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Hitchhiking is super fun and definitely helps you develop confidence. It's a shame there's such a stigma with hitchhiking in the US.

by dmihal 8y ago

vanderZwan 8y ago
> definitely helps you develop confidence Agreed. I think it's worth emphasizing here that it builds up confidence in a very healthy way. Growing up I was very insecure and (was) thought that building up confidence only had to do with getting a higher self-esteem. And sure, having a low self-esteem is bad for you health. But most ways of trying to improve it backfire. For example, if you think of things you're great at it makes you dependent on feeling that you're great at those things and then that can become a source of insecurity. Meanwhile, learning to talk to strangers while hitchhiking is all about getting over yourself. A lot of the anxiety comes from the anticipation of being rejected making you feel horrible as if you were and imagining the worst possible ways it could make you feel. Basically, a normally healthy feedback loop to weigh options has become totally unbalanced and makes you suffer for something that neither happened nor has to happen. More importantly, it suggests you're hyper-focused on yourself and on how others see you. And the irony here is: most people don't, and that's perfectly fine. Or as Melissa Dahl summarized in a title of an Aeon essay[0] about this: "you're simply not that big of a deal, now isn't that a relief?" I'm sure most of us know this rationally, but feeling it emotionally is a different thing altogether. Well, hitchhiking is a great way to train that world-view. It was for me, at least. [0] https://aeon.co/ideas/youre-simply-not-that-big-a-deal-now-isnt-that-a-relief https://aeon.co/ideas/youre-simply-not-that-big-a-deal-now-i...
- kpennell 8y ago
  appreciating your comment...
dejv 8y ago
It is not just US, also in Europe it seems like the hitchhiking is dead. 15 years ago when I was criss crossing Europe many times hitchhiking, sleeping in hostels but usually just in the ditch next to the road or field nearby. I used to meet tons of hitchhikers almost anywhere you go. Today I am not hitchhiking anymore, but I am happy to give a ride to anybody flagging finger. For past three years that happens only once and even those two people were doing it just because of some hitchhiking competition.
- somewhatoff 8y ago
  When I was hitchhiking, people would say 'nobody hitchhikes anymore'. I'd point out that a good hitchhiker is in a car, not by the side of the road...
rrdharan 8y ago
Also a shame it only works if you’re white. (Based on my thankfully limited experience plus https://www.reddit.com/r/hitchhiking/comments/41bbde/hitchhiking_while_black_in_america/ https://www.reddit.com/r/hitchhiking/comments/41bbde/hitchhi...)
- vanderZwan 8y ago
  Well, "only" is an exaggeration but yeah, racist stereotypes do work against you. I'm half-Asian, which I guess is "white enough" to fly under most of the (conscious and subconscious) racist radars out there. OTOH I can get quite a tan and I used to grow a beard years before it was trendy to do so. Pretty much right after 9/11 actually. The Islamophobic associations were definitely real. I figured out a cheat mode though: wear thick rimmed glasses[0]. I used cheap plastic +.25 reading glasses so they didn't look fake but didn't give me a headache either. It's totally stupid but it made a huge difference. And this was years before the famouse Curb Your Enthusiasm bit[1], which clearly is an example of "it's funny (and sad) because it's true". [0] https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/z8h21/whats_the_weirdest_pop_culture_phenomenon_you/c62gmt2/?context=3 https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/z8h21/whats_the_... [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14ECj4OcCC0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14ECj4OcCC0

Hitchhiking is super fun and definitely helps you develop confidence. It's a shame there's such a stigma with hitchhiking in the US.

by dmihal 8y ago

Hitchhiking is super fun and definitely helps you develop confidence. It's a shame there's such a stigma with hitchhiking in the US.

vanderZwan 8y ago

> definitely helps you develop confidence Agreed. I think it's worth emphasizing here that it builds up confidence in a very healthy way. Growing up I was very insecure and (was) thought that building up confidence only had to do with getting a higher self-esteem. And sure, having a low self-esteem is bad for you health. But most ways of trying to improve it backfire. For example, if you think of things you're great at it makes you dependent on feeling that you're great at those things and then that can become a source of insecurity. Meanwhile, learning to talk to strangers while hitchhiking is all about getting over yourself. A lot of the anxiety comes from the anticipation of being rejected making you feel horrible as if you were and imagining the worst possible ways it could make you feel. Basically, a normally healthy feedback loop to weigh options has become totally unbalanced and makes you suffer for something that neither happened nor has to happen. More importantly, it suggests you're hyper-focused on yourself and on how others see you. And the irony here is: most people don't, and that's perfectly fine. Or as Melissa Dahl summarized in a title of an Aeon essay[0] about this: "you're simply not that big of a deal, now isn't that a relief?" I'm sure most of us know this rationally, but feeling it emotionally is a different thing altogether. Well, hitchhiking is a great way to train that world-view. It was for me, at least. [0] https://aeon.co/ideas/youre-simply-not-that-big-a-deal-now-isnt-that-a-relief https://aeon.co/ideas/youre-simply-not-that-big-a-deal-now-i...

kpennell 8y ago
appreciating your comment...

dejv 8y ago

It is not just US, also in Europe it seems like the hitchhiking is dead. 15 years ago when I was criss crossing Europe many times hitchhiking, sleeping in hostels but usually just in the ditch next to the road or field nearby. I used to meet tons of hitchhikers almost anywhere you go. Today I am not hitchhiking anymore, but I am happy to give a ride to anybody flagging finger. For past three years that happens only once and even those two people were doing it just because of some hitchhiking competition.

somewhatoff 8y ago
When I was hitchhiking, people would say 'nobody hitchhikes anymore'. I'd point out that a good hitchhiker is in a car, not by the side of the road...

rrdharan 8y ago

Also a shame it only works if you’re white. (Based on my thankfully limited experience plus https://www.reddit.com/r/hitchhiking/comments/41bbde/hitchhiking_while_black_in_america/ https://www.reddit.com/r/hitchhiking/comments/41bbde/hitchhi...)

vanderZwan 8y ago
Well, "only" is an exaggeration but yeah, racist stereotypes do work against you. I'm half-Asian, which I guess is "white enough" to fly under most of the (conscious and subconscious) racist radars out there. OTOH I can get quite a tan and I used to grow a beard years before it was trendy to do so. Pretty much right after 9/11 actually. The Islamophobic associations were definitely real. I figured out a cheat mode though: wear thick rimmed glasses[0]. I used cheap plastic +.25 reading glasses so they didn't look fake but didn't give me a headache either. It's totally stupid but it made a huge difference. And this was years before the famouse Curb Your Enthusiasm bit[1], which clearly is an example of "it's funny (and sad) because it's true". [0] https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/z8h21/whats_the_weirdest_pop_culture_phenomenon_you/c62gmt2/?context=3 https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/z8h21/whats_the_... [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14ECj4OcCC0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14ECj4OcCC0