When I hear the word skills, Napolean Dynamite comes to mind. That movie forever branded that word in my head. Social skills are skills like any other skill. You have to work on it. Nobody ever pickup a guitar and just started playing. They may have gotten lucky and played a cord or two.
A skill like playing the guitar, is more manual and concrete. We understanding that it takes a lot of time and effort. When it comes to social skills there is not that "one thing" that you do to get better. There are several components involved.
Get in the mood
Your mood can have a huge influence on your social life. You become more attractive if your in a positive mood than if your in a negative one. Have you ever been around a person that you could just tell is in a negative mood? You can feel that vibe radiating off them. Well people can sense that vibe off you as well.
If your going to improve in this aspect of your life I suggest you change your mood. I want you to think of yourself as an explorer. Your about to discover a new you, your new self; your best self. But, just having the right attitude is not going to magically change you into being socially elite. You also have to do the right things. It is however the first step. Think of it as laying the foundation.
Application
I love to learn new things. Learning new things can be fun and exciting, but if you don't apply what you learn, it all for nothing. Let's say you learn all this stuff about "How to be more social" and you never apply it. Well, your never going to get better. There was research that was done on highly successful people and the one common denominator that they had was whenever they learned something new they applied it immediately. I ask that you do the same.
Observe
Your about to go voyeur here. Watch people who are good with people. Make mental note on what it is you like that they do. Write it down when you get a chance. This can be your "swipe file". You may not particularly care for the person entirely, but just take the parts that you do like and use them.
Practice
This is the meat of everything. Try out all aspects of interacting with people, your going to make inevitable mistakes, but you will get the hang of things. With practice, situations that feel awkward will turn into ones you've come across dozens of times, and which you know how to handle. Some things will feel forced and at first, but they will become second nature, and almost feel like you've always had them. You'll start to gain a confidence that comes from realizing you've been around people successfully before, and you can do it again.
Building social skills can be discouraging at times. You may no feel like your progressing as fast as you'd like, but you'll get there. It took some time to learn how to ride a bike, but eventually you did.
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