The trick to these sorts of questions is to just have an answer ready that you give any time people ask this sort of stuff.
Just pick something to officially be your favorite song, favorite movie, favorite book, weirdest thing youâve ever seen. Whether itâs 100% true all the time or not. Just have a stock answer.
One time I knitted a 15 foot long scarf. Is that the most interesting thing about me? Probably not. But itâs in a list of stock answers I have to âshare a fun fact about yourselfâ
Like literally write down for yourself a list of answers to these sorts of questions. Favorite movie, song, food, earliest memory, 3 slightly unusual facts about yourself youâre comfortable sharing, one or two things you like to do in your freetime.
It doesnât have to be profound and it doesnât even have to be 100% accurate at the moment. The point of having stock answers is to give you something to say when you donât know what to say.
Whatâs my favorite tv show? Officially itâs doctor who. The real answer is that I donât really watch tv anymore and Iâm kinda searching for something I actually want to watch. But in the moment to new people Iâll just say itâs doctor who because I know how to talk about it.
This works until someone asks you a question you didn't prepare for. I absolutely do this also, don't worry.
This is also the most neurodivergent possible solution. "Prepare a script" is not how social interaction is supposed to go.
It kind of is though especially with people youâve just met. I didnât have a lot of friends as a kid and had to learn how to do small talk as an adult. I learned by watching people and what I noticed is that people I know who are good at socializing tend to say the same things over and over again to new people. Same jokes over and over again, same stories over and over again.
Over time people tend to narrow down a set of responses they have to things. And you can change some of your responses over time if you want but the fact remains that the world is a stage. When meeting new people youâve got a lot of calculations to make because you donât know how much you can trust each other yet.
Also if someone asks you a question youâre unprepared for saying âWow, Iâd never thought about that. Gimme a second.â before giving your answer is a perfectly normal thing to say. In fact that, word for word, is what I hear people say most times they donât know the answer to a social question in a group of new people.
Social interaction with new people and in very formal settings is a set of scripts. Even for people naturally good at socializing. Thatâs what manners are, thatâs what icebreaker questions are. And thereâs nothing wrong with that.
























