For me, it’s part of a fun combo social anxiety and being an extrovert. I talk way too much, share too much, and then live in constant regret

I used to be like this, but I’m almost 40 now and I have lost the ability to care. Maybe it’s just the culmination of insanely drunken moments I’ve had over the last two decades, but the fact that none of them have negatively affected my life (in a noticeable or significant way, at least) gives me the confidence that…

Your Brain: YOU WERE WEARING THAT STUPID BUTTERFLY SHIRT YOU THOUGHT WAS SO COOL, REMEMBER? I DO!

My brain loves doing that, usually right when I’m about to fall asleep.

I’ve been told it’s on the narcissism spectrum: We imagine we are so important to other people, our awkward interactions must be something they will think about and hold against us forever.

As another over-50, I can explain it using a new-found paste-link skill:

I’ve always attributed it to my anxiety disorder. I spend an exorbitant amount of time thinking (obsessing) about interactions, decisions, actions, thoughts, mistakes, smells (did I smell?), facial and body positioning, FUCKING EVERYTHING. So this “7 seconds” thing is a pipe dream for me... it’s like telling someone…

i’m this way because i’m autistic and i have to be. society has been telling me to do this, overanalyse everything i say and do, my entire life (even before i knew i was autistic) because i was always somehow getting it wrong.

I think it’s a combination of things - natural personality is probably a part of it, like if you’re over analytical, a bit obsessive over details, overly aware of everything going on around you, especially other people’s reactions and expressions, and/or sensitive to emotions, both your own and other people’s. But I…

This. And the thing is that it’s not one singular event, which is why it’s harder to pin down. It’s years and years of little, passive comments here and there on any task you complete. My mother always wonders why my sister and I (29 and 27, respectively) don’t make our beds as adults. Part of it is just that I have…

Maybe she’s born with it... Maybe it’s awkwardness!

I blame my family. Those spiteful bastards like to hold on to every little thing. “Remember when you were 7 and you did this thing? How embarrassing for you?” Dude, I’m 31...but then I still feel embarrassed cause they’ve told me I should!!

Same here - drinking is a double-edged sword for me. On one hand it loosens me up enough to actually talk to people at parties, but then I worry about everything I did or said while my filters were down. And lord knows I’ve had a few doozies.

I commented this above, but it’s lost in the grays. A summary- we evolved to be social animals, so way back when, we really needed to get along with our foraging group, lest we be shunned and left as a lion appetizer. It’s all evolution’s fault, so know that and release your guilt at not being able to totally turn off…

The result of some traumatic incident in childhood?

I don’t know but whenever I google weird personality traits I have all the results I get are links about Asperger’s syndrome, so I’ve given up analyzing these things too much (7 seconds, I guess).

This is so true. When I realized that hangovers actually chemically alter my brain to make the constant murmur of self-doubt get turnt waaayy up, it was a revelation. Even if a few extra units of booze juice feels like it’s helping ease anxiety in those work/social situations, it’s 100% not worth the next day bad…

Yup, just what I was going to say. Having passed age 50, I currently give zero fucks about anything I say that is not (inadvertently, of course) objectively offensive (racist, sexist, classist, etc.). I try to be careful of peoples’ feelings, and believe I succeed for the most part. How I come across otherwise—-I’m…

This makes total sense. My therapist also allowed me to forgive myself for chronic procrastination by assuring me that it’s an evolved skill to only expend energy on doing what is absolutely necessary at any given moment. These two theories combined make my broken brain feel like a fine-tuned machine.

Apparently there’s a theory that your brain goes in hard for remembering things that made it go “oh shit!”, so as to avoid doing it again. This is from, like, millennia of “oh shit!” moments sometimes getting you eaten by bigger animals, and now just manifests as generalised anxiety. I don’t know how true it is, but…