Life is filled with a wide range of different characters and a huge roster of different types of people. This is part of what makes life so interesting and so multi-faceted. It is part of the reason that there are so many experiences out there to be had. If you want to get the most from life, then you need to be able to enjoy the company of lots of different people.
But this is where some people will struggle. While they might be perfectly outgoing and gregarious in their own group of friends, they might struggle to know what to say to people with different interests. They might feel intimidated by people who are more extroverted. Or conversely, they might make more introverted individuals feel awkward or offended.
There is an art to being able to fit in in a wide range of different groups and situations and in this post, we’re going to examine that art.
The Simple Solution
The problem is that many of us spend most of our time in the same group of friends and probably the same office. As such, we tend to spend a lot of time with a certain type of person and very often this is alike-minded kind of person.
Then something called ‘convergence and divergence’ occurs. This phenomenon describes a tendency for us to become more like the rest of our in-group and more different to people outside of that group. As this happens, we then end up getting even more set in our ways and in the worst-case scenarios, it can result in fighting between groups.
Spend years in the same little group and then try to fit in with people different with you and you can struggle. And this prevents a large number of people from getting opportunities that could otherwise change their lives.
So, what do you do to fix this problem? Simple: you start spending more time with more people. If you only have one group of friends, then start accepting more invitations from them and attending events you normally wouldn’t to get out of your comfort zone.
Better yet, spend some time developing new friends. You could do this by joining an evening class for instance, by joining a book group or anything else.
Practice speaking to more groups of people. If you are out at a bar, find another group and chat with them. On the train? Try talking to the person next to you.
Better yet is to do some serious travelling. Head somewhere that’s far away from your usual surrounds and travel alone without friends. This way, you can discover more types of people outside of your comfort zone and you can become a more well-rounded person.
Or why not take one of the biggest adventures of all and actually move away to another part of the country or even try living in another country? The skills you’ll learn will make you a social chameleon and this is an incredible skill to have.
