I have just got home after an
extraordinary evening spent amongst extraordinary people who are all involved
in doing some extraordinary work.
We spent the evening discussing
international affairs and politics. It was an evening unlike any other I have
ever known. To be honest it was the kind of evening I’ve dreamt about having
all my life. High end conversation with incredibly intelligent and well
informed people who also happen to be thoroughly decent and lacking in
arrogance.
I had a blast. In fact it was one
of those moments in life when you keep looking around the room and
thinking to yourself “how did I get here?”.
The answer to that specific
question is that I made myself go along to an open discussion event some months
ago and whilst I was there I made a deliberate effort, despite the difficulties
we all feel in doing so, to introduce myself and make conversation with a range
of people I did not know nor had ever met before.
Most of those conversations
lasted a minute or two, often with little feedback from the other person; they
were fleeting chats, quickly forgotten; but on one occasion the conversation
clicked, it clicked enough for it to develop into a full scale chat and that
chat ended with us swapping details and agreeing to continue our discussion
on-line.
We did the on-line thing and our
conversations continued to go well, so much so that he then invited me to join
him and some of his colleagues at a dinner; that dinner was tonight and whilst
at tonight’s event I met a couple of amazing people who I will also be staying
in touch with.
Talking to people, no matter how
awkward or difficult it may feel at the time, is the key to an interesting
life. It is the way you find things out about others, about yourself and about
the world. It’s the way you make friends, colleagues, acquaintances and
memories.
You need to know that that other
person, the one you don’t know but you’re considering saying “hello” to, is
very likely to be just as unsure about talking to new people as you are, that
they also don’t know what to say or do, but that they are just as keen to meet
someone new, interesting and nice as you are.
So just talk to people.
If they don’t talk back, shame on
them. But I wager that you’ll discover that most people do talk back and that
most people are interesting, decent and extremely happy to make a new friend.
Dragonette & Martin Solveig - I Just Came to Say Hello
