I’ve been working on myself after coming out of a toxic long-term relationship that destroyed my social network, and am quite rusty at engaging with people I don’t know. I’m also an introvert by nature, but am capable of overruling that nature and engaging with people when I consciously try. At this point I feel like I just need to boost my experience and restore a level of comfort in engaging with people I don’t know. When I go out (by myself), I tend to go see live music, which is fun but generally not conducive to conversation. Ultimately I’d like to restore my rusty social skills for the purposes of interacting with members of the opposite sex, but at this point I just need to work on engaging with people in general. WHat say you, people of Lemmy?
Standing in lines. In particular self checkout when there are stations roped off. I’ve gotten them open by joking about it with someone within earshot of an employee.
You can also ask employees about stupid policies like that, or otherwise pointless things they have to do. People love to complain
Supermarkets or pharmacies. You can walk away whenever you like.
I’m a big advocate of bars. Just sitting at a restaurant bar, hotel bar, or at a local watering hole is a good opportunity to make small talk, chit-chat, and just kill time in general. People aren’t expecting a long term conversation with you, but most are happy to chat while they wait for a drink or their meal. If it is slow, see if the bartender is chatty. Typically they will be bored and not wanting to do any side work and will be happy to talk with you since it looks better to their boss than looking at their phone.
And honestly, i have had some great times at concerts talking up the people around me. Get to the show and wear merch from a similar band and you’ll have loads of people let you know how much they love that band/artist. Ask people standing around you if they are local or had to travel to get there. I feel like i am a shy dude, and i know for a fact that i am awkward as hell, but i have a lot of great interactions with people this way.
I honestly love bars for the social aspect above all. You can strike up a conversation with almost anyone
Yeah, especially if it’s local and you can go there regularly. I’m very fortunate that my little rural town has a great bar scene since there are multiple colleges here, and prices are very low ($2.75 for a bottle of Strohs or Rolling Rock, $6 craft pints). I don’t have cable, so i will usually go to my favorite bar to watch major sports events like the All -Star game, world series, playoff matches, or if ny Cardinals are playing a local team and my MLB is blacked out. Literally all it takes to start a conversation is vocally comment about a play and half the guys in ear shot will give you there opinion as well.
Maybe we could start some “24/7 open convo” Discord server? 🤷 If not, I’d say chatting with your coworkers is a good way to make friends and get some experience.
Uhm… Signal? Matrix?
I… I have a lot of friends IRL. I’m… I’m very fun at parties… B-believe me, bro!!!I didn’t even know an app called Matrix existed until now, lol. But yeah, must I do it or is there one already? I’m not lonely but my yapping knows no bounds, I’m sure it could have moderate success. And the 3 ladies on Lemmy could provide enough practice for men not to be afraid of talking to women, lol. 👍
I use Fluffychat. Element is more up-to-date with features, but I think I like the simplicity and feel of Fluffy. Both are available via F-droid at least. There probably are other methods. And yes, both have Linux desktop and developer-hosted web-apps.
FYI Matrix is not an app, but a protocol. Like how you can use different clients to connect to Lemm-Lemm, you can use different apps for Matrix, and not every app has all features. Heck, even the sync authentication systems (that allow you to export your messages to different devices) are different!
But then there’s the fact that you have manage your decryption keys on your own!
…
I think Signal is better for video calls.
It’s a bit less decentralized, but it’s a lot simpler. A popular thing about Signal is that Edward Snowden talked about a Signal update in a congratulative tone of voice.
The lounge car of a transcontinental train.
I started taking German classes and it’s a small class of about 15 people and the bulk of them are now casial friends a few years later. Some good friends. It’s awesome.
Yeah I find people to be far more amendable in educational contexts than they are generally. My Russian class is the only place anyone seems to think my interest in Russian literature is cool.
Interesting. I live in Southern California, and have been learning Spanish on my own using the comprehensible input method. I have pretty decent comprehension at this point, and could really use some practice speaking. I’ll look into this.
I went from about eight years on Duolingo, not progressing, and within one year in a class environment, I eclipsed my eight years easily. 4 years in German class, I have friends, and am in Germany now, listening to my wife and her old friends shoot the shit, and I understand a LOT of it. More than they’d like me to 😁
Any space where you’re put in prolonged stationary close proximity to a few people. It just naturally evolves that way, especially if there’s a lot of regulars or a natural thing to start a conversation about provided.
That’s also why small towns end up with a reputation for friendliness. It’s just a situation that happens a lot, and that trains people to strike up conversation more often in general.
I find i had some luck on the meet up app to find local gaming and hobby groups.
Many people’s social skills suck these days. I have found the best way to meet new people is to put yourself in a situation where you have to. Several life long friends of mine were forged in the fire of Muay Thai. Still others I met while adding certs to my Padi scuba stuff. When I first moved to NYC many years ago, I went on meetup and found a DND group. I don’t recommend it for health reasons, but I met my wife and several other life-long friends via a crippling hookah addiction lol. My point is go places where communication is essential. Many libraries have free cooking classes, etc. Another good place.
What I struggle with is that I don’t use IG and other social media. And a lot of people’s polite/casual conversations are entirely based on that stuff.
I notice I have an easy time talking to people over 50, but under 40… it’s like I live on a different planet. We have nothing in common to really talk about because they just reference social media stuff and I have no context for it. I quit a bunch of stuff recently because all the new people coming in started straight up being rude/insulting me because my life isn’t governed by chasing social media trends or agonizing about response times like theirs is. I get told off by a lot of new people because I don’t text back fast enough and they take it as a personal attack or something when I said ‘well if it’s that important why not call and have real time voice conversation’.
I also prefer face to face interaction and not constantly being in discord/slack chats, which apparently is how everyone under 30 socializes these days.
I’d always suggest volunteering - be it wildlife conservation or staffing a charity shop or restoring vintage trains in a museum or whatever. Pick something that you have a little interest in and you will already have that in common with the other volunteers and, as a volunteer, you have no commitments and can walk away at any point.
My therapist recommended I try to do some volunteer work when I brought up not having anyone in person (other than him and family) to talk to about things really depressed me. Told me about a site called justserve which has quite a few community volunteering projects on it I’m willing to try out.
wildlife conservation
I met multiple long term romantic partners from this exact thing.
Plus even if you don’t find someone, any time invested in saving animals is absolutely positive karma you can feel good about, even if it was just cleaning cages.
It might would. could be a disaster.
plenty of volunteer communities are full of insane gatekeeping types of people.
This is a good idea, thanks!
