Cannabis and social anxiety/awkwardness

Normally I like to smoke solitary or with a small party or during chores or errands. When out in a social setting, I get self conscious. I can lose my train of thought, or sometimes say odd ball stuff that takes all the fun out of a conversation. The drug is psychological in that I seem to be able to sense a lot about people. That fucks with my head a bit.

 

Well, I guess to me it feels when i get anxious it is for a reason. Hence why I never did stupid things like getting stoned before class. I also don't drive stoned. One of the few other situations I can get anxious is the very obvious and already pointed out in this thread: when you still have to do things like go to a bank, supermarket etc. etc. and rather keep on chilling in your comfort zone. It's pretty easy to anticipate on all that. I rarely get anxious at parties, in the park or on the streets etc. The only social situation I would not enjoy stoned is like being with my family and such. So it's a matter of smoking at the right moments for me.

 

Thats it :cheers2:, thats all it takes!

 

it is definitely not a social lubricant for me, i hate being stoned in large groups unless the majority of the people there are also high.

 

I guess what makes me feel anxious in large sober groups is generally the fact you are not supposed to be stoned there. I'm not supposed to be stoned among family so I'm not enjoying being stoned then to the fullest. Some people do not seem to care about the moment and just want to get stoned because it's nice, then get suprised it isn't nice in every situation.. I know a guy who gets stoned because he gets anxious when at his sisters' family's house. I spotted him once after such a visit and he was socially anxious and stressed they might have seen he was stoned... Well, why not wait after you went there is all I can think then.

 

Just do what you are "supposed to" and you'll never feel insecure.

 

Yes, take it out of context. I'm sure you know what I ment there. I'm not saying you can't be stoned in those situations but when one experiences anxiety in such a situation the reason for it might be very obvious and so actually self inflicted.

 

In one way I suppose you do it out of respect for your family and such, in case someone notices you are baked...:leaving:
You don't want it to reflect on family or others you care about, not to mention influential authority. It's a response to a societal boundary, I understand that.. (weed is after all mostly illegal everywhere).... so in that way it causes a guilt response that in turn will not allow you to act naturally in those situations.

If you absolutely knew no one could tell you were stoned, wouldn't you go ahead and bake up on more social occasions than you currently do?

I really think much of why people feel uncomfortable stoned in certain social situations is an amplified sense of guilt or worrying about what people are thinking of them, so it stilts their natural spontaneity of acting socially. Then it can become like a feedback loop of sorts...

 

Funny, my mentality has now gotten to where I feel alcohol drinking is just vile and smoking is a much better choice all around.
The only way in which I feel self conscious about smoking is if it could possibly have an adverse effect on others opinions concerning my wife or children. I honestly don't give a rat's ass what people think of me personally.
I give my friends shit about being paranoid about smoking and shit all the time. In Ca. where I live it's just plain silly to get worked up about weed. Hell possession of an ounce or less is about the same in severity and fines as jaywalking, thanks Mr. Govenator :2thumbsup:.

Just recently I got into it with my brother who had a fit because I pulled out a pipe at his house recently. He went on to say he had read research about how damaging pot smoking is, and other crap, all while smoking his cigarette and drinking whiskey.
I just laughed at him and told him he's an ironic fool.
Fucking morons everywhere.

 

When I smoke I don't generally feel like talking... I get more in my head and either just think or just... sit and not think but it def doesn't make me social (although when I was a teenager I think it did... dunno if it was the strains or the age thing...).... but I have noticed it makes it so if I do have to talk to someone it's easier ... i just don't feel like talking much...
funny that you mentioned sativa though because I have some of that now and when I smoke that it makes me more social and creative and active.... for example... yesterday smoked some of it and went to a cook out/pool party and ended up staying much longer than I would have normally and having more conversations that I actually enjoyed then I normally would... then I came home and did a lot of decorating and craft things for Cason around the house.. note-this strain did NOT make me feel high at all but it almost seemed to work as an antidepressant for me... not sure how else to explain it. I think it's the damiana in it. I have always liked pure 100% damiana.
When I'm actually stoned though I'm just more likely to enjoy relaxing and not doing much ...talking or otherwise...

 

Ha ha ha, typical.

This is why those of use old enough to remember the sativas of central and south america, southern Mexico go on about it, Oaxacan gold, panama red, Guerrero lemon bud...OMG the Columbian Gold.. all pure sativas.
we now know it was the pharmacology of it all, Those ancient strains were kept and carefully cultivated for thousands of years for a reason...

sativa=fun, creative, mind expanding, increased thoughtfulness...

indica= impaired, wasted, introverted, medicated...

You can't get pure strains of sativa anymore, even if those strains still existed, it's just not economical for the growers.
Fortunatly there are a lot of good sativa crosses, just gotta be carefull with dosage sometimes so the indica component doesn't waste you. lol

 

Psychedelic magnification, certainly. The herb does not necessarily provoke 'social' anxiety in my self-conscious but rather exacerbates and amplifies the volume of an already noisy and deleterious internal dialogue; it also greatly enhances the rapidity of my thought processing and 'problem solving' abilities. All psychedelic drugs, herbs included, make readily apparent the mechanical, the calculator nature of the mainframe of mind, but simultaneously open it out on to the vistas of endless splendor of spirit, or soul. This is a confrontation for me and in the right circumstances I am able to focus on the one or the other, all but tuning-out the opposite impulses, but basically I regard mind-manifesting drug taking in general as something of a spiritual phenomenon to be restricted to reverent moments of divine reflection in the privacy of my own home and without major distractions. Preferably without any social interaction but occasionally a person or two can make for an enjoyable experience (especially with the more profound compounds, such as DMT). As a teenager I took all kinds of drugs, in highly excessive quantities, in company both great and small and today am most impressed by the fact that I never got myself into any serious trouble or necessitated psychiatric treatment as a direct result of dissolving boundaries with psychedelic drugs.

Anyhow, I don't view the anxiety produced in even moderatley intelligent persons as any specific form of personal insecurities per se but instead as the result of the apprehension of how truly reserved and disturbed our society has become, how 'closed doors' everybody is and how much we alienate ourselves from our neighbors; this is not how we are supposed to think and that we do so is detrimental to our psychological and spiritual health and increasingly so because any purpose in segregation by class is become changed to separation by intelligence so that the original intent is lost and social stratification has turned into a ruthless cloistering of people living in bubbles. Most people tend to live their lives based on a core philosophical value, no matter how relatively vague the influence or apparatus is, and depending on the intellectual and empathetic capacities of the individual these worldviews range anywhere from neo-nazism to materialist scientism, and from the fervent religious to those minimalists abiding by the consensus golden rule. Any drug which dissolves boundaries is prone to cause tension in a culture which values those boundaries above all else, even surpassing our commonality or 'brotherhood' so that it often takes a tragedy of immense porportions to dissolve these boundaries for those whose lives depend on their constant rigid re-affirmation; truly a house of cards if something as relatively benign as a plant causes it to come crashing down out of control.

 

Yes, definitely.