Yes, and it never works. People don't remember what you did before, so the social and functional capital you've so carefully accumulated becomes worthless as soon as you need to cash in from some bump in the road :(
Because that's not an easy thing to be aware of, particularly not when most societal norms train you to suppress showing more extreme manifestations of emotions.
Just try imagining spending a whole day visibly smiling happy.
People who know you will ask you what's the happy occurrence, strangers will think you either mock them or are simply crazy, that's how out of the ordinary visibly being happy is considered, which is just super sad.
Hmm... Interesting point. I'm going to try that today and see what happens :-) Umm... Of course I barely see anyone except my wife and people on the street (because I work at home), but I wonder how it will make me feel (other than having a tired mouth...)
It does work (source: personal experience). But that depends on the kind of people you have been trying to accumulate that capital with. The real problem is that you don't have much if any control over who those people are in many cases where it matters most - school, work, family.
And then on top of that, depending on how far one is on the spectrum, it can be hard to judge people. It's not that you can't do it at all - it's that you are never really confident that you've got it right. And having an emergency plan that you're not confident in, but you know you will need to rely on at some point, can be very stressful in and of itself.
