Edit wiki/how-you-introduce-yourself.md — Rookie Mistakes & Gotchas

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# how you introduce yourself

## what happened

if saying "I'm in high school" would cause people to pattern-match you into "typical HS kid" and that doesn't represent you accurately, you can just lead with what you do. "I'm a builder working on X" is more accurate than a label that triggers wrong assumptions.

## why it's a gotcha

labels are shortcuts for other people's brains. when you say "i'm a high school student," most adults at tech events immediately lower their expectations and shift into mentor mode. if that's not the dynamic you want, the label is working against you — not because it's false, but because it's misleading.

## the fix

not about hiding anything — it's about not misleading. lead with what you do, not what category you fit into. "i'm building an AI tool for X" starts a different conversation than "i'm in high school and interested in AI." same person, different frame. same concept applies to your product: [[memorize-one-liner|memorize a one-liner]]. the intro opens the door to [[get-contacts-immediately|getting the contact]], and framing yourself as a contributor rather than an asker is the antidote to [[networking-as-extraction]].