My Social anxiety vs a NT

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Hi,
I have suffered with social anxiety for decades, I'm just so worried what people are thinking, I always assume it's bad.
I think this may be to do with my own poor understanding of people, combined with my low self esteem.
I was wondering if anyone knows if two neurotypicals interact do they just look at the signs like the person smiling and then assume they must like each other?

Thanks

I think some do, and having positive social experiences and better ability to read and learn social cues can help NT people have more confidence in social interactions on average than people on the spectrum, but there are plenty of neurotypical people who spend lots of energy worrying about what other people think.

My partner is very social and really good at talking about feelings and expressing and reading emotions and empathy, but she still will often worry that she overstepped or that a friend is upset with her (then they usually talk it out and smooth everything over). I don't think she has an above average amount of social anxiety, but she cares a lot about her relationships and spends a lot of time having intense conversations with friends so it's something she thinks about.

Thanks so much for your kind reply. So you don't think being NT is akin to being a bit psychic when it comes to dealing with people?

I wouldn't say psychic, they just have some sense we lack.
We are born kind of socially blind. Some make up for it with great effort using other senses and they burn out after a decade or two of pretending, some just always lack the crucial information.
I'm socially anxious, too, for the same reason. I never know what people really mean, despite being viewed as intelligent. It's so stressful.

Hey Magz, thanks for clarifying that.
I think I'm in a very similar boat to you, socialising takes a lot of effort for me, I try to be very friendly to people, I believe I come across as friendly, I smile lots(even though I'm not necessarily smiling inside), probably too much, and I think if the person I'm chatting to isn't full of smiles back that they don't think much of me.
This is very ground breaking for me, my therapist brought up high functioning autism as a potential reason behind my never ending and hard to deal with social anxiety and I'm trying to work to understand how us folks are different from NT's, by educating myself a little I hope to at least alleviate a little anxiety

You are mostly right but just because of the way that you are. Let's explain.

NTs get your feelings toward them if looking into your eyes because of their 'deep empathy' and their 'mirror neurons' cause them to feel the same way towards you that you feel towards them. It's one of the first things they do once they see you. Their empathy causes them to feel the same way towards you that you feel towards them then. This all happens within parts of seconds.
For this you have to learn eye contact to get their emotions towards you and you should try to feel positive towards them already before starting eye contact. This causes them to feel good towards you and to like you.
It's also the way to go to make friends. Many people told me that they like me and always enjoy to see me once I learned eye contact the right way.

Well maybe "a bit" psychic is a good metaphor, but I guess I'm just trying to say it's a matter of degree. NT people have misunderstandings with each other all the time, but people on the spectrum tend to have misunderstandings way more pervasively. I guess it's like there are clues that people on the spectrum are more likely to miss which makes everything harder, but even if you're NT and you can perfectly see all the clues, that still doesn't mean you perfectly understand everyone all the time.

I see I think I'm so afraid of misunderstandings, arguments and conflict, I just avoid them the chance of it at all costs.

Thanks both for your replies. I'm reading throught his thread and thinking about what has been said before socialising today.

I feel like I've been less impacted by peer pressure in a group sense. I would always be able to say no to something and never understood why people picked up self-damaging habits. I didn't know I was being bullied but became avoidant of relationships once I learned I was.

I was scared or intimidated in the past, and being around bad or toxic people because I couldn't tell who was who usually lead to violence or verbal confrontation forcing me to fight back in unpleasant ways. Over time though I realized real friendly people exist but they're just hard to find.

It also helps my social anxiety tremendously knowing that a majority of other people experience the same kind of thing, just less severe, and often suppressed at their own expense.

Hey, can I ask about this, I'm not quite sure what you mean, the majority of other people experience...anxiety?? Sorry for needing clarification!

Map84, I can really relate to what you said here. I also smile as a trained response to any social interaction and am very sensitive to the other individuals' reaction to my attempts at friendliness. This is especially true when I am speaking to my boss, for example. If we have a meeting and I notice he doesn't smile a lot, I think I am in trouble, even if the words he is saying indicate the opposite!

If you met one autistic you've met one autistic out of a few million. If you met one NT you've met 100 NTs out of a few billion. (This is a joke since NT population is roughly 50-100x autistic population)

Some NTs have high social anxiety. Some are very comfortable in social situations. The difference between socially anxious NTs and socially anxious Autistics is socially anxious NTs understand the rules of the game, whereas socially anxious autistics don't know what game they're playing. It would be inaccurate to say which anxiety is worse. They can both exist in varying degrees.

Once you learn to read people emotionally you'll find that many NTs have a nearly as much social anxiety as you have and many of them even higher. Most don't even dare to move the wrong way because they are totally afraid to be judged because of this. Their whole body language is often strange and anxiuosly restricted. They don't get if somebody isn't as much restricted and gives a sh*t on social norms. Once somebody is this way and shows that he has the balls to be a way that others don't dare they mostly like him for this.

I am not telepathic

Which two neurotypicals?

The world contains seven billion people

Yes, anxiety. And a lot of people are on medications as well.

Since I'm very bad at interpreting other peoples perception of a situation I would struggle to realize that other people feel anxiety too, so mine got very bad. I believed that I was the only one who was afraid of things like confrontation, embarrassment, or being called out in a crowd. Over time and after years of therapy I've become more aware of how other people think and it started with asking them how they feel in the same situation.

I even asked a very charismatic speaker once. I asked him how he feels talking in front of a large crowd (but made sure we were friends first). He said he experiences nervousness and often feels like he wants to avoid crowds but became comfortable over time. I later asked a few more people, even some on the street, as part of a survey. They all agreed that they felt nervous when in the same conditions I perceived as nervousness, avoided confrontation and disliked being rejected or insulted. That aspect is universal.

I learned that people may feel fear but learn how to conceal it so they appear to be more confident but to us look very thick skinned. It is deceptive and they are still fearful. My view is controversial but by paying attention to peoples reactions to negative things and matching them to mine, I see that they simply just hide them better.

oh that's very interesting! Thanks so much, i'll keep that in mind as it seems a useful piece of knowledge