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Hello everyone. This is the first time I've posted publicly about this so I hope it'll make some sense. I've come to realize that when I engage in conversations with people, whether they be friends, co-workers, family members, etc. that anything that they say I respond in a way that relates to something I did, or I experienced. For a long while I did not realize this about myself, but over the last few years I've been pursuing self-knowledge and trying to work on many aspects of my life. While I wasn't an only child, my siblings were much older than me (they're my half siblings from my father's first marriage, and are 9 and 11 years older than I am). And when my parents divorced when I was nine, I became an only child living with a working mom. So I spent a lot of time alone. I suffered from low self-esteem as a child and was bullied through school (I was overweight through my entire childhood). I was so nervous to even talk to people in any setting. I couldn't talk to people over the phone unless they were my family or friends. When I would be at social events, I generally kept to myself and often people thought I was stuck up because I never talked to anyone. When I had to give speeches in school I was so nervous I'd stumble and shake. I hated being the center of attention. It wasn't until I got a job as an ESL teacher living abroad, where I would have classes of up to 12 students or more, that I broke out of this nervousness about talking to others. I gained a lot of confidence with speaking in front of large crowds, and now that sort of thing doesn't bother me in the least bit. I actually enjoy doing entertaining things in front of crowds. I also now have no issues engaging in conversations in social situations. In fact, I happen to think I talk too much and dominate conversations. It feels weird when I am in conversations now because we'll be talking and when the other person is speaking, I try my best to listen, but I often don't find what they are saying particularly interesting. I want to find what they say interesting, and with a few people I've become genuinely interested in it, but overall I just don't. I've gotten better at not interrupting people and listening in general, but I still seem to always bring the topic back on myself. The more knowledge I gain of this the more self-aware I am in conversations. I know that asking people questions is a good way to engage them and not myself, and I do my best, but I still always seem to have to give my opinion or relate it to my own experience. I'm not sure if this is a subconscious way of trying to empathize with the person or not. And while I've known that I do this for quite some time, I still end up doing it and only realizing that I do it afterwards. And with people younger than myself, I find that I often give advice, even when it is not asked of me. Although I rarely fluff myself up or toot my own horn so to speak. I've asked some friends and co-workers that if I talked too much and they either didn't give a response or just said that I was a "good conversationalist" and always had something to talk about.Perhaps I am being paranoid and looking too much into it? I wonder why I always seem to feel a bit of guilt after having conversations with people. But I find it difficult to make friends on a deeper level than just the acquaintance level. And I feel it is because I cannot connect deeply with people because I talk about myself too much. I know that I don't want to do this, but it just seems difficult to have a two sided conversation. I have gone through days where I don't engage with people much just to avoid getting into the same situation again but I find that makes it worse. If the best way to get better at something is to practice it, how come I still do the same things? Any insight is helpful. Thanks for reading. Shea