Noise at cocktail parties

By JJ Saturday, March 28, 2009

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Does anyone have any suggestions/advice on how to handle the overstimulation/chaos in a cocktail party situation. I was at a party last night and found myself overwhelmed by the noise of multiple conversations and people competing to be heard ( LOUD ) I find that if I am having a conversation with one person I am simultaneously hearing all of the conversations in the room. Hard to focus....especially if the conversation you are having is not interesting and you are hearing other more interesting conversations. I find that sometimes I am seeming not to be interested in the person I am talking to but it is extremely hard to stay focused with all that is happening around you in a party situation. Any thoughts? Observations or suggestions? Others have this problem as well? Curious to hear.

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Marcia

3/30/09 11:26am

I, too, suffer from this kind of distraction...at work! A lovely group of people, but they have loud voices and an endless supply of chitchat.

In your case, when you are with one person, try staring at his nose, or the space between his eyebrows. It's not as intimidating as staring into his eyes, but it helps to give you something to focus on and shut out the others.

Otherwise, it's almost impossible without earphones, which your hostess will frown on, and you might as well go into the kitchen and help with the dishes.

lifeinpieces.wordpress.com

4/ 1/09 3:07am

This works for me, and I'm glad to share.

Problem: Loud voices, many voices, irritating voices that bring on anxiety for reasons we don't fully understand

Solution: Block one ear.

Interestlingly, even when the voices aren't particularly loud, they can be irritating, and sometimes, there need not be more than one speaker, given enough background noise. Even more interestingly, I find that blocking one ear often helps a lot (casually using my hand to hold up my other arm by the elbow and placing the other hand on the side of my face as though I am merely in "a casual position" while blocking the ear with my fingers). For some reason, receiving auditory stimulus from one ear only makes things much better (for me, it's usually the left ear that remains unblocked).

I hope this helps someone else. Good luck!

Noise at cocktail parties

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