Do Something Different, Do it With a Stranger!

By: MurrayM

The person in front of you in a taxi queue, sitting beside you in a bus, or waiting near you for their pizza order to be cooked, talk to people. That person who you always see on your lunch break but never speak with.

Otherwise you’ll never know, will you? I’m lucky that in my line of work I get the opportunity to chat to a lot of people, but I also “put” myself out there, I ask questions and make ‘chit-chat’, you won’t understand how important that is until you start doing it. It’s really just incredible that we were all born, grew up, went to school etc and then we just ‘go on’ with life. Human nature combined with the fast life we sometimes live, leads us into the ‘it’s all about us’ mentality, it is not our fault but the very best thing of all, as long as you recognize that you do it, you can change it!

Now, this may not happen to many people, I would be happier if it didn’t, but have you ever walked around and almost felt invisible to people, sometimes it’s when you’re down and maybe not feeling the best, but just no one seems to notice you, maybe a bit of loneliness sinks in and you really DO feel invisible.

It took me a very long time to come to this understanding, we all like to think we don't do it, but we very quickly can fall victim to it again. We don’t talk to people, “I'm just too busy!, I'm not interested, we’re busy, we’ve things to do….places to go, people to see. God, help me if I’m late!”… Syndrome.

T.A.K.E the time people! Say Hello to person on the bus, make an effort to speak to 5 people a day who you wouldn’t normally. You truly will be amazed at who you talk to and the things you can learn. If you have something lacking in your life, it's sometimes because you haven't surrounded yourself with people who bring energy into your life and enthusiasm.

I put this into practice last month, and it’s amazing how much more perceptive it makes you. If you know that you promised me 5 people you will talk to (and I’ll hold you to at least 5 ;) ) then our human nature sends us almost into panic mode, we wonder what the heck am I going to talk to them about? Some find it very hard, some find this easy, But it does make you more perceptive, I was sitting next to a woman who was my Number 1 for that morning, She was 35’ish, and I wondered, how the heck do I strike up a conversation? She looked bored, stagnant like most of us get when we revert to that robotic “I’m going to work” mode.

Be interested, look around … I noticed she had a bunch of keys she was holding, and on this key ring was what looked like a tiny blue plaster molded hand. “Did you kill a Smurf for that?” I asked… She laughed, we smiled and chatted for 45 minutes on that train and I found out she was a franchisee of Twinkletoes.com.au a rapidly growing business here in Australia. She spoke of her plans and goals and what motivates her and I listened with genuine interest.

Do something different. Do it with stranger... Today! :)

Reprinted from: Communication Skills Articles.

www.murraymiers.com/blog-spot.htm

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