This is something I think almost everyone will recognize when they run into people they have not seen in a very long time. The difficulties on how you get past the phase of only exchanging your life formalities to getting back on how you original friendship/workrelationship/relationship was.
Let me give you an example
Ej Karin long time no see, how have you been??
Yeah all good here, and you
Yeah good, work is fine, kids are good. We cant complain. But you are back from the Caribbean I see?
Indeed! Im moving to Switzerland, so just in Holland for a couple of weeks now
Wow, thats a big step! Sound good though! Im sure you will have a blast there
Yeah, Im looking forward to it as well. But everything is good by you??
We are super busy, so I guess thats good right?
I guess it is. Good seeing you bro! We should catch up more often
We sure should! Let me know when you are back in town!
Typical
I think I had this conversation this weekend about 78 times. And this was often with people I used to spend multiple hours per week with. We could all talk for hours and hours, and now we are into the formality-phrases
I guess catching up is almost never possible in large social settings. What we really need then is a small group setting with 2-6 people for a couple of hours to get past those social talks and get to the real nitty gritty of life.
To talk about why a relationship ended, or how mom got sick and that effected you, or why the job is actually not really so fun anymore, or the details on the why the kinds are not adapting.
Real talk
One of things that I always find interesting is that people answer on the question if they are busy, is that they are good.
This is I think a Dutch thing maybe. Good means you have stuff going on, so you are important or so? I dont know?
I see busy more as a temporary phase and I myself do not want to stay in that phase for too long, I react bad on too busy. As in: it blocks me. Others have that different I guess. Maybe people are not good with having too much free time, because they dont know what they have to do in those days?
I really dont know, Im just guessing?
Fact remains, I saw a lot of people I know in the last couple of days. But was it catching up? No, not at all. I was more showing that we are all still alive.
For the two remaining weeks here in Holland, Im going to stick to small group meetups. That is way more valuable!
