I've always kept more to myself, but when I was younger (kid-middle school age) I didn't have any problems with at least getting something out of it when I did engage with others. I remember texting and chatting on Facebook with friends all the time after school just for fun or even trolling internet strangers or a guy that my friend was interested in.
At some point I got smacked in the face with the realization that it is possible to seriously hurt others without even meaning to, and I started to overthink everything and center my interactions around trying my best to appease the other person rather than to have fun. (This is also when masking my autism went from occasional to most of the time)
I can still have fun interactions with people I am close to, but I frequently create awkward silences.
My brain when put on the spot sorta just panics and closes all tabs and I can't remember anything that I have ever thought about before in my life ever, and sometimes there weren't even any tabs open to begin with tbh 😅🤷
I've read a few other posts with similar titles that got responses saying to just listen to people, so I'm gonna go ahead and let u know that I am already a champion listener and pm my only friend-making strategy for my entire life has been nerdy/alternative peacocking in the hopes that a yapper with similar interests will approach me and infodump forever.
Standard small talk does not spark joy so that's gonna be a no-go as well.
Ideally, I want to get to a point where I can talk to people again in my own freak weirdo little way and sorta pull my own weight in the conversations so that I'm not relying on the other person to do all of the talking or all of the generating of talking points.
Any tips and/or resources would be appreciated (–)