Putting the Pleasure Back Into Pleasantries
Do you ever look at the world and get the feeling that the ‘standard’ or ‘normal’ state of things needs to change? I’m known for my non-standard responses to standard questions. Sometimes beneficial in social settings. Always awkward in job interviews, talking to the police, and funerals. I particularly love to give unnecessarily positive responses when someone asks ‘How are you?’. There’s a little dopamine hit from meddling in mediocre exchange of mediocre words when having mediocre morning introductions.
For example: it’s Monday morning, in a standard office kitchen, at a standard time to have coffee, waiting to use the standard beans at the standard grind, to make what should be (if everything goes correctly) a very standard cup of coffee.
Person: “Hi Matt, how are you doing?” — A pleasantry thrown out, often with barely enough eye contact to know who it was directed at.
I take this invitation, and raise it:
Me: “SEN-SATIONAL!!!!!!. How are you doing?”
There is a slight British accent when I say this. I learnt this word as a child from a British man named Tiny, not because he was small, but rather everything looked tiny compared to his phone book sized hands and chest that looked like a small family could fit inside. ‘Sen-sational!’ was his standard answer, his voice boomed, the pause required after the ‘sen’ a natural product of the force generated from lungs the size of a bar fridge and the emphasis placed on the sounds. Confusing his sarcastic volume for joyful exuberance, I took it upon myself at a young age to answer as Tiny would. ‘Living the Dream, SO GOOD!, Fucking Great, and other answers form part of my standard rotation, acquired through similar means. These are all part of my patterns designed to break other peoples’ patterns)
It’s now time for them to respond. Sometimes, it’s hard to tell if their voice is a robot doing a good job of being human, or a human that’s slowly getting turned into a robot. But there’s a hint of a smile. Their standard programming is starting to throw errors, it wasn’t built for this kind of input.
Person/Robot: “I’m good.” — The awkward smile grows as they wait to see if my original statement was an anomaly.
Person/Robot: “Big plans for the day?” — Normal programming, for the moment, continues.
At this point I really like to turn things up. The vibe I am going for is Robin Williams playing Aladdin mixed with Kramer from Seinfeld: Loud enough to draw attention, but not enough to intimidate, whilst making sure people know, hopefully, that they are now part of something that is designed to be entertaining.
Me: “I think you’re lying” — An innocent smile shines on my face; and a playful tone takes the sting out of the accusation. Me: “The words you used and the tone don’t match.”
Sticking to the facts, this is my way of making sure the robot can effectively diagnose the fault, or the human is aware that they aren’t following robot protocol very well. This just happens to be true most of the time, but actually, it’s just important to really notice the other person. A specific compliment can also be a great way to go.
Me: “I’m hoping to save the world by lunchtime. That will hopefully give me enough time to start working on demilitarisation in the afternoon, and work on hunger and gender equality for the rest of the week.” — my lack of a genuine answer shines a light on the lack of a genuine question, shifts the dial to ‘play’, and forces them to a natural and uncomfortable decision point:
Do I continue my standard programming and disconnect, or do I engage?
Accepting the Challenge
People I’ve dealt with before tend to have an elevated state when I stand next to them at the coffee machine.
I can’t imagine why.
Buried in amongst the waving hands, amplified exuberance, uncomfortable smiles and deviation from the social-norm programming, something really important is happening here. At a meta-level, there’s actually a totally different conversation happening. To give the ‘directors cut and commentary’ of the above role play, we can re-write the story played out above with the story of what is really happening.
Person: Here’s my contribution to the pattern (standard questions and standard responses).
Me: I think the pattern is stupid. I see you and this opportunity as unique. Let’s treat it that way. Here, take some positivity and energy if you want or need it.
Person: I wasn’t expecting a gift. No gifts before coffee. You have earned more conversation, but only at standard protocol.
Me: Request to revert back to standard protocol denied. Join me in my pattern breaking adventure. Let’s talk about beautiful, silly, and wonderful things.
Person/Robot: …
The Response:
I intentionally didn’t show how the person/robot responded to the last part of the dialogue, because that’s the beautiful thing:
It always changes.
For the robots pretending to be humans, this is too much to handle. They’ll either revert to the last save point, shut down the conversation, and revert to what they were doing. Or they throw an error, and give a laugh that I’ve come to learn means “Holy Shit, I did not sign up for this”. Just like a computer trying to do too many things at once, I often need to wait a bit to get the intended response, or come back and give it some time to process.
Consider this an open letter apology to all those in this category.
But for some people, a bit of magic happens. There’s the tiniest variation. Not so much a sparkle in the eye, but a wryness to the other person’s smile, like a child who asks their parents to jump in the puddles, and is surprised when they hear a ‘yes’. There’s something in the body language of the other person that changes, it’s the same thing we all feel in other social situations that deserve our focus: that moment you realise you’re flirting with someone, that moment when you are nailing a job interview, or you are telling a story that you know other people are enjoying.
That moment when you and someone else reach an unspoken agreement: that we are enjoying this situation because this situation is being made by us and for us.
The thing I love about the 1–2 punch of 1) Breaking the pattern, and 2) Making people feel ‘seen’ means that they don’t have to hide behind convention or pleasantries, but they can be their more authentic self. And selfishly, I can be my authentic self. I don’t have to pretend to be interested, because I AM interested. I can listen and engage, because I feel heard AND engaged. I’m no longer dealing with ‘a colleague’ (the term invented because ‘acquaintance’ is too rude for someone you spend that much time with, but you don’t know them well enough to call them a ‘friend’), I’m engaging with a particular and real human, with a real story and with real emotions.
I’m not just reading the blurb on the back cover, but getting a little glimpse into the content within.
When challenging people to rectify the gap between their happy words and their unhappy tone, you never know which way it is going to go. Sometimes the conversation goes to: “Actually, I had an amazing weekend! On Saturday, I…” and they help to double their joys by sharing them. Sometimes it’s: “I’m moving in with my girlfriend in 2 weeks, and we had a massive fight, and now I don’t know what to do”. They help to halve their troubles by sharing.
It’s not always a happier response, but it’s more real. It moves away from the pretend, and into reality. Away from lies, and into truth. Away from exclusion, and into inclusion. Away from ‘leave me alone’, and into ‘I’m not alone’.
In a world where we are constantly fed lies, aren’t we all looking for a bit more reality?
Your Response:
I have intentionally started with one of the most mundane and rudimentary examples of following this mindset of pattern breaking and authentic connection, because its proliferation is everywhere. Everywhere we look, there are patterns that we follow not because they are better, but because consciously or unconsciously, we choose not to break them. These patterns are so obviously broken, we’ve now accepted their brokenness.
How is it that cars keep getting faster, yet commuting takes longer?
Why is social media increasingly less about being social, and more about being media?
How can we, as a species, be in space and in poverty at the same time?
We all know, we all feel, that many of the patterns in our world are not taking us to places that are better than where we are today.
Put simply, they are bad; and they are making things worse.
They are making us worse.
Would we need suburban sprawl if we felt more connected to higher-density communities?
Would we accept the crumbs of connection through an app if we had more meaning from real connections from real people in the real world?
Would we accept poverty being a fixed part of our society if we had more than just a superficial understanding of ‘the poor’?
Some people think I fake my positivity and energy. As you can see from the above, I’m not positive to everyone, I’m definitely not positive about everything, and certainly not all the time. I wouldn’t say I fake it, so much as command it. When presented with another person, I don’t pretend to be happy, or be more energetic than I am. I ask myself ‘what can I be happy about?’ or ‘what can I do for this person?’. It’s a moment to be selfish, grateful and giving all at the same time. It’s an opportunity to give someone a gift that can’t be bought, and costs nothing. It’s about needing one another. “I can’t do this happy dance alone. Will you do it with me?”.
When you’re genuinely enjoying something, you don’t have to fake it.
In short, I do it because it feels good. And other people feel good too. It’s like a dance. You don’t have to force it.
You feel it.
Happy and energetic is often the feeling I go for because I find that’s the dance I’m most suited to, and the one that others dance well with me. I wish I was better at more of these dances. The patient and calm waltz. The tender and considerate slow dance. The ‘I won’t get angry even though you did something really offensive’ tango. There is no right or wrong way to dance. There’s no one ‘best way’ to dance. It’s about feeling the moment, being in sync with your partner, and getting creative.
I’m always on the look-out for dance partners. Both for teachers and for students.
We know the world needs more care. We know we want it to change. We know we want to feel more connected, playful, and human.
We can change the world. We can stop following broken patterns. We can make life more of a dance. And you can do it next time you say hello.
NOTE: You can’t do it by riding your dick-shaped rocket for 11-minutes into space, 9 days after someone who’s not the world’s richest man beat you to it.
Looking for practical ways to break the patterns that get in the way of being happy people on a healthy planet? Download our e-book for a guide on how you can help yourself and your organisation put intention into practice.
This blog is part of a series I’m working on looking at how we connect shapes the world, moving beyond concepts like sustainability and injustice, and digging deeper into why these topics exist at all, and what we can do about them. I’m fortunate to stand on the shoulders of giants, and am massively inspired by the work that activists, intellectuals and ‘the people’ are driving to not just remove what is broken, but to build what is better. At the time of writing this, I’m reflecting on Charles Eisenstein’s “Climate: A New Story” and “Sacred Economics”.
These writings are given as a gift, and your feedback, sharing, and engagement with this is also a gift that I am grateful for.
