Meeting someone new and asking their name, then realizing you were so nervous/focused on making a good first impression you failed to actually LISTEN to what their name was
This is happening to me more and more. But with friends or people I already know. I'm too focused on what I just said or thinking what they might be thinking of me, and how i should look and act while I "listen" That I end up not listening at all :/
And yet, in an ironic twist of events, if *I* mess something up in the conversation, I can remember it for the next 12 years, and channel it's existence into additional anxiety for any future interactions I might have
I felt like this a lot as a kid. I had a drama teacher who told the class that his mother would make up complete bullshit when talking to strangers because she knew she would probably never see them again and she found it fun.
For some reason the idea that I wouldn’t see strangers but once in my life stuck with me and gave me a sense of something close to anonymity. It flipped some switch in my brain and I lost most of my anxious tendencies. Probably not everyone’s trigger but I like to think there’s a trigger for everyone.
In a class one day I accidentally stepped on my skirt and flashed a bit of underwear. I thought no one saw until a few years later a guy that was in that class with me was like " remember that time in 2nd grade when you accidentally stepped on your skirt and flashed people ? "
*anxiety intensifies*
For some reason the idea that I wouldn’t see strangers but once in my life stuck with me and gave me a sense of something close to anonymity. It flipped some switch in my brain and I lost most of my anxious tendencies. Probably not everyone’s trigger but I like to think there’s a trigger for everyone.