Am I delusional to think I can read people

[minimouse456]

and that I am a good judge of character?

The older I get, the better I seem to get at it.

I will admit though that completing mental state assessments is part of my job.

I can't describe it exactly. A large part of it is my gut feeling about someone. And a large part is obviously being able to read body language.

I can pick up a lot of "good" in people. Unfortunately, I pick up a lot of "bad" also.

I can tell instantly if someone does not like me. I can tell that someone actually has bad anxiety, even though they might come across to others as being unfriendly.

I have a friend of a friend with whom I had previously gotten on well with. I can feel that she has bad feelings towards me recently. I have walked back in to a room and I can instantly feel the change in atmosphere and I knew she had been talking about me. I have always just known that she is one of those people who like you as long as you are not doing better than her or you don't have something that she wants.

Does anyone else feel like this?

@HPLikecraft I can assure you it has no impact upon the outcome of my assessment nor on the treatment the patient receives. I do my job and keep my feelings to myself.

I’m not sure what you want here, OP. Validation? Confirmation that you’re special or different because you have, or think you have, a certain ability to a greater level than others? Again, most people have it, it improves with age or experience or practice.

I speak 3 languages and have a working knowledge of a 4th but that doesn’t make me different or special just more able at language learning! Everyone I know has the ability to learn and employ at least one language and I’m sure there are others here who have more languages or have more facility with one or other of the ones I know.

The difficulty with what you're saying, in my eyes, is:

1. We can't know for sure if your hunches can be relied upon. How do you know for sure that this friend-of-a-friend has definitely been talking about you when you re-enter the room, for example, unless you overhear or someone tells you, neither of which count as intuition.

2. We can't know for sure if you are better at this than the average person. Are you better than most other people at working out quickly who doesn't like you, or do you have low self esteem and assume that they must dislike you, when actually they're preoccupied/tired/a bit of a dick really?