socializing – By Autumn Rain

Energy ducking – using low enthusiasm to avoid standing out.
- Don’t be afraid to be playful!
Story gap – hint at something to build interest.
Avoid short answers – elaborate!
- Share enough to make conversation easy, but create space for the other person.
Avoid repeating the same old boring stuff
- Use fun hypotheticals!
Don’t be passive!
- Listen to laugh (be real about it)
- Make others feel smart & funny.

I confess that “energy ducking” is something that I’m quite guilty of, especially in real life. You know how it is when you tell a joke, only it falls flat and everyone stares at you like you’re a weirdo? I have a hard time with that. So it’s easier to not tell the joke in the first place.

I’m struggling quite a bit with camera anxiety. Camera confidence is zero. On the bright side, I’m very skilled at silently staring in terror. Heck yeah!

My social skills are rusty. I probably would have had an easier time building a youtube channel when I was 22, back when I was used to interacting with friends. As it is now, my daily conversations tend to revolve around, “Please do your math lessons,” and, “What would you like for dinner?” However, since my long-term goal is to do livestreaming, I need to brush those social skills off. Remember back when I thrived on social energy? Do that again.

Part of me is kind of embarrassed that here I am in my late 30s, trying to remember what it’s like to be around friends. But, given everything I hear about the “loneliness epidemic”, I’m in good company. Hey there, fellow humans who spent too much time working and no time socializing. Let’s hang out. I can silently stare at the camera in terror. We’ll be awkward together. No judgments.

I recently learned about the “warm social world,” and I very much want to live there. I’ve been starting up conversations with random strangers, and its fun when I find someone who wants to talk.

I may be in my late 30s, but as they say, it’s never too late.

During this last summer, I adopted a puppy.

I got him primarily for emotional support, since I had sunk into the despair of, “I can’t do anything right,” but couldn’t shake the idea that it would be good for me to get a dog, so that I could learn assertiveness and have a constant companion. So, when I came across *the puppy* that felt right for me, I took the gamble.

I affectionately refer to him as my “spaniel mutt,” because deep down inside I don’t really understand why everything has to have some cutesy mixed name, like “spadorkadoodle.” I guess I’m still fundamentally a cat person.

First, I did not anticipate the puppy biting being as big of a challenge as it is. All of those online videos make it look so easy to correct, but instead my puppy would get more riled up whenever I tried to use those tactics and bite even more, go figure. To make it more fun, there was a wide range of advice on the topic, ranging from, “Dogs need to learn the difference between soft biting and hard biting somehow,” to, “Any amount of teeth is bad bad bad.” So, we keep toys scattered through the house for some quick re-direction, and he bites way less than he used to, so he’s probably outgrowing it? I know that people can get quite passionate about dog training, so maybe I’m opening myself up to criticism here, har har. Be nice to me, I’m going through a hard time.

Potty training, on the other hand, was much easier than I expected. Maybe because, as a mom, I’m already used to directing small creatures to go pee, and it’s second nature to me now.

The biggest surprise about owning a dog is the social aspect.

I’m not referring to the fact that dogs are pack animals, but rather how much of an ice-breaker they are for socializing with strangers. It turns out that people with dogs are much more likely to stop and chitchat when you also have a dog.

I’m going to take a moment here for a bit of a soap-box rant: It seems like I’ve spent a long time surrounded by general negative attitudes towards strangers, with people complaining about randos smiling and saying “hello,” just because they happen to pass nearby, but I always liked it — I’m the weirdo who enjoys feeling like I exist in society, I guess. As I’ve been reevaluating my life, it’s occurred to me that maybe socializing with strangers isn’t such a faux pas, and that all of those Negative Nellies are the ones with the problem, not me. I can smile and say hello to whoever I want to, thank-you-very-much! In the culture I grew up in, we referred to such things as, “Brightening someone’s day,” and that’s how I’m going to see it until the day I die.

Anyway, obviously not everyone with a dog wants to stop and chat, but generally speaking the more outgoing the dog is, the more outgoing the owner is, and people really love talking about their dogs. It makes it easy to establish those brief connections.

The thing is, when everything in your life is unexpectedly turned upside down, it’s the small things that provide the best anchor points to keep yourself grounded. Impromptu conversations help provide a sense of normalcy and acceptance, even when it feels like everything has gone to pieces. They aren’t that magic elixir that makes the emotional pain stop hurting, but they still help.

I’m not some guru who has it all figured out. I can’t tell you any steps to make life instantly easier, since all I know how to do is drag myself out of bed even when I don’t want to. Sometimes, all it takes is getting up to let the dog outside to do his business, and from there the rest of the day will fall into place.

I want to add that my children thoroughly love having a dog, and still often talk about how awesome it is. They spend lots of time playing fetch and tug-o-war, and enjoy helping with the puppy’s training.

Adopting a puppy was a good decision.