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Comment by wpietri | Hacker News Reader

I think #2 is awesome. But I've also had to learn to assert my need to be heard. Sometimes I do that explicitly. E.g., "When you interrupt me like that, I feel like you're not interested in what I have to say."

But some of it has been observing extroverts interact with one another and learning their conversational protocols. A lot of people take not-interrupting as a signal to continue endlessly, and are perfectly happy to be interrupted if done in certain ways.

Adopting their protocol never feels perfectly comfortable to me. But, then, neither does trying to figure out how to fake a heart attack so I can get out of somebody's monologue.

So you might try watching your brother with his friends and see how they manage to get heard and/or not kill him.

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> Sometimes I do that explicitly. E.g., "When you interrupt me like that, I feel like you're not interested in what I have to say."

Please keep doing that! I struggle with shutting up or not interrupting people, because I get carried away and because I grew up in a household where everyone always forcefully asserted themselves (to the point where less-forceful friends thought we were fighting all the time).

I often feel quite bad afterwards when I realize that I hogged the conversation, especially because I've had periods in my life where I was excessively shy and felt awful when people did this to me. My only saving grace, perhaps, is that while I might not seem to be listening, I soak up everything the other says, and often get back to that or let it influence my opinions. It's mostly a conversational 'style'.

But please tell people like me to shut up. It works, we deserve it, it makes us aware that we get carried away and, from what I've seen, most of 'us' quickly get over the reprimand.

That is some really good feedback/advice. Thank you.

Like many cultural differences, what seems offensive to some is natural and expected by others. When in a different cultural environment, it's only natural to adjust to the norms. So of course, why wouldn't the same apply to personality types? Makes great sense to me.

It's hard for me to tell the difference between conversational bulldozers that want to own all the air in the room and the common boor. If people talk over me when I'm trying to make a point, I'll say "that wasn't what I was saying", and start over where cut off - once. After that I'll just leave.

I gave up on that, ie trying to fit in. One time, when talking to a co worker who I was fed up with, I just kept raising my voice and repeating what I said until I was yelling, he was stunned, and my co workers looked on admiringly.

Regarding #2, it may be good to search for people/friends who are good listeners.

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