The Deep Connection We Crave: Leaving Small Talk Behind

If we take a minute to step back from the center of conversations, we may finally start to see that people talk quite a lot, about nothing.  Some of it probably stems from just wanting to be heard.  We’ve all experienced the person telling us about something trivial in their life and then 10 minutes later they are repeating the exact script to the next person who will listen.  Almost verbatim.  Many people talk with others for the sole purpose of listening long enough so they can then have a turn to talk about what they wanted to.  Some people don’t even follow the common curtesy of taking turns talking and listening.  They just talk so much that the other person can’t even get a word in.   It’s like we are scared of slowing down to truly connect with others. 

Delve deep to ask the questions of why we think the way we do, and what does that mean for our life and the decisions we make.  Ask others those questions and be excited to listen to the answer without planning our response while they talk.  Many people stay on the path of shallow small talk because everyone else is there too and it doesn’t require much from us.  But as we grow and strive for more, this very quickly becomes frustrating and juvenile.  The need for real, honest, and deep connection is in us all.  When we stop stifling it out of fear, laziness, and distrust, our minds and hearts will open to new levels of connection with other people.  This doesn’t mean bare your soul to the next stranger you meet.  We do need to guard our hearts.  But we all know the moment in a conversation where we recognize an opportunity to be a bit vulnerable, but we usually we wait for the other person to show it first.  Then when they do, with almost a sign of relief, we let some of our own wall down. 

There are many things we can do to help steer conversations from the trivial and mindless to something much more real.  The first step to this change is to think bigger.  Bigger than the person who cut you off in traffic, bigger than complaining about gas prices, bigger than discussing our latest mind-numbing video games or tv show binge.  Bigger than gossiping about everyone around us, “complaining” about our jobs and the extra hours we’ve been working (that we volunteered for).  When we stop focusing on the insignificant things in our life it clears up mental space to start thinking bigger, to start dreaming and setting goals again.  We’ve all been around that person whose eyes are glowing as they exude passion and excitement for what they are working towards.  Even if we don’t find what they are passionate about very interesting, it still draws us in making us feel lighter and more optimistic about life in general.  Being around someone who is going somewhere bigger than their current today is magnetic.  For those of us who truly want change and bigger and better things in life, this will draw us to them and the path of change they represent.  For others who aren’t ready to grow it repels them and they quickly find any reason to not be around that person or any person on that path.  This is ok.  We are all on a personal journey of growth, with our own timeline.  By thinking bigger than our today and getting dialed in to our goals and dreams, those once important shallow topics no longer are front and center in our lives and thus our conversations.  We will find the bubble of passion and optimism start to grow inside us to the point that it starts to overflow to those around us and the conversations we have with them. 

The next step is to focus on others.  Instead of waiting with bated breath for the other person to take a split-second pause so we can butt in and start talking, we can truly get interested in the why behind things.  Why are they feeling that way, why do they believe what they are saying, why are they choosing to do what they are doing?  Instead of asking the questions that lead to small answers keeping the conversation shallow, we can dig deeper and ask questions that maybe they haven’t even asked themselves yet.  Things like, what does success mean to you?  What’s something you’ve learned about yourself in the past year that surprised you?  What’s something your passionate about that you don’t get to talk about often?  If you could go back and give your younger self a piece of advice, what would it be?  Who’s been the most influential person in your life and why?  What’s a memory you hold that always makes you smile and feel grateful?  Many of these questions we may not have asked ourselves or even thought about before.  Answering them ourselves would be a good first step. 

These types of questions very quickly can lead a conversation to a much deeper and intimate level.  Now, many conversations or people wouldn’t be a good fit to try this out as they are fleeting or not the right atmosphere.  You might even be thinking that this would be an awkward random question to blurt out even in the right setting.  A great segway to any of these questions is to start with a statement about ourselves.  How many times do we get asked “What’s new with you?” and “How’s life been going?” from a friend or acquaintance?  These are perfect times to get rid of the overused “Not much” or “Fine” responses and try something like “Gosh, I’ve been on a pretty big self-growth journey and have discovered some really amazing things.”  Or “Things are going great, I’ve been really digging deep and letting go of the things in my life that don’t serve me anymore.”  Can you imagine the look on your friends face when you give a deeper answer like this.  All of a sudden you are requiring a decision from them.  Are they going to take your lead and ask a question to further understand you such as “Wow, that’s really interesting, what do you mean by that?”, or are they going to say a generic answer like “Wow that’s cool, hey did you catch the game last night?”  Whatever the response is doesn’t necessarily matter because it will tell you what you need to know.  Either they are not ready to go deeper themselves or they are and your human connection is about to go to the next level. 

We don’t need a mountain of friends, because true friends take time to find, nurture and grow.  But we can learn a tremendous amount from people in our life who may only be passing by for a season.  If we can allow ourselves to let down our own wall we open up the possibility of learning from someone else’s life experiences.  Giving them the gift of genuine listening, and receiving the gift of their wise life lessons will make us all a better person.