Root cause identified

[Levitat0r]

I feel like I've solved an enigma leading to much introspection, and hopefully self-acceptance. What I began to notice is that I tend to look relatively normal to myself in posed portraits and in the mirror because I'm focused on looking at myself. I'm very regretfully a solitary creature, so I haven't had anyone to take much in the way of candid pictures. I did find that Android phones can be really slow, and what I saw is that I immediately get a distant cross-eyed gaze the moment the shutter makes me wait, because that's how my attention works. It works, it just works different, and "different" is exactly what people can't handle.

So, anyway, here's a picture of me petting a dog, and now I feel like I've solved the puzzle of why people treat me like I'm different. This is what I look like when I'm not intentionally exerting myself to look at myself. I can drive a car. I can drive a motorcycle. It's because those movements are really, really simple, and I have no trouble multitasking them. Socializing with people is vastly detailed and complicated, and I've concluded that if you look like this, people do not think kind things of you. It's very upsetting to me, because I don't see it as a big deal, but the consequences have been totally punishing.

 

[KevinMao133]

First of, welcome to this forum. You know, it’s always good to see new people being on here

I don’t know how to answer your post but I’m glad you have expressed yourself. I’m happy you are here, I’m sure others feel the same

 

[All-Rounder]

I think I look the same when I'm enjoying myself. I don't even want to know and I think that's not a bad thing but I can like understand people being sort of wary of me because of it but what I don't understand is rudeness. Or treated like a child by people who don't understand autism or have their own anxiety or other problems they don't manage.

Btw I really love dogs, I would be the weirdest looking with them. But dogs love that.

And thanks to the biggest idiot that life produced I now know what I look like when I make love, thanks to another when I am getting my hair done in a salon, not like there aren't mirrors anyway. What can I say, I love people messing with my hair.

 

[Tired]

Guess you'll have to find another root cause, because you look just fine on this photo, a normal smile.

 

[Mr. Stevens]

"different" is exactly what people can't handle.

My experience is not yours, but I don't think people hate difference. I think they enjoy it for various reasons. What often bothers us is what feels threatening, which is typically what we don't understand. But, that isn't quite the same as difference.

You look like a nice, average person. You don't look different at all. As long as you are friendly and open-minded toward people, they will probably like your differences, because people want things to be interested in. If they feel threatened they may ascribe that to difference, but that's not really what bothers them.

 

[vergil96]

To me it looks like you might have face blindness, people with face blindness (it doesn't have to be 100%, but partial) have trouble reproducing facial expressions in addition to recognising them. Their faces look more spontaneous as well.

But I don't think it matters in my experience, I think more like @Mr. Stevens that what people care about is whether you're friendly and interested in them. I have found it to be the no. 1 hack to interpersonal relationships to show interest in the other person and be a good listener.

 

[Levitat0r]

Guess you'll have to find another root cause, because you look just fine on this photo, a normal smile.

We tend to look normal to each other. I just got done telling someone who is deaf and non-verbal that their writing looks great to me. To me, having a friend means knowing someone who wants to know how you're doing, and they like to talk to you, and to do things alongside you. So, by that standard, I can go a decade without making any friends, and I usually get nipped in the bud right at "hi", so there's very clearly something very off-putting about me. To me, the picture says I can't multitask petting the dog and looking at the camera at the same time. I look like I'm off in space because I'm focused on the dog, and that I think is typical, and also the reason people make nasty judgments about your level of intelligence and mental presence.

EDIT: I think I can be even more specific. It's not about "static" presentation. It's about dynamics. If I'm going to sit still and pose, I can look very normal. The problem, is that that's not the state that life happens in. You're generally moving around, responding in the moment, and often doing more than one thing at a time, and that's where people decide that you're a spazz, and you're not fully conscious or aware to their standards, and that's where they decide not to like you. It also doesn't take much, because I do agree that the level of weird here is not huge, but I can see it.

 

[tree]

To me the current photo of you with the dog
looks relaxed, enjoying the company of the dog,
and getting a picture taken.

Not spaced out or anything.
Just having a pleasant moment.

 

[Levitat0r]

To me the current photo of you with the dog
looks relaxed, enjoying the company of the dog,
and getting a picture taken.

Not spaced out or anything.
Just having a pleasant moment.

Well, I will chalk it up to birds of a feather, then. I had a circle of fine weirdos back in the US, and then when I left, I realized none of us were ever normal, and that is why we were a community. When you're with your own sort of "folks", they are your normal, but the world doesn't look and see you the same way, and I guess that's what I was trying to work out.

 

[Levitat0r]

To me it looks like you might have face blindness, people with face blindness (it doesn't have to be 100%, but partial) have trouble reproducing facial expressions in addition to recognising them. Their faces look more spontaneous as well.

But I don't think it matters in my experience, I think more like @Mr. Stevens that what people care about is whether you're friendly and interested in them. I have found it to be the no. 1 hack to interpersonal relationships to show interest in the other person and be a good listener.

There might be some of that. I'm not sure that's what you're seeing in the image since I'm looking at a camera, not a face. But you are seeing the same thing I do; there is a certain space-out quality when attempting to multi-task, and I've been told about it before. I just wanted to make sure I wasn't imagining things, so our observations agree somewhat.

 

[Levitat0r]

Anyway, I don't like to sit here in a state of spectacular self-absorption and navel-gazing, so I will try to illustrate my motivation. I am so bereft of community or support that when my landlady falsely accused me, I wound up with a broken hand, and I had to set the bone alone, myself, without medical training, in a hotel room. I think it saves about a thousand words just to lay it out; I'm miserably alone, I have no support, and I don't understand what it is that causes people to reject me so automatically and consistently. So, that's why I'm sitting here staring at myself, unbecoming or not.

 

[Peter Morrison]

Self acceptance is important for mental and emotional health. We compare ourselves to others too frequently, and it is usually over appearance. Looking healthy is a key to being attractive. Having a positive outlook is also attractive. Essentially, it means being comfortable in your own skin. Looks fade with time, but your character can remain constant and attractive throughout a lifetime. Be your natural, normal self, and if someone finds you attractive, they will let you know. Work on self esteem. We are all very hard on ourselves for not being perfect and our apprehension looks like fear to everyone else. Confidence cannot be staged. The facade wears off quite easily. Deal with real confidence and don't consider yourself some kind of misfit because someone else in a group is more popular or better looking. Deal directly with your own reality and learn to identify the aspects of yourself that you like best. They belong to you and they are real.

 

[Levitat0r]

Self acceptance is important for mental and emotional health. We compare ourselves to others too frequently, and it is usually over appearance. Looking healthy is a key to being attractive. Having a positive outlook is also attractive. Essentially, it means being comfortable in your own skin. Looks fade with time, but your character can remain constant and attractive throughout a lifetime. Be your natural, normal self, and if someone finds you attractive, they will let you know. Work on self esteem. We are all very hard on ourselves for not being perfect and our apprehension looks like fear to everyone else. Confidence cannot be staged. The facade wears off quite easily. Deal with real confidence and don't consider yourself some kind of misfit because someone else in a group is more popular or better looking. Deal directly with your own reality and learn to identify the aspects of yourself that you like best. They belong to you and they are real.

I think you mean well, but I group a lot of this advice with what belongs to a person who is preoccupied with total vanity. There's a big difference between someone who collapses at a hint of rejection versus someone who has been totally left out in the cold, and that was the distinction I was trying to draw by posting the broken hand. I don't know of anybody else who winds up alone and is forced to improvise how to practice emergency medicine on themselves because they don't have any friends or companions. That's cruel, and unjust, and it means nobody gives a care about me enough to be near or to support me when I need them. That's entirely different from "I'm going to collapse into a puddle because Jill sez I look like a nerd." They're not the same thing.

 

[NB79]

You know, i have a similar lament.
A lot of people, start friendly with me, i don't know how to make pleasent conversation but i try to be kind, it can start slow, but almost always starts, first i come and the friendliness is gone, the next, i say Hi entering the place and i not even greeted sometimes, and then it could happen people treat me 'deadpan' face and voice like they given up on trying with me, or even they start being a bit maybe uncsiously rude with me, and they see something wrong, thing is i don't know how to be friendly enough it seems, even when i don't have any ill intention, and i try to not do anything wrong and be kind. Then i feel like crap again, after that, another person who is making me feel like the ugly duck.

 

[Levitat0r]

You know, i have a similar lament.
A lot of people, start friendly with me, i don't know how to make pleasent conversation but i try to be kind, it can start slow, but almost always starts, first i come and the friendliness is gone, the next, i say Hi entering the place and i not even greeted sometimes, and then it could happen people treat me 'deadpan' face and voice like they given up on trying with me, or even they start being a bit maybe uncsiously rude with me, and they see something wrong, thing is i don't know how to be friendly enough it seems, even when i don't have any ill intention, and i try to not do anything wrong and be kind. Then i feel like crap again, after that, another person who is making me feel like the ugly duck.

Well, I'm glad you feel like you at least have an "in" with people as a point to learn and grow from. It's very rare that I have an actual conversation with someone. What is very common is that that I say "hi", they intentionally look away from me, and then keep walking, sometimes briskly. There is something very offputting about me and I simply do not understand what it is. I did move to a different country and it has gotten easier to at least make an introduction and chat for a bit, so it's a start. But I've seen a startling amount of violence, hostility, and even police involvement just attempting to interact with people normally. To me, hope comes from finding an island of misfits like this, and hoping that people understand what its like to be judged as a bizarre thing, on-sight, before you have even had a chance to make an introduction.

 

[All-Rounder]

I've been blamed, dragged by force to pay for someone else's stealing when I barely paid and threatened by people so there's a whole crazy world out there that's not friendly to different. I look like a burglar yet I'm the one they're stealing from and harassing in stores without any reason whatsoever but being exemplary compared to their behavior and silly errors. How can I pay in front of you, you give me the proof of payment then you chase after me and drag me. Just to tell me it wasn't me. And by the way, my brand-new electronics you just threw on the metal band are not to be dealt with that way, idiot. Crazy stuff. Can you just say sorry though? No? Well I guess this world is too much to expect anything out of.
None of the staff apologized, like, ever. No gifts, no supplies, nothing. Sometimes I wonder if anyone ever watches the cameras. Or if they even care. Probably just making way more money than I can imagine. Still hate to be them though.

 

[Levitat0r]

I've been blamed, dragged by force to pay for someone else's stealing when I barely paid and threatened by people so there's a whole crazy world out there that's not friendly to different. I look like a burglar yet I'm the one they're stealing from and harassing in stores without any reason whatsoever but being exemplary compared to their behavior and silly errors. How can I pay in front of you, you give me the proof of payment then you chase after me and drag me. Just to tell me it wasn't me. And by the way, my brand-new electronics you just threw on the metal band are not to be dealt with that way, idiot. Crazy stuff. Can you just say sorry though? No? Well I guess this world is too much to expect anything out of.
None of the staff apologized, like, ever. No gifts, no supplies, nothing. Sometimes I wonder if anyone ever watches the cameras. Or if they even care. Probably just making way more money than I can imagine. Still hate to be them though.

Closest thing I could recount was getting heavily bruised and manhandled by a hotel clerk when I asked for my deposit back. They have a racket, where if you look gullible they rob you, and they physically throw you out. It seems like the examples never cease, and I know that people will doubt how miserable your life is, so I've taken to keeping records.

 

[All-Rounder]

Closest thing I could recount was getting heavily bruised and manhandled by a hotel clerk when I asked for my deposit back. They have a racket, where if you look gullible they rob you, and they physically throw you out. It seems like the examples never cease, and I know that people will doubt how miserable your life is, so I've taken to keeping records.

Wow, terrible. I kept record of the date it happened in and reviewed their store. I went to a same store chapter in another area and they moved or upgraded the worst staff to that special location, and the staff was unprofessional to me there too and asked for my ID to return something I bought from them so those people have all my details. So I no longer buy from them. Honestly practice should be illegal.

My mom went to court when her ID details were used to purchase stuff she never knew about but had to pay for. First trials were unsuccessful, lacking witnesses but eventually they came forward with the same problems from the same crook and won the case.

 

[Levitat0r]

Wow, terrible. I kept record of the date it happened in and reviewed their store. I went to a same store chapter in another area and they moved or upgraded the worst staff to that special location, and the staff was unprofessional to me there too and asked for my ID to return something I bought from them so those people have all my details. So I no longer buy from them. Honestly practice should be illegal.

My mom went to court when her ID details were used to purchase stuff she never knew about but had to pay for. First trials were unsuccessful, lacking witnesses but eventually they came forward with the same problems from the same crook and won the case.

I don't have much expectation of justice, or not from people, anyway. I did notify the company, and I forwarded them the pictures, and made it abundantly clear that staff takes a sizeable deposit and then they bodily drag you out when you ask for it back. They acted interested, and then never responded. I haven't been back to look to see whether they replaced the staff. What I did see, at the time that it happened, is that my natural impulse was to lay into the guy physically and impress upon him that he has massively messed up. But I was making progress in faith, and I simply kept yelling at him that he was going to receive cosmic judgment for being a thief. I felt like I got confirmation that I did the right thing, because just as I thought that he was going to throw me down the stairs at the door, he spotted a police car. The guy is a sociopath, so of course he told me "Look, it's the police, they're going to drag you off". But, I happily rushed off and reported him, and the entire time, he's attempting to claim that my fury at being robbed and assaulted is proof that I'm obviously the bad guy. People are brutally insane, and if you bear characteristics that make you look vulnerable, you get a window into the absolute worst of human nature.

 

[All-Rounder]

Religious topics should be kept in Religion, on the Forums. A lot of sociopaths adore their faiths and using them for their gains and losing reality rooting so not sure if they care btw. There's a lot of misinformation about faith and personality disorders, it's best to be aware of it instead of spreading it. Let's talk about this more in DMs.