The Power of “Insignificant” Interactions
Picture yourself standing in the local cafe waiting for your coffee pre-COVID-19. It’s a cold morning, and you wait at your usual spot. As you look around you, all eight people waiting in-line are looking at their mobile phones. But one isn’t. “Fresh morning, isn’t it?” they ask. You can answer in two ways. You can continue the conversation with a question, or you can stop the conversation with a simple “yeah”. Let’s imagine that you carry on the conversation. You have such an interesting chat, and you have so much in common, that you promise to keep in touch. And let’s say you do follow up. Now imagine it’s five years later. Who is this person? Who could this person become in your life?
COVID-19 has been a shock to our system in so many ways.
The way we connect with one another has changed. No longer can we see friends or family as easily. Our after-work drinks have turned into us raising our glass to our laptop camera. Physical distancing has left us all feeling disconnected even from our closest friends. There is no doubt, these are changes to some very significant connections in our lives, and we need to continue to check in on friends and keep these relationships strong. Even as restrictions are being eased in some countries, we are still affected on a great level. The impact of this extended social isolation on our mental health is not yet known, but it will undoubtedly affect us dramatically.
But there is another element of connection that we are missing as well. The seemingly insignificant ones.
But what do I mean by an “insignificant” interaction?
We engage in these every day. Saying hello to a random person at the supermarket. Observing something interesting about a person on the train, or asking for directions. When we come to the end of the day and think about these interactions we would not consider them significant or particularly life-changing.
In 1973, Stanford sociology professor Mark Granovetter published a paper on the topic of casual interactions. He refers to strong ties as family or friends, and weak ties as strangers with a common cultural background. But it is not just the cultural background that gives us something in common, we are all human beings with our own unique story. Research suggests that on a typical day, we might interact with fifteen people on a casual basis or in these insignificant situations. These interactions are crucial, and there is significant research supporting the benefits of these connections. It isn’t just in a movie that people share personal stories with their barista or hairdresser.
Even without COVID-19, as a society, we are constantly striving to make our lives more convenient. Often, this is at the expense of face to face connections. For instance, we have hair salons in some parts of the world that ban conversations, we can skip the waiting in a coffee line using an app and use a self serve to check out at the supermarket. All of these choices are made to make our lives more convenient. Instead of speaking to a human, we avoid potential interaction. Of course, none of these choices is a concern individually. But added up they erode face to face human connection. We could go through an entire day without speaking to another person. We are reducing these casual conversations.
And when we actually do think about these interactions, many of them can indeed be insignificant. If you were to plot a graph of your life’s interactions, with the x-axis measuring the impact of the interaction, a large proportion of them would be in one section of the graph to the left. Low impact. But there would be a much smaller number that’s over to the hand side right of the graph. Very high impact. Life-changing. The point is, we don’t know which of these interactions will be plotted where on this graph.
But how many married couples talk about their first meeting as a seemingly innocuous meeting or comment? And how many jobs have come from just a casual chat?
Looking back on the past year, I was personally really fortunate to have some great experiences with some of these insignificant interactions.
If you have ever travelled to Vietnam, you probably went to Hạ Long Bay. An incredible part of North East Vietnam, it’s a UNESCO World Heritage Site known for its limestone islands and emerald waters. Most travellers to Vietnam will make the journey there?. For me, I travelled by bus from Hanoi. But as I walked through the bus to Hạ Long Bay, an American couple invited me to sit with them. By the end of the day, we had spent time together, visited Hanoi’s bars and ultimately became friends. I learnt a lot from their stories. I know, when I visit the US or they visited Australia that we would continue as if that night in Hanoi was just last week.
I met one of my closest friends during the Graduate Careers Fair, a simple curious ‘hello’ turned into a coffee conversation and meeting a great friend.
That’s how Simon Haan and I met as well, having a casual conversation at a Meetup event, MelbourneSOUP. An insignificant interaction, but it was the catalyst for doing some great work together.
The actual interactions themselves appear insignificant. An offer to sit down on the bus and a couple of hellos. Not so important on the face of it. But it is from these interactions that such strong relationships and wonderful experiences were formed.
During my 100 Coffees Project, I realised that everybody has a story. And everybody can teach you something if you just listen for long enough. Embracing curiosity is crucial when you go into conversations with new people. Having the self-confidence to understand that you have a story too, and that people want to connect with you also helps to frame these connections in a positive way.
When we talk about working from home and the benefits of that, let’s also consider this in balance with these interactions and how they can change our lives in such a positive way.
So what can we do, today and going forward to ensure that we don’t lose these?
- Consider the value of these interactions and reflect on the ones in your life that had an impact. You will all have an “insignificant” story of connection.
- Keep a curious mind towards interactions, practice asking better questions and listening. Everybody has a unique story.
- Set a goal for your day to make every interaction positive with others.
- Value connection over convenience. Society is constantly pushing us towards eroding our face to face interactions so that we are less ‘busy’ — don’t simply accept this. Just because it saves you a few seconds, you never know what you might miss out on.
I believe people want to connect, you just have to be open to it and approach it in a genuine, curious and kind way.
Now, thinking back to the person you met in that cafe. Five years have passed. Maybe they changed your life. Maybe they didn’t. But you just never know.
Insignificant interactions, they are not so insignificant after all.
