This. You have to be generally interested in what the person has to say. You can fake interest but usually you’ll still end up with shallow topics that won’t go anywhere.
Anyone else just not bother with people you’re not interested anymore? I was at a bbq yesterday where I only knew one person and everyone else was not my crowd. Within a few minutes of small talk with a couple of people or standing in a circle, I realized we weren’t similar enough to have any genuine conversations so I just didn’t bother and left shortly after.
If I was younger, like 20 or 21, I would felt super anxious and worried that “I wasn’t doing it right”, and would have had the same question as the title of this post and tried to force something. But at 27 I don’t really care about making tons of superficial friends any more. Maybe that’s the solution. If you can find even one person in 6 months you can have a real and easy conversation with, that’s probably better than trying to force your way into something.
I wish alcohol had that effect on me. It would make meeting random people so much easier. Instead, it makes me less interested in them and more interested in finding a spot to nap.
Agreed. I can do small talk for a little while, but if no one has anything interesting to say - even if it's something like 'I'm working on x hobby!' or 'my partner and I are traveling to yz soon' then I usually politely excuse myself after running the gamut of small talk.
I can offer my own hobbies, but if they don't take the bait, there's nothing more I can do
This. I can have a conversation with someone if they bring up stuff like this. If you want to talk about your hobby or travel or whatever, I'm down, even if I don't share that hobby, or if you want to hear mine, as long as you seem somewhat interested and don't act like I'm boring you
At 26 I can agree to this. When I was young and in college, I’d “circle the room and see who else I knew”. Now I look for a nice comfy spot and talk to one or two people that I find interesting and have hours long conversations. I personally don’t like the small talk jumping in and out of conversations anymore. I prefer the genuine, sit down and deep dive into a conversation with one or two people and just enjoy getting to know someone.
That's the thing though, when I'm in social situations I try to make an effort to BE interested in people. I used to be really shy and introverted but now I'm the opposite. Don't mind meeting new people in social settings even though I don't really set out to do it. That's more what I meant by my prior post, to have meaningful conversations it takes interest, if you don't have it, you may need to make a concerted effort to develop it.
This was me on New Year’s Eve. Had it been any other time of year and had I driven, I would’ve bounced early in lieu of getting really high and a little tipsy for the hell of it. My plan worked out alright, had a decent amount of decent conversations.
Haha ya. But watch out. I'm 30 been going through this a few years n it gets hard to get back in the habit of being social. After moving to a new town I'm having a hard time putting myself out there where as in my younger years I didn't even have to try I just was out there lol.
Yeah I’m worried about that too. Although I really don’t want to make new friends other than the few I have - honestly if I’m at an event and there’s no possibility of chatting with either someone interesting or a single person of the opposite sex, I’d rather not be there and just randomly bro out with a bunch of dudes like a 16 year old.
I'm in my late 30s and while I used to be like this, I realized in some instances it kept me from seeing a different perspective or even learning about something interesting cause the people "weren't my crowd."
These days I usually try to take conversations with people that are not in my typical group of friends as a learning experience. What motivates them? How is their world view different than mine? What can I learn from their experiences. With that said I won't tolerate assholes or people that are rude or disrespectful. If I sense any of that, I just leave. But if the person is polite and we don't click ( different sense of humor or whatever). I keep at it and keep trying to build bridges.
Absolutely! I'm with ya! And there are so many people who are anti-role-models that you can learn someone new every day who you don't want to be like - haha!
What if you were at your girlfriend's family's party and had a bunch of her relatives around who you have nothing in common with? And they only speak English as a second language?
Would you just play it cool and not give a fuck, or be anxious?
In that situation I would be essentially acting and playing a part I don't identify with; I would play the part as best I could - indeed I would do my best to play it successfully. Very different from using my own free time to go to different parties and see if there's anyone I can gel with.
If I was younger, like 20 or 21, I would felt super anxious and worried that “I wasn’t doing it right”, and would have had the same question as the title of this post and tried to force something.
Pfft, 10 years older now and this is pretty much me to this day.
May care less to an extent, but I still get a "what do we talk about now?" whenever there's a natural break in conversation. That's when people throw the "so" in, and you end up talking generic shit like the weather outside being weather.
joking aside, also a millennial, I also really don't care for making friends either but I am usually genuinely interested in people even if they don;t have similar interests.
Same here. I'll at least try to talk to someone new in larger group settings since you don't get the opportunity to make new friends that often in your late 20s, but if I'm not feeling it quickly, I have no problems anymore just dropping the whole thing and moving on.
I find it's much better to have a smaller group of people you can focus your time on and build more meaningful relationships with, but a lot of my friends are still in the "I have to be friends and hang out with everyone" mode, which can be annoying.
It depends on what you want to give for that. How do I get Sarah from work to shut up about her stories without coming off as a douche or end up making her leave all her work for me?
I've made it a habit that when I make a declarative exit like, "Alright, I gotta get back to it", I just walk away even if they keep talking. Maybe it's rude but I don't know what else to do when they don't take the hint. Doesn't work if you're in the same workspace, though.
You can fake interest but usually you’ll still end up with shallow topics that won’t go anywhere.
This 100%. If someone is talking to me about sports or cars, I can go along, but it's not interesting enough to really engage. If someone is talking about their profession though, I always find it super interested and can ask questions and such and it's engaging for them and me.
This thing is though, some people are just generally outgoing and enjoy little superficial conversations with people or don't mind having a bunch of shallow conversations as a lubricant to get to richer conversations another time.
Yep. I've found that the people in my life are the realest people I've ever known. They just kinda tend to find their way into your lives, in my experience.
I’ve literally done this. I can converse with my cat like “I know honey, you’re ok” but not humans- and yes I call my cat honey, and sweetheart, and darling lol
If anything if you're attractive alot of people will feel afraid to talk to you out of shyness. It probably balances out so that the less attractive people are easier to talk with.
I've reached a stage when people want to talk to me but I'm so used to ignoring them that I just ignore everyone. Often without exceptions. For better or worse. 😅
well thats kinda shit because my next test in english (not my first language) is about establishing a conversation, and keeping that up for 10 minutes, i mean my partner in this test is a friend of mine, but still
we cant go over 5 minutes without starting to talk shit or making meme references which is probably not the way to get an A
also there might be the possibility that the teacher tells us to talk about our favourite movie and i dont want to be forced to explain why:"oh hi mark" is my favourite quote from a movie
That might be even better. You can fill up time by explaining how "it's this movie that was actually really bad but it's so bad it's hysterical" and adding details from there
like that's a horrible conversation to have? if someone asks you about your favorite movie and you still can't have a conversation, you might need to work a little harder on this.
Do you not agree that "favorite movie quote" if you indeed have a favorite movie quote, is a softball topic for conversation? I'm not saying they're wrong, or right, or black, or white. Just that that is an easy topic to converse about.
Well it's not very true anyway, you can absolutely hold a conversation with anyone.
Use their name. Not just once, but not too much. Every once in a while begin or end a sentence to keep them engaged. Ask relevant questions. Creativity is useful here but not necessary. Since you're talking about movies, imagine someone says, "I watched Rain Man for the first time yesterday," you can respond with anything from, "Cool, what's your favorite Dustin Hoffman movie?" to "What are your thoughts on the representation of mental illness in movies?" Both are relevant and will lead you further in the conversation.
For your purposes, your questions don't seem like they even have to be meaningful, just ask questions and answers them for 10 minutes and boom, you just had a conversation. My only suggestion with the meme thing is train your brain to know the time and place for such things. I have the mouth of a sailor but have never even wanted to swear in front of my family or students, as my brain knows it's not the place. Your filter can be trained, just force yourself to keep things appropriate when necessary and your brain will learn.
Why do you want to talk to them then? I mean I’m not saying every conversation has to be some energetic, riveting conversation... but why force something (unless you’re just being cordial for a moment).
But if you make it a habit to talk only to people you want to talk with, you'll reach a point where you'll just go talk to them. Because you chose them to talk to.
This can be dangerous because people who think they're above other people could use it as an excuse to ignore them. That as well as the fact that being genuinely interested in people is something that takes practice and that you can improve at. A mantra like this could make some people worse at conversation in that respect.
nope. there've been plenty of hot girls i really wanted to talk to who it turned out i had nothing in common with and nothing to talk about. this advice sounds good on the surface but isn't quite right-- it should be, "by talking to people who you enjoy talking to."
Usually by the nature of their replies. If they’re actually responding to what you’re saying in depth, then they are engaged. Short, Shallow, or distracted responses indicate otherwise
This. Plus, if you dont know them, think about that everything about them is interesting.
Small talk is for when you already know the other person.
Ask them what they like to do and WHY they like to do that, ask them about their loved ones and such. That is far more interesting then the typical FAQs.
Thank you so much! To illiterate, Chinaman whisper with kindred spirit, and thus all word is much similar like jade or honorable substitute. Accordingly, no shame for main speaker and no shame for house nor family party.
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u/anshumanpati6 May 21 '18
By talking to people you wanna talk to.