A metaphor I've used recently is that I feel like I'm on a bicycle on the freeway and I'm trying to keep up but cars are swerving around me and passing me at 70 mph.
Sometimes I feel like if I could pause life in social situations like you can pause a video game, things would be much easier. I feel like there are situations where I react awkwardly or that I misunderstand because it just happened too fast and I didn't have the time to analyze it.
One situation that happened a few years ago that was very difficult was at my girlfriend's birthday. We went to a restaurant with some of her friends and her sister. The way I saw it is, since it's her birthday, I'm going to pay her meal. I imagined going with her to the register with both our invoices and paying both myself.
What actually happened was, when the waiter came to the table to give us the invoices, my gf's friend and sister immediately reacted and reached out quickly to grab her invoice to pay for it. At the moment, I had no idea what just happened - I didn't immediately realize that they were reaching for her invoice. Instead, I just sat there wondering what was going on.
It seems I passed for a jerk who just doesn't care when in fact I just didn't understand what was going on. It just feels like it happened so fast that I didn't have time to process.
Is this something you guys have experienced as well?
Sometimes I feel like if I could pause life in social situations like you can pause a video game, things would be much easier. I feel like there are situations where I react awkwardly or that I misunderstand because it just happened too fast and I didn't have the time to analyze it.
One situation that happened a few years ago that was very difficult was at my girlfriend's birthday. We went to a restaurant with some of her friends and her sister. The way I saw it is, since it's her birthday, I'm going to pay her meal. I imagined going with her to the register with both our invoices and paying both myself.
What actually happened was, when the waiter came to the table to give us the invoices, my gf's friend and sister immediately reacted and reached out quickly to grab her invoice to pay for it. At the moment, I had no idea what just happened - I didn't immediately realize that they were reaching for her invoice. Instead, I just sat there wondering what was going on.
It seems I passed for a jerk who just doesn't care when in fact I just didn't understand what was going on. It just feels like it happened so fast that I didn't have time to process.
Is this something you guys have experienced as well?