Dear Ravi,

thank you for your reply and for taking the time to read.

I have read the article. It has a lot of valid points and I can see some of the behaviours described in myself.

However, some of the words used are quite upsetting. The headline is kind of provocative. I do not want to be unkind and dishonest to any person or try to manipulate anyone. I don’t believe this is the person I am.

I do not scan a person to see what they like and don’t like, as described in the article, so then I can tell them what I like based on their preferences. I like what I like and will not lie about it. If somebody shares an interest then I will likely talk more about this common ground than other interests with them. But I will not pretend to like something when I don’t.

When I meet somebody new, I mainly feel resistance to talking to them. The first conversations will be awkward and I will be very tense. Only over a long time period of time I will feel more comfortable with someone until I really want to spend time with them. I do not try to impress. My main thought will be: I want to be polite, but I also want to get away and be by myself again (unless I know somebody and feel comfortable with them):

Also, I am o.K. if somebody doesn’t like me. Still, I would want to be polite to them, even if we don’t like each other. I just wouldn’t want to spend my free time with them, but still say hello and talk politely to them, if there is an issue that needs to be discussed. Of course, if somebody decides that they want no contact with me or don’t want to speak to me, I want to respect and accept that. But, I can’t deny that it won’t upset or hurt me and that I might have sometimes a weird reaction to that. I will get an endless stream of thoughts about all possible and impossible reasons of what I could have done wrong and become distressed. Then, I will probably react weirdly to that person – I will become very unsure how to react and behave when we still meet. I acknowledge that I still have a lot of work to do on myself when it comes to this.

However, some things described in the article, I can see in myself. I have a very hard time expressing to others what I want or to express disagreement. Saying no is not very easy for me. Sometimes when I tried to say no and the other person pressured me in the slightest way, I gave up my resistance and did what they wanted of me. And in these circumstances I did things that were not true to myself, as said in the article. It ended up not working out at all for me or the other people.

I have also gone to events or helped a friend with their projects, when I did not really want it or wasn’t feeling well myself. What I wanted was to be a good and supportive friend or a good person. I expected a lot of myself and felt bad about saying no. The end result was, that I wasn’t of much help to my friends and only felt more stressed myself. From those experiences I have learned that I should not neglect my own needs and feelings, but it also took a long time just to see and understand this. And I still have a very hard time saying no or criticizing others.

Another thing discussed in the article is trust. And yes, I have a very hard time trusting myself and others. The feeling that the way I am is not o.K. is very strong. And it is worse trusting others that they will like me. This is why I prefer to be by myself, because then I feel like I can relax and just be me.I need a very long time before I will feel comfortable with someone. At least I have learned and accepted that about myself, so I will not rush myself again, when I meet another person.

The article raises a lot of points that I have to still work on. It is good to become more aware of them again, so thank you.