Sorry.* ALL* people are assholes.
There’s a set of personality traits frequently referred to as the big five. Two of them are extroversion (vs introversion) and how open we are to new experiences. If you take a look at the cite both of those seem to relate to the question.
The big five show a a pretty strong heritable component in twin studies. In this study 53% of extroversion and 61% of our openness are determined by the time we’re born. There’s a significant number of similar studies for homosexuality with varying answers. IIRC from a review paper about 50% of sexuality is heritable. We typically see that as being born that way. Things like social pressure/shaming and conversion therapy don’t work as environmental influences in any kind of meaningful to alter that strong birth predisposition. The relevant personality traits to the question are as determined or a little more strongly determined by the time we are born than our sexuality. We probably shouldn’t expect to expect similar strength predispositions to just disappear from interventions that don’t work to change sexuality.
Some people are just born differently than you are sta3535. Environment will have some effect but not necessarily more towards your personality; it may push then further away from you. It’s really that simple.
I don’t want to hang out at any one else’s house and worry about breaking something or spilling something or going to the bathroom. I’d rather be around my own stuff. I’ve outgrown hanging out with buddies at bars. And I don’t like making small talk, especially in professional settings, so I don’t network – to my detriment over the years and against a lot of stereotypes about my profession. I find it awkward and uncomfortable. Always have. My spouse and I have each other and that’s about it, and we’re good with that.
I’ve an objective answer for myself. I’m hard of hearing (very loud tinnitus that changes frequency). I do have hearing aids ($6000) and while top of the line, they don’t help in loud environments such as restaurants or parties.
We have Holiday parties at work. I avoid them like the plague. I’m sure people think I’m standoffish, when in fact, I just can’t figure out what they are saying. It sucks. I no longer go to any conferences for work. The acoustics are real bad, even for the classroom type settings.
I can do phone calls, but actually have to take my hearing aids out for those. I have a headset for when I need to be on the phone at work.
If it’s a quite environment, with only a few people, that works. Usually. I took my wife to a new restaurant for her birthday, table for two. The acoustics where such that I could hardly understand a word she said. And she understands that she needs to speak up and I rely on visual cues.
I used to be a people person. Then I met people.
I could have written enipla’s post word for word. My ENT tells me that I’d be the perfect candidate for a cochlear implant, except my hearing with a hearing aid is still too good for my insurance to cover it. Ideally, he says, I should have had the surgery about ten years ago and would have benefitted immensely. Instead, as my hearing gradually declines over the years, I’ll probably qualify after the point where I’d elect surgery. A loss for the patient, but a huge win for my insurance company. Sure, I could always pay the ~$100,000.00 out of pocket . . .
Sucks doesn’t it. I smile and nod a lot. Bad if someone says they are going to a funeral.
This is it for me, except swap “asshole” with “irritating.”
For me, socializing is like an obstacle course. At the end of the course is a person who is interesting and fun and has some value they can add to my life. But to get to that person, I have to figure out how to navigate their personality quirks. I’ve got to figure out which ones to jump over and which ones to punch through. It’s exhausting.
Sounds like, on this board, the better question would be, “why are some people so interested in meeting new people and open to social interaction? Like what is with them anyway?”
Well, this bunch is ok Ulfreida, but those folks over there, I think I need another nap instead. 
Everyone is someone else’s “idiot”.
-Dilbert
I can fly my introvert flag as proudly as any one else. I can walk into a room full of people at a conference and come out an hour later having talked to almost no one and knowing absolutely nothing about anyone in the room (my sister and niece, on the other hand would know the names of 80% of the people and have made plans with about 20%).
That said, I learned a long time ago to fake it. In faking it, I found out something interesting. Most people are not, in fact, assholes. Most people are basically nice but self-involved, and, well, friendly if approached. Just like me. If I find them to be a mix of boring and interesting, I find that they regard me the same way (though usually too nice to say anything rude). It’s really not that bad, and if you’re going to lead, you have to engage.
Though, as an introvert at heart, I have many acquaintances, but only a certain small number of friends.
As the family social director and a woman with a full time job, two kids and a husband, I’d rather hang out with people I know and am comfortable with than find novel things to do and dance around the niceties of making plans with people I can’t be relaxed with.
I like the IDEA of new people and new friends, but I’m typically the one who does all the heavy lifting to check calendars, coordinate activities and make things like that work. By the end of the week, I’d just as soon not.
I have a fairly wide circle of friends, and through those friends, I will very occasionally meet new friends. Recently - like over the past four years, I’ve become really good friends with someone that way, which has caused new acquaintances to open up and for me to become better acquainted with other people. For some reason, this woman and I existed in the same circle for years, but really never met - and when we did we hit it off. Then events in her life along with some in mine conspired to throw us together for a bit, and now we are close. And thinking about it, my friends circle has grown quite a bit over the last few years, my friends’ children are getting old enough that I see some of them as friends, and my own children are old enough that their friends are becoming mine. But I haven’t gone seeking these people, they’ve grown organically.
But I have no desire to make friends with - oh say, my husband’s coworkers who I will never see after he leaves his job. If he goes to one of those parties, I tend to stay home. We’ve been together almost 30 years, and in almost 30 years, I haven’t been to one of those yet where I do anything other than make senseless small talk with people I don’t make any connection to. I can much better use that time on myself - reading, knitting - then expend energy (I’m an introvert, so its significant energy going out with none coming back) for those events. I’ll do the corporate wife thing for official events. His coworkers would be great “networking” contacts for me - since we operate in the same industry - but I don’t tend to use acquaintances in that fashion - and don’t like being used by acquaintances in that fashion - too often its the idiot you wouldn’t give a recommendation to who is reaching out to you for an introduction to someone you respect, instead of someone you respect reaching out to you for an introduction to someone you respect. (I have no problem putting two idiots together, or two people I respect together - but I hate to facilitate an introduction against my better judgement.)
I can’t imagine moving to a place where I didn’t know anyone and creating new friendships from scratch.
Usually I find interacting with strangers more than superficial “How’s it going?” and “Have a good day” very tiring. I will break out of my shell occasionally but by and large mixed social situations wear me out.
Haven’t seen my “excuse” listed yet.
I am hearing-impaired. And the hearing loss is progressive, it won’t be too much longer until my hearing is completely gone.
For me, meeting new people is WORK. I have to explain myself, and then work like sonofabitch to figure out what is being discussed. I have to be around someone, to become familiar with their speech patterns, before I can even begin to understand maybe, maybe 65% of what is being said. Multiply that by however many is in the group.
And to “converse,” I have to face the person speaking. If I’m in a group, I end up spinning like a dervish.
Ideally, I have a “translator” with me. Preferably Mr VOW, because he knows how desperate I am. I tap him on the arm and say, “What is the topic of discussion?”
I am an expert and reading faces, smiling and nodding, and making vague statements like, “I understand,” or, “Anyone would feel that way.”
Whoo! I am emotionally drained just explaining all that.
~VOW
Someone recently was attempting to tell me how horrible their life had been going, with her parents both dying and her home facing foreclosure. But as she was going over the litany of horrible things she was also laughing, as in nearly hysterical laughter. I lost track of the conversation direction and when she started laughing I just joined in. My gf pulled me away.:o
It’s me in a tee shirt.
Management here has ordered me to start taking two meals a day in the main dining room to make me more sociable. I’m 65 and as sociable sober as I’ll ever be but they’re extroverts with no concept of the possibility that anybody could be anything else. Eating with strangers is like torture to me. Maybe I should threaten a lawsuit. Enough elder abuse lawyers advertise on daytime TV.
Sounds like HR needs to add a new slide to the diversity training educational materials.
I’m a resident of a nursing home, not an employee. And HR tends to be full of the worst violators of personal space.