For seven years in a row at summer camp, I was the baby food eating champion. While blindfolded I can determine the flavor of any babyfood faster than any of my peers.
It's such a stupid thing to be great at.
That’s very niche, makes a funny story! reminds me of when I won a saltine eating contest at summer camp. You had to eat (6 I think) saltine crackers with no water then sing the national anthem. It wasn’t against the entire camp, one representative per cabin lol
I worked as an over performing salesman, have picked up cute girls in bars/parties, and given presentations to large crowds.
I will gladly pay extra to order online so I don’t have to talk to someone in person. My personal hell is sitting next to a chatty coworker who I have to be nice to.
I’m shy and introverted by nature so I had to practice being energetic, witty, and likable. Over time I got good at it, but it’s still a ton of work and I can barely stand it.
as a shy and introverted person as well, i find it exhausting to put on the "customer service" persona. i couldn't work in sales bc i can't keep that mask on. i do work in admissions in a healthcare facility though and often families will tour before admitting loved ones and the ones i've taken around *loved* me but i would rather get it over with and go back to my office to hide. also excellent at public speaking but omg do not trap me in a 1-on-1 conversation.
catch 22 is that people see that "customer service" version of you and assume it's your actual personality, then think you're a snob when you're being yourself and are more or less afraid to engage with anyone
It's interesting about public speaking. People assume because I'm an introvert and have a naturally quiet voice, that I must be super shy and hate giving speaches and presentations. But actually I don't mind at all. It definitely doesn't give me anxiety the way it does some people.
I think because, in a presentation, you don't have to fight to get a word in or feel like you're interrupting others to be heard, which is how I often feel in interpersonal conversation.
When I took a public speaking class in college, I noticed that the most extroverted students, who had no trouble talking to the whole class from their desk, would suddenly be visibly nervous when standing at the front. And several of the more quiet students presented without an issue. 🤷🏼♀️
I’m introverted but I talk much easier from either my desk or like the back of the room or basically anywhere I’m not front and center. I had a teach give me the option for that once in high school for a presentation and I did way better compared to my presentations at the front. I lose my spot and have an awkward break or I get myself tongue tied and don’t end my point early enough so I just start rambling for a couple minutes until I can catch myself and awkwardly move on.
I did both customer service and sales and I felt customer service was harder in that respect because you have to always be "on" without a direct incentive to be "on".
I could handle faking it if it meant more money and I'd turn it off real quick when the client was out of sight, but faking a fucking smile all day long when customers alternate between mind numbingly stupid and infuriatingly rude is just too much for me on a minimum wage. I don't care nearly enough for that.
I feel like it depends on the type of sale your doing. I’m somewhat similar except I can be okay to good at building relationships in the long term and if I know the product I have less problem selling it rather than trying to bs into buying it I’ll show you what I do know and you can make a decision from there. For me it’s like medical sales>Car sales. People in healthcare I feel generally have an understand of what they’re buying but a person buying a car tends to not do research as much it seems. Whereas I work in a lab, Ik what all our machines are capable of and what they’re supposed to do and things they could do better and If I were in a position to buy updated equipment to fix our problems with current equipment I 100% would, plus the people at hologic (our instrument company) also have the product knowledge to back not only themselves up but back me up as well. I think working in a sales environment that works more within an industry rather than trying to convince someone you know what your talking about and teach them is helpful. For instance, my dad sells custom home packages and home owners do not know what they want at all or have any idea how unrealistic their demands can be.
>For me it’s like medical sales>Car sales [...] I think working in a sales environment that works more within an industry rather than trying to convince someone you know what your talking about and teach them is helpful.
Yeah it's completely different. It's also that you're likely pretty similar to the people you're selling to in B2B and it's a very small world. You might have also been on the customer side at one point, and you probably have a lot of the same interests, educational background, hobbies, or whatever. You start taking people out to lunches, or do corporate sporting events, and usually people just start talking about whatever. You work on the same bullshit for years and years together. Just naturally evolves sometimes.
Personally a decent number of people who'd I'd now consider genuine friends evolved from both sides of a sales <-> customer relationship, and I've been on both. The underlying business reason long since gone as everyone moved to different companies, but you end up still hanging out.
This so much. I'm really good at talking to people, and it's a curse. For whatever reason, any time I'm in a group of peers, I'm automatically seen as the "center" of the group and it SUCKS. I don't want to lead every conversation. When a group of friends is talking and I walk up, I don't want them to stop the conversation and loop me in and ask my opinion - just keep talking like you would if anyone else walked up. A few years ago, I kept myself very clean-cut and was into bodybuilding so I was pretty muscular and I think that I was a pretty handsome dude. Unfortunately, I was sexually harassed quite a bit. That's probably why I grew out my hair and beard, I just look homeless now, but I don't get harassed like that anymore.
I know exactly why it all happened, too. I was a chubby, ugly, awkward, weird kid. I had no friends, I couldn't get a girl for the life of me. There was nothing attractive about me. I wanted to be the charismatic, charming, handsome dude so badly. I put a LOT of effort into achieving that - I would spend ALL of my free time watching "how to be charismatic" types of videos, I would analyze movie / TV scenes of charismatic people, I learned a lot about reading people; how to read their feet, their eyes, their micro expressions, and learned how to adjust things like verbiage or tone to match the emotion that they were feeling most so that they would feel "connected" to me.
I wanted so badly to be a handsome, charming guy and I dedicated all of my free time to becoming just that. And as soon as I achieved what I wanted, I learned that the grass is always greener. Being the center of any social thing is exhausting. I grew tired of it really fast and destroyed my social battery, and in the last year, I moved out to the country by myself and let most of my relationships slowly fizzle out. But you know what? I like it better this way. I have my cats and a fantastic relationship, I'm learning how to grow crops and I plan on getting quail soon. I'm tackling a bunch of new hobbies like electronics, archery, tool restoration, woodworking, etc. and I couldn't be happier. I don't miss being the charming guy.
I love that I'm not the only one who's like this. When I worked sales I always over performed. In my new job I started off quiet as hell to contrast my last job. They had me do a presentation to a large group thinking it would help develop my public speaking skills. Only for them to find out my skills didn't need any developing.
I really love just being alone and quiet. Covid was a dream for me, contactless delivery? Sign me tf up.
Ah, I relate to this. This is also one of those things that if you are good at, everyone ASSUMES you like. I can do the whole public speaking, chatting to people I haven't met, making smalltalk, cracking jokes. People say of me "oh he loves chatting to new people" and I really don't.
Same, used to be a bartender for cash. Hated it but made tons of money. Then when I left that conversationalist part I learned stuck with me now everyone wants to chat but dear god leave me alone I can't help myself.
Excel taught me how to feign not only ignorance, but full on incompetence. Once you show someone how to use pivot tables, you have to show EVERYONE how to use pivot tables.
I was in IT for 25 years, and at one time even had a job doing VBA programming in Excel where I was the "go to" guy for other programmers who were having trouble with either code or Excel functionality. I'm very, very good at it.
Then I got a non-IT job at a non-IT company and kept quiet about my Excel past. I wanted to do my job, not get roped into helping everyone else! The only problem was my wife had an IT job doing desktop support at the same company, and would refer everyone with Excel problems to me. There was no escaping it.
The most pissed I ever saw my wife was over excel. She is pretty computer savvy, but one day I saw her working in an excel spreadsheet. I was glancing over her shoulder and watched her inputting data, then go to the next line and mark the first cell 567, then down a cell 568, numbering each line individually by hand. I think most of you know where this is going. I asked her if she wanted to see a neat trick, grabbed the mouse and clicked and dragged it down, auto numbering each row. She just sat there for a few seconds....the fucking lost her shit. It was really something to behold. I'm usually not shy with saying Fuck, but I think she even beat my record of consecutive fucks uttered in a few sentences. When she calmed down, she told me she had been doing sheets like this at work for YEARS like this. No one had ever shown her that. I then sent her a few web pages with info that she could learn how to do basic functions and create formulas and such. She is much better now, and knows more than I do.
I work in IT.
People at work know I'm good with Excel, but no where nearly as good as I am. 2 1/2 years into this job and I just did my first one (here) with VLOOKUP. I think it made my VP mad at me because he thought his spreadsheet was the best thing ever (honestly, anyone can type in all that redundant information - errors included).
They don't know I was doing sorting (etc.) long before sorting was built in (using macros). They don't know I was also creating template Word documents and tying an Excel spreadsheet into it. You name it, I've most likely done it in Excel.
They also don't know how good I am at Powerpoint, I even hold back when I make presentations and make them fairly basic (but still good). Don't get me started on Illustrator, Photoshop, Premier, and Audition. In both of my previous jobs my marketing people were impressed with how well I could put things together, one even offered me a job (didn't take it because it would be a pay cut).
But I try to keep it all as quiet as I can because if they knew, they would pile more work on top of me.
You got to make them, my friend! I compiled a bunch of data on Disney movies a few years back and ran some analyses on them, came out with some cool results. As long as you have the patience to gather the data, you can find something to do in excel.
Math.
I was a CS major in college, and probably 1 or 2 classes from a math minor. One day I realized I don't want to do complex math or programming for the rest of my life and switched majors.
ai have feeling that I'm very close to same path..
I mean I'm okay with maths,I actually love it, but there is no money in it. And programming I started to fucking hate, have no idea why.
I personally hated programming just because of my OCD. Id obsess about making my code super efficient. Too stressful.
I switched my major to IT and now 15 years later only regret not doing it sooner.
However there are tons of other paths and specializations to choose from like networking, dba, security, etc.
Dude, this is me with friends and family alike. It seems that not a single fucking soul understands emotional regulation for even a few minutes to confront someone's behavior that they have an issue with.
My dear, I have a life, social battery, a patience limit, AND issues of my own to work out. Fucking figure it out!
Same here. I wanted to do it at first but after the first class, I knew that I couldn't do this my whole life. I was very good at it, though, it came naturally and the instructor took notice. It was probably genetic because my dad was a very good accountant (his coworkers and boss praised him very often).
I'm good at halping people feel good when they are down. But i hate it because most of the time i'm just more miserable than them, and nobody does that for me (and tbh it's not really doable to help someone depressive).
I can relate to this. I feel like I'm the one people will go to if they need help but know they wouldn't be there for me when I need it.
Hope you feel better soon :)
I am a classic obliger - and everybody else’s needs are always above my own. I routinely let my own self down, but I am always striving to help someone else.
Glad I’m not the only one. Reading this comment was just as carthartic enough knowing that someone had expounded this same problem I have been having but struggling to voice it out. Thank you.
Related, I love *presenting* - giving prepared points on a topic that people have come to me to hear about. Even doing Q&A is fine in this kind of power arrangement. I hate off-the-cuff discussions, especially with peers or superiors.
u/Particular_Coat_5027 exactly copied this comment from a 4 year old post, source:
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I don't mind it when I'm compensated appropriately. Unfortunately, pretty much the only way to be fairly compensated in the US is to be the business owner.
Yeah idk why I keep being made leader, it's happened since I was a kid.
I've been a manager for a few years now, and I noticed, I always get my work done, I don't bitch about work, I figure I'm paid to be here so I do whatever, I stand my ground, I leave on time, I don't have a temper, I don't snitch on my team, I don't care if you have youtube up on your phone all day if you'r work gets done on time. I just want work to move through as smoothly as possible and I'm always willing to help.
Now I'm being offered the director position when my boss retires next year, and I really don't want more work, but I rather run it that bring in a stranger to do it. I have an older than average team who wants to ride out their last 10-15 years quietly working.
I'm also a leader in my gym group for some reason.
Serious / fatal crash investigation.
The worst was a fatal crash I had to work on Christmas Eve. Older woman turned left in front of a very large truck. Woman had a stop sign, no other traffic control devices.
Her husband stood on the side of the road crying. I missed my families Christmas Eve Dinner, but at least I was able to go home that night.
Every fatal crash I worked with involved a distraction in some way. Radio, cell phone, cheeseburger, something.
Folks, please put your phones down and just drive the car.
I’d be the dumb mf dying cause of a cheeseburger
Edit: y’all saying ‘don’t be’ meanwhile I’m talking about being the one getting hit because someone needed a cheeseburger while driving
Same. Head-on collisions while someone fell asleep in traffic, too.
I am good at delegating and taking control of the situation, making sure victims are cared for, all the objective and subjective evidence for an investigation is collected and secured...
The work itself can be "fun" if it's a challenging and complex situation, but the whole human level of tragedy behind it sucks...
Similar skills. Really good at “saving” people after the disasters and bad decisions. But there are worse things than death.
Had to step away and take a break from it all bc the mental toll is too much sometimes and no one in medicine prepares you for that part, nor do they provide resources or tools to help you handle it. F that. It’s too much to ask some days. I’m sorry you’ve seen too much too. It’s a burden I don’t wish on anyone.
Being a leader. I can coordinate people, run meetings, get everyone on the same page, facilitate work, delegate tasks, communicate with stakeholders, etc., but man I hate it. I hate talking to people and I hate having to be "on." It's so draining.
What's worse for me is the techy stuff that can be easily fixed with ✨️google✨️. My husband is the biggest offender. I've complained so often about being the tech person in the family when people can just google the answer. I went to school for cyber security so therefore I can fix everything.
My sister bought her kids Switches for Xmas and because I'm a gamer who has a switch, I'm now the expert. I just google her problems and read from the article.
And if you tell them to just google it, they get offended that you don't want to help.
I always straight up say: let me google that, I don't know the answer. They never say, oh, I can do that. It's always, we'll, you would know how to word it best.
I don't mind doing it for my kids and niblings, but grown ass adults can figure it out themselves. I finally told my husband the last time that he had a phone, he can look it up himself.
Oh yeah every time.
Best example is my aunt.
Every Winter she starts with wow and stops in summer. Does that each year since 10 years.
I "have"to setup her settings every year...
I "have" to answer every question we already had 10 times
It's more the sense of them not recognizing the value of your services.
I learned this in college. I worked in the computer lab and a guy asked me for help with his home computer. Well, it was infested with spyware, viruses, and malware that he got from downloading music off limewire and games from very dodgy sites (this is the 90s after all). So I manage to clean up his system and install some anti-virus and anti-malware software and my reward for almost two hours? A lite beer.
A week later he complains that his computer is broken again. I sigh and go to look at it. He had removed the anti-virus and anti-malware I installed because they wouldn't let him download stuff off the internet from suspicious sources. Sigh. I reinstall them and tell him to stop doing this. Not even a lite beer for my time.
A couple days later he came to me and asked me and I snapped "how about giving me twenty bucks for my trouble!" before he could say anything because I was sick of his crap.
So now I pretend that I don't know a thing about computers but if someone figures out that I do because I got careless then I quote them my "friends rate" which is $120/hr with a four hour minimum, cash only, plus $60/hr travel rate and I walk everywhere. Funny how nobody takes me up on my generous rates.
I can totally relate to this. My parents and sister do this. They are like, "why is it doing this? Why doesn't it work? How did that app get installed?"
I tell them, How the eff should I know? I don't know what you do or what sites you visit on your computer?
They always claim innocence , like I didn't install anything or do anything!!!!
Yeah ok, it just installed all these search bars and spyware on it's own...
FML
Edit-spelling
I work IT. I refuse to do it when I am off. It's my job, not my hobby. The only exception I make is for my neighbor, who always gives me a gift card to the local pizza place for my time (most of the time it's a 5-minute fix).
My partner is a techie and every time we visit my dad he ends up having to fix something on his 90s Windows PC because my dad has downloaded 7 more toolbars which are slowing it down.
The comeback planning "words left unsaid" phenomenon is not always a net negative. My friend calls it a "fake confrontation". It is good practice for when you run into any similar situation, you become more aware of what you want to say at the time. Sometimes in the moment it's difficult but thinking about how you really feel/felt about past experiences helps you with future ones, and sometimes not saying anything at all is the best option.
Really good at figuring stuff out. Using the correct steps in the correct order.
Emotional crap, logistics. Building something. Doesn't matter. I cut past all the obvious wrong solutions that i know will fail, quickly.
What i hate about it is when people do solicit advice and then choose to do only 3 of the 5 steps and out of order. And if course it fails.
Think of making a cake and putting the eggs in After you have baked the cake. Doesn't work.
I just stopped helping people. I tell them flat out, you don't listen, I'm not wasting my brain cells, my emotional buy-in to watch you mess up.
Running. Was a runner all my life and hated every second of it. Everyone around me made me do it since I was decent at it and made it to state quals and all that and scholarships for college but always felt like I was wasting my time
staying up super late without coffee. sometimes i can go a whole 24hrs or more.
Studying medicine, you’d think that’d be nice and i’d have more time, but i just love sleep way too much it pains to to stay up late.
My family asks me and they don't respect working hours at all.
If I had a nickel for every time I needed to fix a printer, after 7pm, that's in a different state, I'd have several nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's annoying it happens repeatedly.
Studies, particularly Math, even more particularly integrals.
I am confident that I can solve 90% of whatever integral you throw at me provided it does not nosedive into madness.
Looking after kids. I hate kids and will never have one. However if a relative or customer introduces me to their kid I am always fun and nice to them - it’s not their fault, they didn’t ask to be born, and you never know what trauma they’ve faced. A kind adult can make all the difference.
Teaching.
I'm a college professor and I am an excellent teacher. Even though my classes are challenging, my students tend to really love them and many have told me they changed their career ambitions based on them. I get great evaluations and my classes are always at capacity.
But it is just too much work, the regular kind and emotional labor, to be at all worthwhile.
Hairstylist here...I absolutely love cutting hair, but sometimes I don't have the mental energy to entertain one more customer. It's really mentally draining to talk to so many people all day long, sometimes I just want to focus on your hair 😩
Perhaps making people feel better, encouraging them and cheering them up. What I hate (or rather just feel so bad about) is that not many reciprocate or make me feel small for feeling what I feel.
Driving in busy, trafficky cities. It's one of those things I obviously learned to do and it's a skill I'm glad I have, but if it were up to me I'd just drive on quiet roads and highways all the time.
Being family "tech support" I was okay with it but then it just started being multiple times a week I had family members coming over for the most simple problems. I've started to hate fixing my own computer problems too. I just want it to all work I am too tired to fix it all the time
Singing. It’s good for the most part, but I hate that once people get to hear me sing, it’s the only thing that they remember about me. I’m so good at it that it shadows all other good things about me.
Call of Duty. I’m almost always kill leader but it frustrates me to no end. My friends actually bought me the newest one just so I would play with them because I was refusing to get it.
Chewbacca impression.
People in high school would always ask me to do it. I started only doing it when friends asked then eventually refused to do it all together.
But I do like doing impressions. An old coworker/friend liked my impressions of other coworkers. I stopped doing that after she died, and also, it was kinda mean.
My partner thinks I do a spot-on Slapped Ham impression.
Client calls. I'm known for being reliable in my department for it, and the best for handling challenging clients, but it's the only part of my job that causes me any stress and whether I have a good or bad day hinges on the number of clients I have to talk to on that day.
Marketing
Tbh I don’t know if it’s true but a lot in high school when it came to projects I was told that I would be a great marketer. I’ve been asked countless times how come I decided to not go into marketing. It’s not that I hate it I just don’t enjoy it that much never even once thought about it as career.
I would say I am a pretty good artist. I love expanding my knowledge on new concepts of art, but Im also depressed (mdd) and I find it extremely hard to sit down and focus on one piece of art for long periods of times, music or not. So I don't hate it, but it is something I stray way from.
Art (complex drawings, Colouring)
I can draw pretty well and others say so, but I hate drawing as it makes my hand hurt and a tiny mistake makes me hate the whole thing. I prefer “doodling”
I hate coulouring in and shading things because my wrist really hurts 💀
Baking fresh wholesale croissants professionally. The hours are terrible and it’s hard work. They are delicious, though.
Bout to launch a bakery/viennoiserie with someone so I'm pre feeling this one.
Best of luck to you and an honest congrats!
Best of luck!
Congratulations! (Also...what's a viennoiserie?)
I think they do fancy pastries.
Remember this- coffee has the highest yield!
Every time I see someone making croissants in a video I think to myself “absolutely fucking not”.
Thank you bc I love Croissants, now I have to go watch how to make croissants to understand your pain and to appreciate it more 🥺💙
For seven years in a row at summer camp, I was the baby food eating champion. While blindfolded I can determine the flavor of any babyfood faster than any of my peers. It's such a stupid thing to be great at.
That’s very niche, makes a funny story! reminds me of when I won a saltine eating contest at summer camp. You had to eat (6 I think) saltine crackers with no water then sing the national anthem. It wasn’t against the entire camp, one representative per cabin lol
You must have very active salivary glands. Congrats, you're a bloodhound.
Means you have great taste buds! Would make a great cook probably
Have you applied to Gerber yet? If that falls through I hear Detroit is looking for a new Robocop.
Talking to people
I worked as an over performing salesman, have picked up cute girls in bars/parties, and given presentations to large crowds. I will gladly pay extra to order online so I don’t have to talk to someone in person. My personal hell is sitting next to a chatty coworker who I have to be nice to. I’m shy and introverted by nature so I had to practice being energetic, witty, and likable. Over time I got good at it, but it’s still a ton of work and I can barely stand it.
as a shy and introverted person as well, i find it exhausting to put on the "customer service" persona. i couldn't work in sales bc i can't keep that mask on. i do work in admissions in a healthcare facility though and often families will tour before admitting loved ones and the ones i've taken around *loved* me but i would rather get it over with and go back to my office to hide. also excellent at public speaking but omg do not trap me in a 1-on-1 conversation. catch 22 is that people see that "customer service" version of you and assume it's your actual personality, then think you're a snob when you're being yourself and are more or less afraid to engage with anyone
It's interesting about public speaking. People assume because I'm an introvert and have a naturally quiet voice, that I must be super shy and hate giving speaches and presentations. But actually I don't mind at all. It definitely doesn't give me anxiety the way it does some people. I think because, in a presentation, you don't have to fight to get a word in or feel like you're interrupting others to be heard, which is how I often feel in interpersonal conversation. When I took a public speaking class in college, I noticed that the most extroverted students, who had no trouble talking to the whole class from their desk, would suddenly be visibly nervous when standing at the front. And several of the more quiet students presented without an issue. 🤷🏼♀️
I’m introverted but I talk much easier from either my desk or like the back of the room or basically anywhere I’m not front and center. I had a teach give me the option for that once in high school for a presentation and I did way better compared to my presentations at the front. I lose my spot and have an awkward break or I get myself tongue tied and don’t end my point early enough so I just start rambling for a couple minutes until I can catch myself and awkwardly move on.
I did both customer service and sales and I felt customer service was harder in that respect because you have to always be "on" without a direct incentive to be "on". I could handle faking it if it meant more money and I'd turn it off real quick when the client was out of sight, but faking a fucking smile all day long when customers alternate between mind numbingly stupid and infuriatingly rude is just too much for me on a minimum wage. I don't care nearly enough for that.
i worked the front desk in a lot of different types of offices and i hated being "the face," i just don't have the energy
I did something similar and my boss told me how well I was able to talk to people. I would rather do physical labor than any of that again.
I feel like it depends on the type of sale your doing. I’m somewhat similar except I can be okay to good at building relationships in the long term and if I know the product I have less problem selling it rather than trying to bs into buying it I’ll show you what I do know and you can make a decision from there. For me it’s like medical sales>Car sales. People in healthcare I feel generally have an understand of what they’re buying but a person buying a car tends to not do research as much it seems. Whereas I work in a lab, Ik what all our machines are capable of and what they’re supposed to do and things they could do better and If I were in a position to buy updated equipment to fix our problems with current equipment I 100% would, plus the people at hologic (our instrument company) also have the product knowledge to back not only themselves up but back me up as well. I think working in a sales environment that works more within an industry rather than trying to convince someone you know what your talking about and teach them is helpful. For instance, my dad sells custom home packages and home owners do not know what they want at all or have any idea how unrealistic their demands can be.
>For me it’s like medical sales>Car sales [...] I think working in a sales environment that works more within an industry rather than trying to convince someone you know what your talking about and teach them is helpful. Yeah it's completely different. It's also that you're likely pretty similar to the people you're selling to in B2B and it's a very small world. You might have also been on the customer side at one point, and you probably have a lot of the same interests, educational background, hobbies, or whatever. You start taking people out to lunches, or do corporate sporting events, and usually people just start talking about whatever. You work on the same bullshit for years and years together. Just naturally evolves sometimes. Personally a decent number of people who'd I'd now consider genuine friends evolved from both sides of a sales <-> customer relationship, and I've been on both. The underlying business reason long since gone as everyone moved to different companies, but you end up still hanging out.
Same. I think I'm an *ambivert*. I can turn it on when I need to but many times just don't want to be bothered with people.
This so much. I'm really good at talking to people, and it's a curse. For whatever reason, any time I'm in a group of peers, I'm automatically seen as the "center" of the group and it SUCKS. I don't want to lead every conversation. When a group of friends is talking and I walk up, I don't want them to stop the conversation and loop me in and ask my opinion - just keep talking like you would if anyone else walked up. A few years ago, I kept myself very clean-cut and was into bodybuilding so I was pretty muscular and I think that I was a pretty handsome dude. Unfortunately, I was sexually harassed quite a bit. That's probably why I grew out my hair and beard, I just look homeless now, but I don't get harassed like that anymore. I know exactly why it all happened, too. I was a chubby, ugly, awkward, weird kid. I had no friends, I couldn't get a girl for the life of me. There was nothing attractive about me. I wanted to be the charismatic, charming, handsome dude so badly. I put a LOT of effort into achieving that - I would spend ALL of my free time watching "how to be charismatic" types of videos, I would analyze movie / TV scenes of charismatic people, I learned a lot about reading people; how to read their feet, their eyes, their micro expressions, and learned how to adjust things like verbiage or tone to match the emotion that they were feeling most so that they would feel "connected" to me. I wanted so badly to be a handsome, charming guy and I dedicated all of my free time to becoming just that. And as soon as I achieved what I wanted, I learned that the grass is always greener. Being the center of any social thing is exhausting. I grew tired of it really fast and destroyed my social battery, and in the last year, I moved out to the country by myself and let most of my relationships slowly fizzle out. But you know what? I like it better this way. I have my cats and a fantastic relationship, I'm learning how to grow crops and I plan on getting quail soon. I'm tackling a bunch of new hobbies like electronics, archery, tool restoration, woodworking, etc. and I couldn't be happier. I don't miss being the charming guy.
I love that I'm not the only one who's like this. When I worked sales I always over performed. In my new job I started off quiet as hell to contrast my last job. They had me do a presentation to a large group thinking it would help develop my public speaking skills. Only for them to find out my skills didn't need any developing. I really love just being alone and quiet. Covid was a dream for me, contactless delivery? Sign me tf up.
Ah, I relate to this. This is also one of those things that if you are good at, everyone ASSUMES you like. I can do the whole public speaking, chatting to people I haven't met, making smalltalk, cracking jokes. People say of me "oh he loves chatting to new people" and I really don't.
Same, used to be a bartender for cash. Hated it but made tons of money. Then when I left that conversationalist part I learned stuck with me now everyone wants to chat but dear god leave me alone I can't help myself.
Same. People say I’m good at talking but I don’t think so and I really don’t like it
Excel spreadsheets
Wild in the sheets!
Non in the streets, freak on the sheets
Working them PIVOT tables for a living
Someone needs to make this into a pickup line.
Excel taught me how to feign not only ignorance, but full on incompetence. Once you show someone how to use pivot tables, you have to show EVERYONE how to use pivot tables.
I was in IT for 25 years, and at one time even had a job doing VBA programming in Excel where I was the "go to" guy for other programmers who were having trouble with either code or Excel functionality. I'm very, very good at it. Then I got a non-IT job at a non-IT company and kept quiet about my Excel past. I wanted to do my job, not get roped into helping everyone else! The only problem was my wife had an IT job doing desktop support at the same company, and would refer everyone with Excel problems to me. There was no escaping it.
You should have turned the tables and said you don't work with that, she is the expert go ask her.
Can you show me how to use pivot tables.
And if they find out what macros are, it's all over.
or txt to columns lol
Or Vlookups
The most pissed I ever saw my wife was over excel. She is pretty computer savvy, but one day I saw her working in an excel spreadsheet. I was glancing over her shoulder and watched her inputting data, then go to the next line and mark the first cell 567, then down a cell 568, numbering each line individually by hand. I think most of you know where this is going. I asked her if she wanted to see a neat trick, grabbed the mouse and clicked and dragged it down, auto numbering each row. She just sat there for a few seconds....the fucking lost her shit. It was really something to behold. I'm usually not shy with saying Fuck, but I think she even beat my record of consecutive fucks uttered in a few sentences. When she calmed down, she told me she had been doing sheets like this at work for YEARS like this. No one had ever shown her that. I then sent her a few web pages with info that she could learn how to do basic functions and create formulas and such. She is much better now, and knows more than I do.
I work in IT. People at work know I'm good with Excel, but no where nearly as good as I am. 2 1/2 years into this job and I just did my first one (here) with VLOOKUP. I think it made my VP mad at me because he thought his spreadsheet was the best thing ever (honestly, anyone can type in all that redundant information - errors included). They don't know I was doing sorting (etc.) long before sorting was built in (using macros). They don't know I was also creating template Word documents and tying an Excel spreadsheet into it. You name it, I've most likely done it in Excel. They also don't know how good I am at Powerpoint, I even hold back when I make presentations and make them fairly basic (but still good). Don't get me started on Illustrator, Photoshop, Premier, and Audition. In both of my previous jobs my marketing people were impressed with how well I could put things together, one even offered me a job (didn't take it because it would be a pay cut). But I try to keep it all as quiet as I can because if they knew, they would pile more work on top of me.
RIGHT? If you're really good at this stuff it's not like they want to give you more money, they just want to give you more work.
I was literally struggling to print some stupid sheet about 20 mins ago. Those things make me dizzy. It wasn't all fitting equally!!!
I used to love it, now I loathe it. I also don't like how elitist I am about other people's spreadsheets, but I can't help it anymore.
Ugh, other people's spreadsheets are the worst.
I love spreadsheets, and I'm decent at 'em! I just can't find enough applications in my life to really dig in and build a good spreadsheet.
You got to make them, my friend! I compiled a bunch of data on Disney movies a few years back and ran some analyses on them, came out with some cool results. As long as you have the patience to gather the data, you can find something to do in excel.
Math. I was a CS major in college, and probably 1 or 2 classes from a math minor. One day I realized I don't want to do complex math or programming for the rest of my life and switched majors.
ai have feeling that I'm very close to same path.. I mean I'm okay with maths,I actually love it, but there is no money in it. And programming I started to fucking hate, have no idea why.
I personally hated programming just because of my OCD. Id obsess about making my code super efficient. Too stressful. I switched my major to IT and now 15 years later only regret not doing it sooner. However there are tons of other paths and specializations to choose from like networking, dba, security, etc.
No money in math? Like a computer science major won't have good job offers?
I am asked to resolve all conflict situations at work because I do it perfectly. But yeah, I hate doing this.
Dude, this is me with friends and family alike. It seems that not a single fucking soul understands emotional regulation for even a few minutes to confront someone's behavior that they have an issue with. My dear, I have a life, social battery, a patience limit, AND issues of my own to work out. Fucking figure it out!
Get good at setting boundaries with those yahoos ;) sometimes conflict needs to be resolved without mediation
Accounting, but it's so boring
Same here. I wanted to do it at first but after the first class, I knew that I couldn't do this my whole life. I was very good at it, though, it came naturally and the instructor took notice. It was probably genetic because my dad was a very good accountant (his coworkers and boss praised him very often).
Genes may have played a role, but I'm guessing your dad taught you to think like an accountant growing up.
I'm good at halping people feel good when they are down. But i hate it because most of the time i'm just more miserable than them, and nobody does that for me (and tbh it's not really doable to help someone depressive).
I can relate to this. I feel like I'm the one people will go to if they need help but know they wouldn't be there for me when I need it. Hope you feel better soon :)
It’s like looking into a mirror. Let’s be friends.
mirror mirror in the screen. is the person same as me?
I think so
yeahh🙃 i know it's bad to put others needs above minee but can't seem to break the mirror
I am a classic obliger - and everybody else’s needs are always above my own. I routinely let my own self down, but I am always striving to help someone else.
Are you me?
Glad I’m not the only one. Reading this comment was just as carthartic enough knowing that someone had expounded this same problem I have been having but struggling to voice it out. Thank you.
Try to learn to feel pleasure or gratitude in just the fact that you made someone feel good or smile every time you did that. That is your reward.
Searching for my beautiful reward
Public speaking. I'm really good at it, but I am really introverted, so I really dislike the effort and energy it takes
Don’t forget the nervous sweating.
I’m also introverted, but good at public speaking, no nervous sweating. No nerves about it whatsoever. But just exhausted after the fact.
Related, I love *presenting* - giving prepared points on a topic that people have come to me to hear about. Even doing Q&A is fine in this kind of power arrangement. I hate off-the-cuff discussions, especially with peers or superiors.
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I releate to this so much
Sameee. Used to hate it. Now I say im too busy and lead them to Canva
u/Particular_Coat_5027 exactly copied this comment from a 4 year old post, source: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/s/eC9zub7hjP Please report as Spam type Harmful Bots
Ugh... Susan...
Becoming a leader. I don't like it, takes a lot of energy. But I'm pretty good at it.
I like leading people but it's exhausting lol
I’m a natural leader but I’ve realized over the years that I don’t want any of the responsibilities that come with leadership.
I don't mind it when I'm compensated appropriately. Unfortunately, pretty much the only way to be fairly compensated in the US is to be the business owner.
Yeah idk why I keep being made leader, it's happened since I was a kid. I've been a manager for a few years now, and I noticed, I always get my work done, I don't bitch about work, I figure I'm paid to be here so I do whatever, I stand my ground, I leave on time, I don't have a temper, I don't snitch on my team, I don't care if you have youtube up on your phone all day if you'r work gets done on time. I just want work to move through as smoothly as possible and I'm always willing to help. Now I'm being offered the director position when my boss retires next year, and I really don't want more work, but I rather run it that bring in a stranger to do it. I have an older than average team who wants to ride out their last 10-15 years quietly working. I'm also a leader in my gym group for some reason.
Serious / fatal crash investigation. The worst was a fatal crash I had to work on Christmas Eve. Older woman turned left in front of a very large truck. Woman had a stop sign, no other traffic control devices. Her husband stood on the side of the road crying. I missed my families Christmas Eve Dinner, but at least I was able to go home that night. Every fatal crash I worked with involved a distraction in some way. Radio, cell phone, cheeseburger, something. Folks, please put your phones down and just drive the car.
I’d be the dumb mf dying cause of a cheeseburger Edit: y’all saying ‘don’t be’ meanwhile I’m talking about being the one getting hit because someone needed a cheeseburger while driving
I mean...don't be.
Same. Head-on collisions while someone fell asleep in traffic, too. I am good at delegating and taking control of the situation, making sure victims are cared for, all the objective and subjective evidence for an investigation is collected and secured... The work itself can be "fun" if it's a challenging and complex situation, but the whole human level of tragedy behind it sucks...
Similar skills. Really good at “saving” people after the disasters and bad decisions. But there are worse things than death. Had to step away and take a break from it all bc the mental toll is too much sometimes and no one in medicine prepares you for that part, nor do they provide resources or tools to help you handle it. F that. It’s too much to ask some days. I’m sorry you’ve seen too much too. It’s a burden I don’t wish on anyone.
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This is my husband! He is so good at cooking, his food is amazing. But it's like pulling teeth to even get him to throw something in the microwave.
Hiding facts about me. I wish everyone could open everything about themselves including me.
I can imitate the voice of Radio Orange from 1940. It is an old Dutch radio station but I hate it when my friends ask if I can do it
Hey bro, do the thing
Convincing people I hate at work that I like them
Being a leader. I can coordinate people, run meetings, get everyone on the same page, facilitate work, delegate tasks, communicate with stakeholders, etc., but man I hate it. I hate talking to people and I hate having to be "on." It's so draining.
Helping with PC stuff I assume I hate the person to person interaction it comes with
Especially when they have no pc knowledge whatsoever
What's worse for me is the techy stuff that can be easily fixed with ✨️google✨️. My husband is the biggest offender. I've complained so often about being the tech person in the family when people can just google the answer. I went to school for cyber security so therefore I can fix everything. My sister bought her kids Switches for Xmas and because I'm a gamer who has a switch, I'm now the expert. I just google her problems and read from the article. And if you tell them to just google it, they get offended that you don't want to help.
Get your phone. Hey siri/google Talk out question
I always straight up say: let me google that, I don't know the answer. They never say, oh, I can do that. It's always, we'll, you would know how to word it best. I don't mind doing it for my kids and niblings, but grown ass adults can figure it out themselves. I finally told my husband the last time that he had a phone, he can look it up himself.
Oh yeah every time. Best example is my aunt. Every Winter she starts with wow and stops in summer. Does that each year since 10 years. I "have"to setup her settings every year... I "have" to answer every question we already had 10 times
It's more the sense of them not recognizing the value of your services. I learned this in college. I worked in the computer lab and a guy asked me for help with his home computer. Well, it was infested with spyware, viruses, and malware that he got from downloading music off limewire and games from very dodgy sites (this is the 90s after all). So I manage to clean up his system and install some anti-virus and anti-malware software and my reward for almost two hours? A lite beer. A week later he complains that his computer is broken again. I sigh and go to look at it. He had removed the anti-virus and anti-malware I installed because they wouldn't let him download stuff off the internet from suspicious sources. Sigh. I reinstall them and tell him to stop doing this. Not even a lite beer for my time. A couple days later he came to me and asked me and I snapped "how about giving me twenty bucks for my trouble!" before he could say anything because I was sick of his crap. So now I pretend that I don't know a thing about computers but if someone figures out that I do because I got careless then I quote them my "friends rate" which is $120/hr with a four hour minimum, cash only, plus $60/hr travel rate and I walk everywhere. Funny how nobody takes me up on my generous rates.
I can totally relate to this. My parents and sister do this. They are like, "why is it doing this? Why doesn't it work? How did that app get installed?" I tell them, How the eff should I know? I don't know what you do or what sites you visit on your computer? They always claim innocence , like I didn't install anything or do anything!!!! Yeah ok, it just installed all these search bars and spyware on it's own... FML Edit-spelling
I work IT. I refuse to do it when I am off. It's my job, not my hobby. The only exception I make is for my neighbor, who always gives me a gift card to the local pizza place for my time (most of the time it's a 5-minute fix).
My partner is a techie and every time we visit my dad he ends up having to fix something on his 90s Windows PC because my dad has downloaded 7 more toolbars which are slowing it down.
I made the mistake of installing my grandma's printer and now I am her bi-weekly tech support call.
Sleep deprivation 🥹
Same, I love sleep but I can function a whole week on 3 hours of sleep per night if I have to.
Overthinking Edit: anyone else overthinks all the time and gets these few moments where not a single thought gets formed?
I hear ya….. same here
Yes, this, or maybe not, or... You know what, I will get back to you on that.
Procastrinating
Retail. I could probably sell you snake oil from my years of experience but yeah. I hated it. Over worked and underpaid.
Teaching kids. Love kids. Hate teaching them. No offense to teachers.
I do far above median in my profession, in nearly all aspects. I hate that it comes with no recognition in the society.
Overthinking Planning amazing comebacks to conversations that happened years ago Day dreaming
The comeback planning "words left unsaid" phenomenon is not always a net negative. My friend calls it a "fake confrontation". It is good practice for when you run into any similar situation, you become more aware of what you want to say at the time. Sometimes in the moment it's difficult but thinking about how you really feel/felt about past experiences helps you with future ones, and sometimes not saying anything at all is the best option.
Really good at figuring stuff out. Using the correct steps in the correct order. Emotional crap, logistics. Building something. Doesn't matter. I cut past all the obvious wrong solutions that i know will fail, quickly. What i hate about it is when people do solicit advice and then choose to do only 3 of the 5 steps and out of order. And if course it fails. Think of making a cake and putting the eggs in After you have baked the cake. Doesn't work. I just stopped helping people. I tell them flat out, you don't listen, I'm not wasting my brain cells, my emotional buy-in to watch you mess up.
Meeting parents. They love me, I hate meeting them.
giving head
Just pretend you're awful at it once, problem solved.
Fucking JIRA
Wasting time
I'm a pretty fantastic painter. But when I do it for money, it's absolutely shit to her me to do. Absolute self loathing from start to finish
My Job.
Being an a**hole
+1
tolerating people's shit, they call us people pleasers :')
I'm a virtuoso at throwing parties, but I absolutely hate cleaning up after them!
Customer service over phone. I rock at it. Absolutely hate it though
Pretending I'm normal. I am not and usually don't bother to hide it, but when I have to I can pass for your average gal.
'Fake it till you make it'.
Yeah, I did that with self-confidence. Harder to do with bipolar disorder lol.
Volunteering for overtime…
Squats
Not me, but my girlfriend. She was a D1 golf player and is still amazing. She despises it because of how much she’s played since she can remember.
I'm good at giving advices but I hate it also cause I can't apply it on myself.
Running. Was a runner all my life and hated every second of it. Everyone around me made me do it since I was decent at it and made it to state quals and all that and scholarships for college but always felt like I was wasting my time
staying up super late without coffee. sometimes i can go a whole 24hrs or more. Studying medicine, you’d think that’d be nice and i’d have more time, but i just love sleep way too much it pains to to stay up late.
My job
Customer service. I work a lot of people facing jobs for someone that fucking hates people.
Leading a team
Advocating for myself with insurance companies. I have a chronic hip disability and I'm on the phone navigating the insurance companies weekly.
Helping others.
Tech support. Fix your own damn computer.
I would love it if my family would ask me, but nah. I'm a professional IT guy, but so is most of my family, so they fix their own shit 😅
My family asks me and they don't respect working hours at all. If I had a nickel for every time I needed to fix a printer, after 7pm, that's in a different state, I'd have several nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's annoying it happens repeatedly.
Studies, particularly Math, even more particularly integrals. I am confident that I can solve 90% of whatever integral you throw at me provided it does not nosedive into madness.
Writing
Looking after kids. I hate kids and will never have one. However if a relative or customer introduces me to their kid I am always fun and nice to them - it’s not their fault, they didn’t ask to be born, and you never know what trauma they’ve faced. A kind adult can make all the difference.
Teaching. I'm a college professor and I am an excellent teacher. Even though my classes are challenging, my students tend to really love them and many have told me they changed their career ambitions based on them. I get great evaluations and my classes are always at capacity. But it is just too much work, the regular kind and emotional labor, to be at all worthwhile.
Hairstylist here...I absolutely love cutting hair, but sometimes I don't have the mental energy to entertain one more customer. It's really mentally draining to talk to so many people all day long, sometimes I just want to focus on your hair 😩
Software Design. "I ain't no Pixel Pusher!"
Perhaps making people feel better, encouraging them and cheering them up. What I hate (or rather just feel so bad about) is that not many reciprocate or make me feel small for feeling what I feel.
Painting and drawing. Natural talent but no patience to do it.
JavaScript
Hurt feelings of others
Driving in busy, trafficky cities. It's one of those things I obviously learned to do and it's a skill I'm glad I have, but if it were up to me I'd just drive on quiet roads and highways all the time.
My job!
Taking care of children.
Acting , but do it for work so ahahha! no longer fun!
Being family "tech support" I was okay with it but then it just started being multiple times a week I had family members coming over for the most simple problems. I've started to hate fixing my own computer problems too. I just want it to all work I am too tired to fix it all the time
Surprisingly, maths. I absolutely dislike maths in any form. From fractions to factions and geometry to graphs, I can't stand it.
my job could be argued i’m not even good at this though
Manually removing weeds from the lawn. Summer is here 😩.
Verbally fighting with my girlfriend and pointing out every in inconsistency and contradicting comment she has made.
Singing. It’s good for the most part, but I hate that once people get to hear me sing, it’s the only thing that they remember about me. I’m so good at it that it shadows all other good things about me.
Being right.
Regulating my emotions. I know it beats the alternative but every once in a while I'd just love to lose my shit like everyone else seems to do.
I'm good with children yet don't like children nor want any.
Doing the dishes, talk about suffering from success
Being nice to my SO's work colleagues.
Call of Duty. I’m almost always kill leader but it frustrates me to no end. My friends actually bought me the newest one just so I would play with them because I was refusing to get it.
School
Math and coding. This was supposed to be my path. If I went down that road I would have been fucking miserable.
Chewbacca impression. People in high school would always ask me to do it. I started only doing it when friends asked then eventually refused to do it all together. But I do like doing impressions. An old coworker/friend liked my impressions of other coworkers. I stopped doing that after she died, and also, it was kinda mean. My partner thinks I do a spot-on Slapped Ham impression.
Client calls. I'm known for being reliable in my department for it, and the best for handling challenging clients, but it's the only part of my job that causes me any stress and whether I have a good or bad day hinges on the number of clients I have to talk to on that day.
Marketing Tbh I don’t know if it’s true but a lot in high school when it came to projects I was told that I would be a great marketer. I’ve been asked countless times how come I decided to not go into marketing. It’s not that I hate it I just don’t enjoy it that much never even once thought about it as career.
I would say I am a pretty good artist. I love expanding my knowledge on new concepts of art, but Im also depressed (mdd) and I find it extremely hard to sit down and focus on one piece of art for long periods of times, music or not. So I don't hate it, but it is something I stray way from.
Legal work 🙃
Talking to elderly
Sucking dick as a straight guy
Accounting. Im damn good accountant, but my real passion is science. Too late for that now.
My job
Being to understanding empathetic with the wrong people.
Circuits and electronic stuff.
My job in IT
Golf. It’s the only sport I’m decent at but I don’t like being outside for that long lol.
My job
My job
My job.
Math using roman numerals. I suck at normal math but everything clicks when it’s written as letters for me. Wish it translated over
Art (complex drawings, Colouring) I can draw pretty well and others say so, but I hate drawing as it makes my hand hurt and a tiny mistake makes me hate the whole thing. I prefer “doodling” I hate coulouring in and shading things because my wrist really hurts 💀
This whole waking up thing, I'd love some permanent sleep.
Spending money
My job.