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I've had this for the most time, social fear with exactly that thinking. I did overcome it in the last years though. I can't really explain how but I internalized that other people can be like that too, so you're not alone, and that when there are no rules, you can behave how it's comfortable to you and that's 100% fine.
I was always terrified to take the bus for this reason. I never did in grade school (always was picked up) so the few times I had to take the bus was pretty bad - none of the teachers or bus drivers ever told us how to do it, it was just assumed that everyone knew where all the stops were. This was exacerbated by the fact that since I was not a regular, the driver forgot my stop. So the second and maybe last time I took the bus, little 10yo me got off 1 stop early out of fear and walked the rest of the way.
This caused a deep seated trauma around buses and public transit that was only mitigated when I moved somewhere with excellent (by US standards) transit, though I still feel like a fish out of water if I don't know the route or the stops - so trains are a lot less stressful.
That is the normal human experience, I think.
No, it is not normal, at all. From what I gathered reading hundreds of thousands of reddit and lemmy posts, it's a young person thing.
We GenX kids had zero problems discussing our deepest fears among each other. Can't think of a single instance of anyone worrying about how to act in simple public situations.
I'm probably biased as old reddit and lemmy aren't representative of society in whole. I have several friends I've known since their late teens, early 20s now, and none of them talk about social anxiety.
Phew. Good. For a moment I thought I might be on the spectrum.
This. Almost everyone I know has said, "Fake it 'til you make it" and "When in Rome..."
Yes the hard part is when you either struggle too much to do that social mimicking.
Or In my case it's anxiety, and it's overwhelming dread about failing to mimick.
Very relatable. Being afraid of doing anything new because I'm so sure I'll mess it up and do it wrong or get asked something I'm not prepared for. Same reason I want to try and research things as much as possible beforehand. It's not as bad as it used to be for me but I definitely still relate.
Worst case is when there are some written rules, but there's a spoken agreement (which you don't know about) to ignore some of those rules
Someone once remarked to me that I'm "good on the train". That's because I used to get near panic attacks on where I should be standing, sitting, where to stack my bike, and if someone else needed a seat.
Even now I'm constantly adjusting my position at every stop like a slowly neurotic madman to give people space and walk access because I'm terrified of blocking anyone
Not autism but ADHD and social anxiety and I struggle with this so much 🥲
I've gotten a lot better with it though :)
No one has all the answers. Some might think they do and some might get close, but there's always something there to throw a wrench in what we know.
That's why the best answer is to simply not give a fuck. Learn what you can, take failures as lessons but try not to fuck up too bad. If you do fuck up, fuck up with glee knowing you can always be the one to throw the wrench and that no one else really knows what they're doing.
One other approach would be to do it your way. Being accepted is nice, being yourself is too. For me it is some point in between.
