😃
you see they’re looking at you but maybe they’re not blinking and suddenly you feel like they are wanting 100% eye contact don’t even glance once kinda thing and you’re like whoa man that’s a little heavy but you’re scared that if you look away you will have lost the battle but now you can’t focus on what you were talking about because you’re remembering that this might be a symptom of autism and that would be wild but it seems like everyone’s kinda claiming autism now and maybe it would be chill and you could find some community through that and you unlock a new confidence and start not making eye contact as a point you’re trying to prove now about self acceptance
Related Recs
👀
I'm a well known eye contact avoider. after my college graduation my family had a little celebration dinner with some family friends and my dad got up and made a toast. he started his speech by saying "for years we thought Nicholas was autistic because as a child he would never look you in the eye!" which was very cringe inducing but he had a point i suppose.
i've gotten better about it as i've gotten older and been more intentional with it, but there's definitely a moment where i have to override my instinct to look away. generally i find that when i get going on a topic during conversation i kinda naturally look away from the person i'm talking to, i'm a verbal processor so guess it helps me focus?
Aug 8, 2024
👁
Since I was a kid, I’ve never been able to consistently look at ppl in the eye during conversations.
You know when you say a word too many times that it starts losing its meaning and you don’t even know what you’re saying anymore? (re: semantic satiation)
The same thing happens to me with eye contact. If I stare at someone for too long, I start losing sense of their face because I’ve been too hyper focused on looking into their eyes. And if I get too caught up in maintaining eye contact, I risk potentially losing track of what the person was even saying to begin with; which generally just comes off as me being rude/inconsiderate of the other person in the convo.
I’ve definitely gotten better at maintaining better eye contact as I’ve gotten older, but it’s still a struggle. I generally have to do a little dance with my own eyes and alternate between looking at different parts of a person’s face (or occasionally look elsewhere/fidget with something for a couple of seconds between stares) so that I’m still “looking” at them most of the time without appearing like I’m uninterested or risk losing focus on what they’re saying.
Aug 8, 2024
🫣
i struggle with eye contact big time and force it when i’m at work so as not to seem rude, but i have to break it constantly before i explode. even if someone is pretty to look at :( i can usually only do it with my closest friends. it makes me very sad because i enjoy connecting and interacting with people sometimes i just wish our eyeballs didn’t have to telepathically kiss when we do it. i like how cats slow blink at you as a way to break eye contact bc they Know. so strangers will not be getting a single eyeball from me.
Aug 8, 2024
Top Recs from @mitch
📹
Dude i think about him once in a blue moon. What a vibe
Jan 24, 2024
💱
this too easy. I’m the lebron of changing what I said before
Jan 26, 2024
🧅
You’re going to not cry and look very fast like maybe you are an aviator of sorts
Jan 27, 2024