Hi Doc,
Let me talk about myself, I’m a international student studying in an Uni abroad and I’m kinda bad holding out conversation and sometimes I’m trying to overcompensate the whole thing by making things a bit awkward, and then I’m having breakdowns because I feel like everything that I do is my fault.
Over a year ago, I met this girl at my university and at that time we weren’t really close. There’s one time when I’m conversing with her, I was really bad at trying to make jokes so I decided to tell her one of my drunk story which makes her uncomfortable and she started to distance me.
Over the times I’ve becoming more aware that she have been around with the friends that I had and I’ve been freaking out that because I feel like when I’m just couldn’t able to talk to people, avoiding people with her is what I’ve been doing and I hate myself for not able to tell her how I want to be not be awkward around her again.
guythatsaidshehadabadfeelingaobutthis
Deep breath, dude.
Here’s the cold hard truth about social awkwardness and being creepy by accident: it’s not in what you say, it’s in how you respond afterwards.
There will always be times when you’re going to have random moments of awkwardness. Some people have them more than others. It’s part of life and most people get that; throw a stick into any group of people and you’ll hit a dozen people who will have a story about how they said the wrong thing or made a joke that turned out to be offensive or otherwise just plain fucked up. I could tell you some legendary stories about times I tripped over my own dick hard enough to break my metaphorical neck.
However, the way you repair those moments is by being cool about it. You own your mistake and apologize. Not a non-apology apology like “I’m sorry you were offended” or “I’m sorry you misunderstood” or the like that puts the blame on the other person, but a sincere apology.
Getting past an awkward or creepy moment is simple. It’s a four step process.
Step One: Own your fuck-up. Don’t put the blame on the other person for not intuiting what you meant. Don’t use passive language like “Mistakes were made” that abdicates responsibility. You screwed up. Own your mistake. That shows emotional maturity, social intelligence and self-awareness.
Step Two: Apologize. Keep it short and simple. “Oh shit, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize…” for example or “Wow, that really came out wrong, I’m so sorry,” or “OK that joke really didn’t work, huh? I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable…” You don’t need to rend your clothing or beg for forgiveness on your hands and knees – in fact, making a production of it just makes things worse. Just a simple “Sorry I was creepy there” or “Sorry I was offensive” and you’re good to go.
Step Three: Let it go… in every sense of the word. Once you’ve made your apology, don’t dwell on the subject or constantly demand reassurance that it’s all OK again. This makes the moment all about soothing your feelings rather than making up for an awkward moment. If the other person accepts your apology, then it’s all taken care of and you’re free to move on. Similarly, don’t let the fear of that awkward moment constantly control you. Yeah, I know what it’s like to sit there and feel like everyone is thinking about the stupid thing you said and now everyone’s going to hate you. Trust me: most people either won’t have noticed or won’t remember that it happened. Despite how it feels, we’re not the center of everyone else’s universe and people aren’t always rehashing the stupid thing we said or did.
The other part of letting it go means not making that mistake again. If you’ve gotten too close to somebody when you were talking to them, be mindful of the distance. If you made an inappropriate joke, don’t tell that joke again. If you said something offensive, try to avoid saying similar things.
Step Four: Forgive yourself. Brain farts happen. Awkward moments happen. The more you hold onto these moments, the more you make things difficult on yourself. You fucked up, you apologized, now move on.
Now in the case of your friends and this one woman you had an awkward moment with: unless you told a story about how you took advantage of some woman or an equally disturbing story, then the odds are that she’s completely forgotten about things other than “yeah, we had a weird moment last year.” It would be supremely unlikely that she’s going around to your friends and pouring poison in their ears and now they all hate you. The odds that you come up as a topic of conversation at all is so remote that you’d likely have better odds winning the lottery. So the person who’s making this all weird is… well, you. By freaking out and getting all fidgety around her, you’re going to make other people uncomfortable; they’ll pick up on your nervousness and start feeling weird too. So what you need to do is take a deep breath, let it out and forgive yourself for having screwed up.
The next time you’re around this woman and your friends, just be cool. Take slow, deep breaths, force your muscles to relax and just be there in the moment, not in the past. People will forgive awkwardness, even repeated awkwardness, if you can show that you’ve grown past it. If the topic comes up, make that simple apology and change the topic. Everyone will be happy to let the past be in the past.
So relax, guy. You’ll be fine.
Good luck.
Doc,
I broke up with my now ex-boyfriend about 3 months ago. We were together for 18 months. I broke up because I went through his phone where i found some inappropriate messages he had with a girl. The reason why I did it was because i have always had a bad feeling about a particular girl because they have been snapchatting a lot with each other. And we have had some earlier problems with other girls because he is the type of guy who loves the attention from girls but he won’t never cheat on me, so sometimes it was hard to fully trust him.
The break up was very hard on me. I lost my appetite so I lost so much weight and i cried a lot and smoke a lot of cigarettes. People were always gossiping and telling my what he has been up to. He drank a lot, partied, flirted ALL THE TIME with other girls. I was always hearing a lot of negative stuff about him that made me look at him in a different way; it was like I didn’t know him at all.
So now he want’s me back and he is very sorry for being that stupid and has realized his mistakes now (which i think is a bit late). He says that he always wanted me after we broke up but he was too proud to say something to me and had to be tough. He’d tried to move on by being with other girls and was putting a cold and hard facade up. He wants to try again because he wants to change and he says I just have to trust him so I can prove it to me.
I am just so afraid to commit to him again and then end up being more hurt than before. I feel like it’s hard to forget how he has after we broke up, because he seemed so different, so much that some of his friends couldn’t even recognize him. He has also been with 3 other girls sexually after we broke up, although he says that with the two first girls he couldn’t get erection. Don’t know why. So i feel like I am in a big dilemma. But I really feel his words are coming from his heart, but still. It is just hard to build trust up again and let the past go.
I must say we have always had a good time together and enjoyed each others company.
Not Sure How To Feel
Deeds, not words, NSHTF.
Talk is cheap. Anybody can say anything; I can tell you that I’m the Sultan of Burundi if I wanted to. Doesn’t mean that they’re going to let me into the palace any time soon. So, he may say he’s changed, but unless he’s actually is showing how much he’s changed then all you’ve got is a lot of hot air.
So look at his behavior. Don’t worry about how different he was when you two had broken up – sometimes people act out after a break-up. How has he been acting since he’s told you he wants to get back together? Is he acting the way he did back when you were dating? Is he still being the wild and crazy party animal? Or is he going out of his way to be open and honest with you and trying to reassure you that the mistakes that he made are in the past?
? It’s always tempting to get back with an old lover; nostalgia is a powerful emotion and sometimes we miss the comfort of the known more than we miss the actual person. But if you’re both fundamentally the same people you were when you broke up, then you’re going to fall right back into the same patterns you were in before… the patterns that lead to your breaking up in the first place. Going through it the first time was bad enough; why would you want to live through the sequel?
If you really want to give this a shot, then that’s up to you. Just don’t leap back into things as though nothing happened. That’s the recipe for heartbreak. You need to take things slowly and carefully – as though you’re dating for the first time – and see where you both are. And don’t forget: he may very well be putting on his best behavior in order to show you how much he’s changed. It’s how he behaves over the long term that shows you how much he really has or hasn’t changed.
Oh and one more thing: as a general rule, I’m against people snooping through their partner’s stuff. Sometimes you’ll find things that retroactively justify (not excuse…) the snooping, but it’s a pretty serious violation of the other person’s trust in you… and when you snoop, you’ll often find things you wish you hadn’t known. So you may want to ask yourself if you’ve changed enough to make this work too.
Good luck.