[HN Gopher] The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
___________________________________________________________________
The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
Author : giuliomagnifico
Score : 132 points
Date : 2023-09-23 15:34 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.economist.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.economist.com)
| mettamage wrote:
| I overanalyze social interaction. I'm a constant beginner at it.
| I'm constant scared. Yea, whatever, I don't care, let's do some
| talking!
|
| How to talk to someone? There are a few ways:
|
| 1. Give a compliment that you _genuinely_ mean. It has to be
| genuine because sometimes you gotta go in-depth with your
| compliment to show that it 's genuine. Such as: "I really like
| your whole outfit style. I don't want to assume, but it makes me
| think you're a free spirit playing guitar and I'm just vibing to
| that feel."
|
| 2. Ask a question you're curious about that you think the person
| next to you might _on the off chance_ know something about.
|
| 3. Talk about something happening in the situation that seems to
| be interesting "do you have any clue why there's such a huge line
| over there?"
|
| 4. Talk about something happening and just make it a statement "I
| love the fact that Amsterdam has these free water fountains in
| certain places!" (while everyone is standing near it)
|
| 5. Tell a story.
|
| When you talk to someone, you need to be aware that they're on
| autopilot. This means that you first need to grab their
| attention. I personally do this by saying "excuse me". When they
| look up, then I tell my actual thing I want to say.
|
| Responses:
|
| - Good: carry on
|
| - Mediocre: maybe carry on?
|
| - Not interested: don't carry on. Don't internalize it was you.
| It might've been you, it might've been something else. You don't
| know. And even if it was you, maybe it really was some projection
| of their psychological state that goes back to childhood (aka not
| really you). You just don't know. But yea, learning to be okay
| with that not everyone is interested is okay.
|
| Other ideas:
|
| * Playfulness helps. Playfulness generates humor. I don't know
| how to generate humor, but I do know how to be playful (playful =
| don't take things seriously, don't look for truth, do look for
| fun and play).
|
| * Curiosity helps.
|
| * Asking questions helps, as long as you're interested in them
| and you're not asking them to just carry the conversation.
|
| * Statements help. Not everything needs to be Q&A.
|
| * Telling stories help. Just in general, it gives people to latch
| onto a lot.
|
| I hope this helps some. It's a non-comprehensive guide made by
| someone who has spend a lot of time thinking about it (but at the
| moment is quite rusty :P). I fail at it often, I succeed at it
| often as well. Whatever, I'm talking to people. Failure and
| success doesn't matter. All that matters is are you sending a
| ping to the whole wide world, or not? :D
| nickjj wrote:
| The article mentions "Strangers on a Train" which I've never seen
| or read but I've had a number of really interesting encounters
| from train talk. It's a natural place to end up in a scenario
| where you could chat with someone for a decently long time if you
| both choose to do so. A takeaway I always remind myself is that
| you never know what's right next to you.
|
| Last month someone asked me which track the train leaves from. I
| answered and that turned into chatting with someone from Lebanon
| visiting the US who was nearing the completion of their PhD in
| theoretical physics mixed with quantum computing. Out of no where
| a 90 minute conversation ensued around programming, life in
| different countries and a bunch of other assorted topics.
| JumpinJack_Cash wrote:
| Yes, but there has to be a non-zero probability of them becoming
| some sort of presence in your life.
|
| Say at the airport or abroad the chances are essentially 0.0% for
| friendship and somewhat higher for romantic relationships
| provided that you are young and wild enough.
|
| More generally guys should strive to build a crew , some sort of
| small army of friends whose components are stable during the
| course of time.
| kaftan-permans wrote:
| https://archive.ph/Y8Fju
| MrThoughtful wrote:
| I'm always surprised that so few people on planes talk to each
| other.
|
| It is amazing how a talk to the person next to you on a plane can
| turn a boring, multiple hour long flight into a nice experience
| that feels way shorter.
| ip26 wrote:
| I would suggest it's simply because flights are often much
| longer than a subway ride. Making small talk for six, eight,
| twelve hours isn't really fun for anyone.
| exitb wrote:
| On the other hand, I've seen not an insignificant number of
| cases where someone overstepped a boundary by forcing a
| conversation on someone who was clearly not into it. I think
| it's ok to try, but given the context, cultural differences,
| legal requirement to stay in your assigned seat, it might be
| easy to get confused about consent.
| noduerme wrote:
| Where is there a legal requirement to stay in your assigned
| seat? I've switched seats with people plenty of times on
| airplanes, or simply moved into empty rows. If you want to
| switch you can simply ask. (That is, if you're not afraid to
| talk to strangers!)
| dmd wrote:
| I fly 10-15 times a year and I have seen an empty seat on a
| flight maybe once.
| cortesoft wrote:
| I find a good book or movie makes the plane ride feel shorter.
| Talking to the person next to me so often ends up in an awkward
| situation when the conversation becomes tedious and boring, but
| it would be rude to just stop talking to them and move on to my
| book.
|
| If I dont start talking to the person, I don't have that
| problem.
| financypants wrote:
| In the context of chatting with strangers rather than someone
| you know, I've never felt it awkward for the conversation to
| trail off and both parties move on to something else.
| cortesoft wrote:
| Sure, but in my experience the person I am talking to wants
| to keep the conversation going longer than I do, and they
| won't let the conversation trail off.
| ang_cire wrote:
| Yes, but usually in those situations you can actually
| _move_ on to something else. One a plane, you 're forcibly
| stuck there. No, "Hey, it was nice talking to you, I'll see
| you around!" option.
| metabagel wrote:
| It happens. Some people don't take cues and will continue
| to talk to you forever.
| lamp987 wrote:
| actually it used to be like that in earlier days of airliners.
| it was a social experience.
|
| but those days also had a darker side, like having a dress code
| for passengers...
| coldtea wrote:
| Darker? Sounds like a much brighter side...
| Fergazi wrote:
| I was just telling someone how I wish people would dress a
| little nicer on airplanes. I've had many flights made
| significantly more miserably by smelly people who obviously
| haven't showered recently. A very slight dress code, like
| no sweatpants or tank tops, would go a long way towards
| encouraging people to wash themselves and wear clean
| clothes before they sit 6 inches away from me for 5 hours.
| noduerme wrote:
| What's dark about that? I wish they'd bring back a dress
| code.
| firstbabylonian wrote:
| Somehow I feel that changed recently (post-COVID?).
|
| I remember having lots of random conversations with my
| seatmates on planes, and I'm not the type to talk to strangers
| myself.
|
| It used to be normal to always ask something along the lines of
| "where are you headed?" and maybe let that evolve into a chat
| about shared experiences about cities and places. I still
| remember some of the fascinating people I met this way and will
| never see again.
|
| But in the last couple of years all my flights have been purely
| transactional where not a single casual word is ever exchanged
| with anyone.
| geewee wrote:
| I imagine it's because if the conversation is terrible you're
| still stuck together for potential hours. It's high risk medium
| reward.
| 123pie123 wrote:
| Not really, if the conversation is not going well then you
| just do your own thing that you would have done, if you
| hadn't have tried talking.
|
| I've had many fantastic conversations with people on planes
| and few meh ones, it's deffo worth putting a bit of effort
| in.
|
| where is the risk?
| metabagel wrote:
| Some people don't take the cue that you're done talking,
| and will continue to try to talk to you for the entire
| flight. Combine that with the fact that some of us are
| uncomfortable overtly shutting someone down, so we are
| stuck with nodding and trying unsuccessfully to go back to
| reading our book.
| [deleted]
| hooverd wrote:
| They say talking to strangers helps you work on social anxiety,
| and that people really won't remember you, but I get the
| impression from this thread that people will remember you for the
| rest of their lives and tell all their friends about how weird
| you were.
| tayo42 wrote:
| It takes alot to be memorably weird, no unhinged political
| takes, conspiracy theories, don't start crying, don't talk
| about your near death experiences.
|
| Anyway what does it matter? Those all happened to me, I suspect
| they're living their lives indifferent of my opinion.
| AndrewKemendo wrote:
| I doubt gregarious people need more data to cold start social
| interactions (I certainly don't)
|
| Similarly, non social people aren't that way because the data
| suggests it's better, and data isn't going to change that
|
| Rather some mix of biological differences in attention, cognitive
| arousal styles and environmental conditioning determine sociality
|
| The more interesting question to me is "what are the
| environmental and structural contexts that maximize 'high
| engagement' prosociality?"
|
| With the follow on "via what means would we modify our current
| environment to realize that optimization"
| tilne wrote:
| I very much agree. I would consider myself to be more asocial
| than average, though certainly not aggressively so. The types
| of sentiments expressed in this article are usually written by
| very social people who see conversation as some inherent good.
| I think you are in the minority of such social butterflies in
| terms of checking that assumption.
|
| For an example, take this quote:
|
| > But that is not the whole story. In mid-life and beyond
| people can still experience the joy of a random meeting,
| however short, which somehow touches a nerve.
|
| What exactly is the joy? Is that joy not something I can obtain
| more easily via the "traditional" social channels I've
| cultivated over the course of my life thus far? And won't a
| social interaction in one of those channels have a much greater
| chance of lasting positive impact given that person is more
| likely to be someone I interact with regularly, enabling me to
| build off that initial interaction over time?
|
| Moreover, what's the downside of the encounter? I suspect a lot
| of asocial people like myself strongly dislike the much more
| common awkwardness and self-doubt that accompany a social
| interaction that goes poorly. Is enduring a lot of that really
| worth the few instances where you feel a fleeting sense of
| connection?
|
| Putting effort into that social interaction also means I will
| have less energy to put into other pursuits that mean more to
| me: my marriage, playing piano, reading, career goals, riding
| my bike, existing friendships, etc.
|
| I don't disagree with the article necessarily, but I do think
| it's mostly an "ode to random social encounters" more than a
| serious attempt to make a case for why people not predisposed
| to doing so should try to have more random social encounters.
|
| The questions you ask in your last two sentences really get at
| the interesting stuff. But of course they are too nuanced and
| complex to answer in any comprehensive, generalized way within
| an easily digestible length.
| [deleted]
| wcedmisten wrote:
| Reading this from an airport boarding area coming back from a
| conference, and I couldn't agree more. I feel like my social
| skills of talking to strangers have atrophied during COVID, and
| now I'm trying my best to exercise those social muscles again. It
| really requires deliberate practice.
| zwayhowder wrote:
| (Working in IT) I love laptop stickers for this. Whenever I'm
| returning from a conference a quick look around the lounge will
| reveal plenty of people with laptop stickers that are an easy
| to to startup a conversation. "Oh you're into $LANG/$TOOL, did
| you go to $CONF too?".
| ang_cire wrote:
| Laptop stickers are a perfect means to signal who you want to
| talk to, and who you don't, without saying anything.
| worthless443 wrote:
| And in the end, it feels good and fresh. Just like any other
| (meaningful) skill, decent social skills put forth significant
| effects on one's awareness of their local surroundings, and
| with good social skills, invaluable experiences. I've struggled
| with it for the best half of my life, and later ignored the
| need to take action and improve. I moved on to finding out the
| subtle beauty of just pulling up a conversation with a
| completely new person, of course our perspectives and opinions
| might differ, and that's where I see the beauty and without it,
| the world wouldn't have been so dynamic so I think.
| RugnirViking wrote:
| I wish more people would talk to me on trains planes or wherever
| else. If ever something like that does happen it usually really
| brightens my day.
|
| You might ask why I don't start such conversations. I simply do
| not think im capable. I wish I were, but ive spent a great deal
| of stress trying to get myself to talk freely at things like
| conferences, parties, etc. I just can't do it. This affliction I
| think is more and more common.
| nuancebydefault wrote:
| I often start conversations with random people around. It feels
| liberating to be able to do so, I recommend it. Now and then I
| learn something interesting. Oftentimes, I start the
| conversation but also have the last word. Which feels
| frustrating. You can't have it all.
| nico wrote:
| Try the book The Charisma Myth, it has some great exercises to
| help you do stuff like talking to strangers. You have to do the
| exercises though
|
| There is stuff there that can help you get people to talk to
| you without initiating the conversation yourself
|
| That book changed my life
| PartiallyTyped wrote:
| There's something quite funny about reading a book, an
| activity usually enjoyed alone sans conversations, about
| well, conversations.
|
| Thanks for the recommendation, I will give it a try.
| nico wrote:
| For sure. However, the most important thing is not reading
| the book, but doing the exercises
|
| If you could do just one thing, I'd recommend only reading
| the intro and practicing the 3 tips/exercises as much as
| possible until they become a habit
| sph wrote:
| I have the same issue as GP, and the Charisma Myth book has
| sat, unread, in my bookshelf for a year. I also bought the
| audiobook with my Audible trial, still unlistened. Self help
| books have a tendency to feel hollow and unsatisfying by the
| time you reach the end, but I really wish I could stop
| overthinking the process of striking a chat with a complete
| stranger. I am quite pleasant and I believe witty once the
| conversation gets going, but by God, I couldn't start a
| conversation to save my life.
|
| I'll try to read that book, hopefully I'm not let down by the
| hope there is a social magic trick I have never been privy
| to.
| nico wrote:
| Try just reading the intro. It gives you 3 very simple
| exercises that work surprisingly fast and are pretty easy
| to do
|
| I'd recommend to not read any further until you've done the
| exercises, every chapter has 1-3 different ones
|
| Reading the book might help you understand some things
| about yourself or about people, but by far the most
| important thing is to do the exercises
| thom wrote:
| I sometimes overcompensate for anxiety by being chatty and over
| familiar, but since I've had kids it's also behaviour that I
| think is important for them to see. It makes my day when I have a
| positive interaction with a stranger but I also want my kids to
| know people are mostly kind and interesting and it's okay to feel
| confident around them.
| teekert wrote:
| Fwiw I feel the same. I don't want my kids to learn stranger
| danger, I want them to know most people are kind and helpful.
| Fnoord wrote:
| Having kids is a great way to lower the barrier. As a parent
| with autism ('introvert') it is also a great way to overstep my
| boundaries. Like, I have to, even if I don't want to. My secret
| weapons are smiling and talking to my kid.
| matthewtse wrote:
| I really identify with this article.
|
| I find the modern "autopilot" social life tends to put me in
| touch with much the same people. Whether that's through meeting
| similar friends of friends, similar socioeconomic people through
| work, or algorithmically-determined similar people through social
| media or dating apps.
|
| I put a conscious effort to live in a large city and interact
| with the people around me every day, and sometimes I'm called
| weird for it. But I think it's weirder that we move around these
| cities and treat everyone as "strangers to be ignored" until the
| moment we meet up with our target social group, and suddenly
| everyone these is "someone interesting and worth talking to".
| bassrattle wrote:
| There's an emerging star named Johnny Hamcheck whose whole
| schtick is talking to strangers in ways they don't expect. It's
| harmless unscripted humor. If you like Surveillance Camera Man,
| this might be for you. I'm linking his YouTube, even though he
| gets a tiny fraction of the views there compared to other
| platforms:
|
| https://youtube.com/@johnnyhamcheck
| teekert wrote:
| "Children are taught never to speak to unknown grown-ups,
| especially those regarded by their parents as untrustworthy."
|
| Not my kids, they talk to anyone. When they ask me a question
| about someone I encourage them to ask the person. When the want
| something I encourage them to ask (respectfully). They always,
| always get nice responses and I get friendly conversations
| afterwards. Think of yourself, how would you react? Well 99.999
| of people would react the same.
| Eumenes wrote:
| I recently went on vacation abroad and struck up so many pleasant
| conversations with other Americans and some Brits, Irish, and
| Australians - maybe its cause we were excited to speak the same
| language, but it was strange, because this rarely happens in my
| part of the US (everyone seems to be in their own clique or
| group).
| lusus_naturae wrote:
| For people who work in defense, strangers randomly talking to
| them is always a sticky point.
| sambazi wrote:
| yea, living near an us overseas base, you gotta be careful with
| questions about their $dayjob
| bradley13 wrote:
| Not so long ago, I was having my first cup of coffee in a hotel
| restaurant. A woman sat down directly across from me and started
| off with how nice it was to have someone to chat with.
|
| Um. No. I was polite, but...no. I had no interest in learning who
| she was, why she was there, or what she did for a living. I heard
| all of that anyway. Look, I haven't put on my social facade yet
| and I am _not_ interested.
|
| You're next to me on the train? I have zero interest in talking
| to you.
| meindnoch wrote:
| [flagged]
| swayvil wrote:
| Yes, was she hot?
|
| Of course this is the first thought on the mind of 99% of the
| people here.
|
| So spill.
| coldtea wrote:
| Obviously no, else they'd had no problem
| dominojab wrote:
| [dead]
| hackermatic wrote:
| The cultural differences about this are vast even in the United
| States. In the part of the Midwest where I grew up, strangers
| would come up and offer compliments about your outfit or car,
| make friendly small talk in the grocery store checkout line, or
| at least offer a quiet "hi" and smile when passing on the
| sidewalk. In the Pacific Northwest, we try not to even look at
| each other when passing, although people are friendly when
| something does get us talking.
| monero-xmr wrote:
| No one is friendly in urban areas because you are getting
| accosted / hustled so often. If a stranger tries to talk to me
| I have to give an ocular pat down and risk assessment before
| engaging beyond a skeptical glance.
| ekidd wrote:
| > _No one is friendly in urban areas_
|
| Yes, this is mostly an urban/rural divide. I've lived in
| several small New England towns where people talk to each
| other in public all the time.
|
| But I've also lived in Boston. And I've learned that if a
| stranger strikes up a conversation in Boston, there are two
| possibilities:
|
| 1. They need directions or emergency aid.
|
| 2. Or they have absolutely no grasp of appropriate social
| norms, and I am about to have a deeply weird conversation. At
| best.
|
| In theory, I am perfectly happy to speak with strangers on
| the subway. In practice, I do not wish to hear about how
| lizard people rule the world.
| AussieWog93 wrote:
| Dead set, you should give the weirdos a go. If you listen
| to them, they'll often have some genuine wisdom, and they
| usually don't mind if you laugh at their crazy theories or
| disagree.
| Liquix wrote:
| > I have to give an ocular patdown
|
| hold it right there, jabroni
| [deleted]
| MenhirMike wrote:
| Are you sure that you don't want to make some extra money on
| the side by joining my MLM? You can do so from the comfort of
| your vacation home timeshare! And if something happens to
| you, do you really have the term life insurance that you
| absolutely need?
| PartiallyTyped wrote:
| The hej thing is common in some Scandinavian countries, but
| people don't strike up conversations with each other nor do
| they make new friends easily.
| Klonoar wrote:
| The PNW can get to talking eventually but it's like pulling
| teeth before it catches.
|
| Maybe a better analogy is starting a lawnmower.
| dieselgate wrote:
| I'm inthe PNW and feel this is largely situation dependent.
| Was camping in Oregon last weekend and was surprised by how
| many different groups of campers were conversing at length
| with one another. When on/around my boat at the marina it's
| common for folks to chat openly.
|
| In my neighborhood it's very much the opposite and there's
| little/no eye contact and chatter.
| gwright wrote:
| I've found that campers/hikers anywhere are generally very
| approachable.
| dieselgate wrote:
| For sure, one of the best parts to me about being in a
| National park for example is how happy and stoked on life
| everyone is
| Klonoar wrote:
| The replies to this comment illustrated it well, but yes, I
| would agree in general. It just gets tiring when you have
| to go do something to have a simple conversation.
|
| i.e, random convos in bars here are not a thing - or at
| least not comparable to e.g the east coast of America.
| ptmcc wrote:
| Socialization in the PNW is highly hobby/activity oriented.
| It's immediate common ground and usually a recreational
| context.
|
| Day to day is more much reserved and insular as we go about
| our business.
| hackermatic wrote:
| That's what I've noticed, too -- even casual trail
| walkers are much more likely to greet you and smile.
| artursapek wrote:
| I think it's a sunlight thing
| codelikeawolf wrote:
| This is pretty on the nose for me. My wife and I moved from a
| Chicago suburb to Portland about 5 years ago. The amount of
| effort required just to strike up a convo with strangers (and
| keep it going) was pretty significant. We especially missed how
| acceptable giving people "the business" (i.e. harmless joking
| or razzing to lower someone's guard and make them feel
| comfortable) was so common where we grew up. You could give
| someone sh*t for something trivial then end up helping them
| remodel their basement.
|
| It was isolating for a while until we sort of gave up and
| accepted that people are just different out here. There's
| nothing wrong with that, but we're moving back to Chicago (for
| other reasons). We're looking forward to not having to jump
| through hoops just to have a meaningful convo with a stranger
| again.
| smcin wrote:
| Which area/suburb of Chicago?
| GrumpyNl wrote:
| Walking your dog ( its cute and small) makes a big difference.
| MrVandemar wrote:
| It also reduces the number of people with bad intentions who
| will approach you. A dog may be cute and small, but they are
| also fast, bitey, barky and very good on picking up threats.
| Slow_Hand wrote:
| This matches my personal experience. When I moved from Boston
| to Austin it was like night and day how different interactions
| with strangers were. Strangers in Boston kept to themselves and
| when you approached them it would have an air of "what are you
| trying to sell me?" in which their feet were already pointed
| away from you and they were prepared to keep walking.
|
| On the other hand, Texans are far more open to speak with
| strangers and shoot the shit with people in public. There's
| less rush to keep moving and people are far more open to
| chatting.
|
| My theory is that population density may have an effect on this
| behavior. Boston is far more dense and when you ride the train
| or bus everyday people keep to themselves. It's far more
| emotionally draining to keep interacting with everyone that you
| meet so people conserve their energy.
| musha68k wrote:
| Geographical differences certainly ring true but I think it's a
| bit of a generational thing as well?
| grecy wrote:
| I live in a small mountain town now, and it's unthinkable you
| would walk past someone on the sidewalk and not say hi.
| cybrexalpha wrote:
| The last time someone I didn't know tried to talk to me on public
| transport I moved to another seat.
| coldtea wrote:
| very gracious
| BasedAnon wrote:
| [flagged]
| lamp987 wrote:
| asocial cringe
| hansoolo wrote:
| What would you do in a totally overcrowded train or bus then?
| Fnoord wrote:
| Did they ask you to please remove your bag so they could sit
| next to you?
| sambazi wrote:
| i hope you found the time to excuse yourself
| teekert wrote:
| Where I live that's considered pretty rude. You could however
| respectfully say that you'd rather listen to music or just say
| you prefer not to talk. Or just be short in your answers and
| don't ask anything back. Most people get the hint quickly.
| wowdang wrote:
| Holy based
| nico wrote:
| For anyone interested in developing the skills for talking to
| strangers, I highly recommend the book The Charisma Myth by
| Olivia Fox Cabane
|
| It has some really good exercises to build confidence and ease
| social anxiety
| black3r wrote:
| I can talk for hours with anyone about anything, but I have some
| kind of social anxiety about starting the conversation, and that
| sadly goes not just for strangers but also for people I'm
| familiar with but not super familiar...
|
| I'd never start talking to a person sitting next to me on a train
| or a plane, but when they start I'm most often very glad to have
| someone to talk to...
| nuancebydefault wrote:
| I hope i will run into you. I like starting conversations. I
| tend to hate it when people slow down or block the conversation
| by simply replying with a short yes or no, even when there's
| nothing for them to do (while, say, waiting in a queue) other
| than gazing at their little screen.
| gabrielsroka wrote:
| 2021
|
| See also https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27809018
| JustAPerson wrote:
| I've spent years of therapy trying to overcome my fear of talking
| to strangers. Mostly it just feels inappropriate and unwanted;
| like I would be intruding on people. I can talk to strangers when
| there's an appropriate social context (e.g. clerks / service
| people). But lacking the right context, it feels deeply
| uncomfortable.
|
| Has anyone overcome this problem? Where would you go to interact
| with strangers-importantly where there's an appropriate social
| context that permits interacting.
| speps wrote:
| Or watch How To With John Wilson, season 1 episode 1 How To Make
| Small Talk, very enlightening!
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(page generated 2023-09-23 23:00 UTC)