it builds trust), maybe do a Weekendtrip together.
This can also sometimes backfire.. But thats basically how i formed my friendships so far
Do you change your behaviour after you know Somebody for some time?
I could totally miss the mark here, but that is what I've seen in my own life. I make a friend am too serious, couple of months later I am all by myself again.
So I decided to become more playful, and that really worked! If you are noticing that you might be too serious yourself and might need some playfulness. Here are a couple of things I did:
1. Asking: how am I naturally already playful, I enhanced that. I simply looked harder for more situations to utilize that playfulness.
2. Understanding: what is playfulness? It took me 2.5 years to understand that it means to not be serious (e.g. the sky is purple and there BE CATS ON CATNIP ATTACKING US! <-- it's not funny per se but if practiced a bit people will play along, though this example is well, oh dear, it at least has cats :) ).
2.5 years of trying to get an emotional feel for playfulness. Yep, it didn't come easy but now I have a hang for it. It's quite fun :)
3. What type of playfulness can I do?
This list is non-exhaustive. Note: always err on the side of being respectful if you feel a that a certain form of playfulness is too difficult to pull off. If you don't do that, then you risk being a little mean, and a little offending and all those things. It's not the end of the world, but it's simply not nice.
The types that I know:
- The roleplay: I once approached a woman in a club pretending I was her long lost brother and that I was raised in the jungle by apes and that I was still learning her language speaking very broken English. She laughed her ass off and played along. Who knew that pretending to learn English could be so fun!
- The fantastical exageration: I already provided an example of that.
- Teasing: teasing is like trying to hurt the other person with the twist that it should be positive and not actually hurt them. If this idea seems confusing, err on the side of being positive and not hurting people.
- Trolling: it feels like teasing but it isn't. You basically try to fool someone a bit, but you do need to see if they are able to take it. Err on the side of caution and safety. One friend I have used to be a bit rigid. He's gotten used to me now. So with him I could be quite light saying like: "look, it's a red tree." "No Mettamage, it's brown!" "No it's red, it's like a hellspawn from Satan!" "What do you mean, it's so clearly brown, what are you smoking?" "Everrryything my friend. Want some? ;-)" "My god dude, everything? Haha, you're crazy mettamage" "I know :-)" "Hit me up" "For sure" "Oh, yea, now I see that tree is totally red!" (just to be super explicit: the smoking thing was a roleplay, no one smoked anything)
- Musical improv: I did this since I was 4, it's second nature. Just pretend that life is one big improvized jazz band and hum and dance along with it to whomever you're talking to. It's quite Disney-like really, like some Disney character suddenly starts singing.
4. What happens if I fail? Are there failure modes that I can't recover from?
If people simply think you said something silly but weird, you're fine. If you went a bit controversial and tried to be playful that might pose a problem, so the tricky bit is to stay light. My guide is to stay respectful, that helps a lot.
5. Are there forms of social imitation I could learn from?
- Watch comedy that you like but is popular
- Go to improv classes
I guess that is what being serious is even if what you are serious about is roleplaying an abstract machine for days.
When I meet a friend, things seem to go really well at first, and then my friend seems to slowly get bored of the interactions we have, and after a couple months I just don't hear from them again. Not sure what I'm doing wrong. Is there a scientific way to find out?