I'm happy to see that in a sea of commenters who'd hate for anyone to strike a conversation with them, there are people who still enjoy connecting with others.

We are in a public forum afterall and we are all strangers here. I'm always happy when random person sends me an email.

As someone who has struggled with social anxiety over the years and has thought about this a lot, I have some thoughts.

It's all nice to imagine everyone talking to each other, but the reality is that in (western?) society, we have kinda collectively decided that socialisation is to be avoided. Either it's too weird, too boring, or too unsafe. I mean have you tried randomly talking to people? Most don't seem very open to it.

Also it doesn't help that the little "pretext" scenarios that can lead to socialising are being systematically eliminated from our lives.

And finally, if you're neurodivergent or otherwise aren't perfectly typical, enjoy people thinking you're weird anyway.

It's indeed pretty interesting how our society has normalized being. what I would say is antisocial by the norms of previous generations in the form of the gen z stare. Funnilly I remember a situation where I got a job offer from somebody from an older generation and I just stood still and stared for 1 minute. Not because I wanted to be disrespectful but because I was processing the information and I was simply so baffled that I forgot the social dance of showing the thinking on my face and doing thinking sounds (if you know you know). This led to the other person holding a lecture on how you should respond that you do not have a response yet but I thinking. I ended up accepting.

ok it's a bit late but i think a big part is the non-verbal thing you're putting out.

my story is me and my wife moved to another country a few years ago for my study. after 4 months moving there, she already know and conversed with the people working the apartment and some neighbors. while i mostly just exchanged cursories and nods and glances. then one day we just walked out together and the same people i passed earlier just says hello and converse and stuff with my wife and me. yes she's very much an extrovert but i can see people are way 'more open' and my wife has that too. me on the other hand do have 'i don't want to bother you so please don't bother me' vibe.

Glad to see this here. Age-wise I'm in the oldest 10% of users here, maybe 5%. I have noticed over the years the eroding of the ability of young people (20s basically) to interact in what I consider normal social situations.

Talking to your fellow humans in all sorts of situations is how you can form actual knowledge within yourself derived from direct observation. Everything else is a filter and synthesis. How can you know "reality" if you don't interact with it directly?

I find the decay of human connections an interesting problem to solve. I used to have an app that encouraged meeting in person by utilizing friends inviting other friends[0]. This solved many app-problems like correct matching and safety.

Didn't catch on, though. Setting up events turned out to be too prohibitive. If this interests anyone feel free to contact me at contact [at] eventful [dot] is

[0] https://blog.eventful.is/p/the-perfect-dating-app

I find the community on Clubhouse understand this better than anyone (well, this is true for Reddit and HN too). Clubhouse especially though because people are bat shit crazy on there and somehow conversations happen. It’s a hidden gem that I think the HN community would enjoy.

A tip from a past life working a customer service / food service job:

Learn a few words in a variety of languages. They are great conversation starters / expanders – I made a lot of actual friendships by talking to people (after taking their orders), asking them where they’re from, and then knowing a few words in their language. Nothing makes people happier than hearing someone speak their native language, no matter how poorly.

This was in a university town, so knowing a couple words in Chinese, Arabic, Hindi, etc. was useful.

What is also fun is to just say 'hi' or 'hello' to random strangers, accompanied by a smile. I usually do that on the sidewalk (western Europe), but other places might also be fair game. I made an active effort to just greet people, now it's a habit. In the beginning I felt rejected sometimes by people blankly staring back at me and not saying 'hi' back.

Some people are not into that, don't suspect it or don't know how to handle that. Like half of this comment section, I really read some cringe comments here about how people don't want to be talked to. To them I can only say: don't worry, I see/feel from miles away that you don't want to be talked to. And even then, I might say 'hi' to you, just to gauge what happens. ;)

For me, it's okay if people don't say anything back. That's not even the point. I want to share a little positivity with the world (when I'm in the mood) and 90% of reactions are either a big smile back, a little nod or even a small conversation. There's nothing for me to 'win' (as a lot of commenters seem to think is the point); thinking in these terms makes it a business transaction.

I found out that especially elderly people are way more open to these things. Also, people who don't seem open to it (probably going through a bad time) might actually surprise you with a warm and welcome smile. These little interactions taught me to not judge a book by it's cover, give a little without expecting anything in return, and just knowing that you made somebody smile who needed that.

So if you think this article is something you want to try, but you're a little afraid thinking about whole conversations and stuff, just start with greeting random people. Don't see it as a transaction, just see it as age old human behavior (which it is). If you have a hard time reading social clues, this also might be a good way to practice that a bit.

I have always found it helpful to try and put yourself in the other person's shoes to look at the situation. makes it easier to connect IMO