Some may be surprised, but communicating with friends also implies following certain rules. The sooner a person masters them, the better his relationships with others will develop.
It is believed that the rules of communication with friends should be clear on an intuitive level, but practice proves the opposite. Very often a person suffers from his own loneliness, sincerely wondering why people avoid him. There can be many reasons. Many people tend not to notice their own shortcomings and ignore other people’s comments, considering them unfounded. But the problem of communication exists, moreover, it is becoming relevant and widespread.
Neither a friend nor an enemy, but just like that
There is a category of people who have absolutely no need for communication. Misanthropes, hermits, introverts - these are just a few of the epithets that are awarded to those who prefer complete solitude to a noisy company. But there are only a few of them, and the majority of the population experiences a certain discomfort due to the lack of live communication. To improve the situation, you need to master the rules of communication with friends. At this stage it is worth asking a number of questions:
1) Am I a good friend?
2) Will I come to the rescue of a loved one if he asks for help?
3) Do I offend people with words or deeds?
4) Am I tactful enough?
5) Can I have a competent, constructive conversation?
6) Am I a sufficiently erudite and comprehensively developed person to be of interest to others?
Honest answers to these simple questions will paint a clear picture.
What to talk about with a friend on the Internet or on the phone?
A conversation on the phone or on the Internet between two friends, in my opinion, should not be long. If you already called or wrote a message on messenger or a social network, then find out the most important things:
- How are you?
- How is your health?
- How is the family?
- What's new, what are your plans?
For other reasons, it is still better to communicate when you meet, in order to know for sure that no one else will see or read everything that you want to talk about only with your close friend. Of course, this approach will be more congenial to adults; teenagers most often resort to correspondence, because only there can they hide their secrets and plans from the adults on whom they still depend.
Important! The only exceptions to topics for communication by phone or on the Internet are those people who cannot see each other often, because they live very far from each other, and they simply have no other opportunity to communicate. But at the same time, you should always be very careful, choose your words and expressions more carefully so that your friend does not get offended or misunderstand you.
How to easily find topics for communication with a friend, regardless of the situation:
Secrets of Friendship
As a rule, friendship begins in early childhood, and if you are lucky, it lasts throughout your life. Such relationships are not interrupted, even if people move to different cities and start families. This is what we should strive for.
So, there is one wrong position: everyone should perceive me as I am. This is the greatest misconception. A person must strive for the ideal all his life, engage in self-education, listen to criticism and draw conclusions. A personality cannot be at one stage; it either develops or degrades. Of course, everyone wants to see in their circle of friends those people who are trying to become kinder, smarter, more educated. A good example is contagious. If you have the desire, then it’s time to move on to practical advice. The rules for communicating with friends are:
1) Listen. Perhaps this is the main rule. Not every person is able to show sincere interest in the story of the interlocutor.
2) Don't be silent. Of course, it’s not worth interrupting and inserting a similar story, but making relevant and intelligent comments is not only possible, but also necessary.
3) Give advice with caution. Perhaps the interlocutor is waiting for them, but is it worth taking on such responsibility? After all, in the end you can remain guilty.
4) Friends meet to spend time together. The key word is “together.” That’s why you shouldn’t hide in a corner with your phone and look gloomily at your comrades who are distracting you from your favorite toy with conversations.
Error 1 – “Oh, what a girl...”
Trying to please her friends, a girl often forgets that she communicates with men. And excessive friendliness, smiling, sociability and the desire to be attractive in their eyes are often perceived as flirting or “playing around” and can be incorrectly assessed as frivolity and availability.
In addition, such behavior can offend the guy himself and cause jealousy or a negative attitude. Of course, in the soul of every girl there is a dream about how all men are in love with her. But we should not forget that men have a slightly different attitude towards this.
Basic Etiquette
Every person is familiar with the basic rules of etiquette. But theoretical knowledge and applying it in practice are not the same thing. The rules of communicating with friends are a whole science that every person who is tired of loneliness has to master. Friendly etiquette says that you cannot:
1) Putting a friend in an awkward position. This means that it is strictly forbidden to ask for a loan from someone who is overly frugal or to demand speed from someone who is slow.
2) Make difficult requests. Your friend will feel guilty because he is unable to help.
3) Ask for help too often. Sooner or later, such regularity will begin to get boring, and the person will try to stop communicating, believing that he is being used.
4) Making promises and not keeping them. Such actions make you disappointed in your friend.
TOP 7 things to talk about with a friend
The topics that I will present to you will help you diversify your meetings with your friend and make them even more enjoyable and meaningful.
| Subject | What to talk about |
| Amazing phenomena | Perhaps you witnessed some unusual event, or something that really surprised you personally. Talk about it and compare notes with a friend. |
| Funny incidents from life | Certainly some incidents have happened to you that you have never told anyone about. You can share this with a friend, and he will probably also share with you a funny story about himself. |
| Media | Music, cinema, art are eternal topics for communication. You and your friend may have a lot in common with them. Perhaps a film starring your favorite actor has been released. You can discuss the details of the film, express your opinion about the plot, the performance of your idol. |
| Technologies | Music, cinema, art are eternal topics for communication. You and your friend may have a lot in common with them. Perhaps a film starring your favorite actor has been released. You can discuss the details of the film, express your opinion about the plot, the performance of your idol. |
| Future plans | Plans for the future You can share this with a friend, so you can tell him everything, so that he can advise you something or simply express his personal opinion regarding your idea. |
| Children | This is a topic of conversation for any parents. Dads and moms always talk about their blood, because they are the most important part of their lives. What parent wouldn’t want to share the successes of their beloved son or beautiful daughter with a close friend? |
| Bad habits | It may be that you are getting rid of some kind of addiction. In the process, you encounter difficulties that you can talk about. A friend will give you advice or take something useful into account for themselves. |
You can also tell your friend about your dreams, desires, talk about fate, the past and hopes for the future. These topics will always be relevant for both women and men.
Virtual world
The Internet has firmly entered the life of every person and has become an integral part of it. Social networks are replacing face-to-face communication, so it is not surprising that there are rules for online communication with friends.
The first and main commandment is: you must respond to messages sent by friends. Sometimes people online choose to ignore them. Here we need to make a small digression and imagine such a situation. Two friends met:
- Hello.
- Hello.
- How are you doing?
The interlocutor did not answer anything; he silently turned around and left. Silent scene. This is what silence looks like on the Internet.
Also, do not send cheerful and funny pictures to your friend. Never. Perhaps this is very funny and interesting, but suddenly the person is busy or simply not in the mood. He will have to make an effort to respond to this meaningless message.
In the modern world, a fashionable habit that you need to eradicate in yourself is to answer with abbreviations. For example, “thank you” instead of “thank you”, “plz” instead of “please”. The Russian language is beautiful and rich. It is much more pleasant to communicate with a person who speaks it perfectly, rather than having difficulty connecting two words into a sentence and being frighteningly tongue-tied.
Mistake 4 – “your guy”
A girl’s desire to please a guy’s friends can have another extreme: the desire to become “her guy” in a group of guys. This behavior is caused by the desire to share their hobbies, to become a part of the guy’s life. This can manifest itself in joint gatherings, attending sporting events, or some purely male entertainment. At first glance, this may seem correct, but with a detailed analysis of the situation, it is easy to understand that such behavior leads to the destruction of relationships. We are not talking about a situation where love arises from common hobbies. In this article we are looking at a situation where a guy introduces “his girlfriend” to his friends, and not a guy like them.
Problems with relationships with classmates
The years of study are remembered with warmth and tenderness. Every person sooner or later thinks about the distant time when he was a carefree schoolboy. But nostalgia will come decades later, but in the meantime there may be problems in relationships with peers.
The rules of communication with classmates will help you avoid them. The catchphrase is appropriate here: treat people the way you want them to treat you. This means not giving offensive nicknames, laughing at physical disabilities, or being disrespectful or rude. These banal truths need to be learned; they will help build harmonious relationships with society.
Always be smiling and friendly
When meeting your man's friends, be friendly. No one is asking you to pretend and pretend that you are wildly delighted with them, just say hello and smile. This is quite enough.
Don't think that your husband's friends want him to break up with you. Men are not at all like women. They will not envy a friend if everything is going well in his personal life.
Forget about your prejudices and try to make contact. A cheerful and friendly woman will not leave anyone indifferent. Be like this and you will be able to find a common language with any man.
Is it possible to lie to friends?
Some people will probably be surprised, but sometimes you can lie to your friends. The rules of correct communication say that you must always remain an honest and sincere person, but no one has canceled the concept of “white lies.”
So in what situations is guile acceptable? A lie is justified when the truth can lead to unpleasant consequences or even tragedy. For example, an unattractive girl asks: “Am I ugly?” Is it possible to answer this question in the affirmative? Truth-lovers, of course, will say that it is always necessary to speak only the truth. But does the person asking such a question want the truth? Also, lying is justified when it comes to saving life, dignity and honor.
Mistake 3 – “Princess without a kingdom”
The girl distances herself from the company of guys, behaves slightly arrogantly and unfriendly, considering this behavior correct towards the guy, demonstrating that she has nothing to do with this “kingdom.” Her behavior shows, maybe not superiority, but certainly not disposition towards friends. This will also bother the guy because... he will realize that the girl is bored and not interested in being with his friends. The fact that the two worlds: past and present, do not fit together will lead to psychological discomfort for the guy, who may draw the wrong conclusions. Although, in fact, the princess’s behavior is just a girl’s game, a desire to show her inaccessibility and peculiarity.
How to become a good friend?
French writer Michel de Montaigne said: “In friendship there is no other calculation than itself.” So why is it sometimes difficult for a kind and open person to communicate with people?
The rules of successful communication will help change the situation for the better. And if the standard norms of dialogue and behavior are known to every person from early childhood, then more subtle nuances can become an amazing discovery. Psychological rules of communication are a panacea for the loneliness that weighs on the soul:
- Sharpening your communication skills will help you overcome a communication barrier.
- Control over your own emotions is something that you need to develop in yourself.
- Observation will allow you to adapt to your interlocutor, this guarantees maximum benefit from communication.
- The ability to select a topic is the key to success. If we look at a simple example, then a person with three higher educations, talking with a simple worker, will not start talking about Barrow’s theorem or about modern research in the field of genetics. Unfamiliar topics will confuse the participant in the dialogue, and he will become embarrassed.
- The sweetest word for any person is his own name. During communication, you should not depersonalize your interlocutor; you should address him by name.
- A friendly smile works wonders.
Recommendations for interesting communication
Before we move directly to the topics, I would like to highlight important nuances that will help avoid mistakes in communication:
- Try to ask open-ended questions, that is, ones that require a more detailed answer than a monosyllabic “no” or “yes.”
- If you come to a one-on-one meeting, do not turn the dialogue into an interrogation with bias. Don't bombard the person with questions as if they were coming for an interview. When you decide to touch on a particular topic, be sure to tell similar information about yourself. Usually people continue to speak out of inertia and do not feel any discomfort. But it’s also not worth pulling the blanket over yourself, forcing you to listen only to yourself. Stick to the golden mean.
- Listen carefully, ask clarifying questions. This will show interest and respect.
- Do not give unsolicited advice, especially to strangers. Even if it seems to you that the person needs it. This is extremely tactless.
- Avoid complaining and pitting anyone. Negativity is repellent.
- Don't be afraid of silence. There will be natural pauses in any conversation. Long conversations are also exhausting. If it is comfortable to talk to a person, then it will be comfortable to remain silent with him for a while. At least to finish your salad or finish your cup of coffee, if the circumstances are appropriate.
Know how to compromise
Even if you don't like your husband's friends, don't tell him about it. Do not try to protect your man from this relationship. Learn to come to a common decision.
For example, your husband's friend needs help. What do most women do in this case? They begin to find out who is more valuable to their husband: her or his friends.
A friend needs money, let his husband lend it to him, just take a receipt first. If friends ask for a ride after a party, offer to call a taxi.
Think about what you would do if similar circumstances arose for your friend. Most likely, they would also rush to help.
Get to know your husband's friends better
Do everything possible to ensure that your husband's friends become family friends. Try to find out as much as possible about them. To do this you will have to communicate with them.
Invite your man's friends over for dinner. Come up with a few topics that you would like to discuss. Ask questions, take an interest in their life. You will definitely find common interests.
Don't be shy and don't act like a queen. Be natural. If it’s difficult for you, think about the fact that these are the closest people to your beloved man. They don't wish you anything bad.
Don't overdo it, don't interrogate, don't ask questions about your personal life.
A girl's first meeting with a guy's friends
It wouldn’t hurt to learn more about your lover’s company. What connects them? Perhaps they studied together, worked together, lived in the same yard. Ask your partner to talk about important nuances from the life of each person you know. Maybe there is a certain topic that should not be discussed.
So, the guy wants to introduce you to his friends. Let's remember a few rules of good manners.
1. Be friendly
Even if one of the men turns out to be harsh or makes inappropriate jokes, do not openly express your dissatisfaction. There is also no need to pretend to be wildly delighted with the speeches of your interlocutors. A nice greeting and a smile is all that is required from you.
2. Don't get into arguments
Men love loud discussions on politics, religion, and business. It won't be entirely appropriate if you start interrupting people to demonstrate your knowledge.
3. Pay attention to everyone
Some girls make a grave mistake when meeting a guy's friends. They notice a person who is close in spirit and chirp sweetly only with him. Remember to pay attention to all meeting participants. Try to give a small compliment to everyone. The result will pleasantly surprise you, and then you can definitely say: “The guy’s friends like me.”
4. Don't drink alcohol
Remember strong drinks are taboo. And in general, any alcohol should be excluded. It’s better to “get high” from your lightness and femininity.
5. Be bright and noticeable
How to behave when meeting a guy's friends? Showcase your excellent sense of style and delicate taste. Do not slip into vulgarity and licentiousness. This means no fishnet tights or vulgar jokes. If you gather guests at your home, exclude plain or threadbare home clothes. If you plan to go to a restaurant, wear something elegant.
Remember, once the first impression is ruined, there will be no second chance to make it. And one more moment. Don’t tell everyone around you: “I don’t want to meet the guy’s friends!” Build your confidence, increase your spiritual rating.
The benefits of communicating with all people
The benefits of communication as such are obvious and beyond doubt; besides, being a sociable person is important for successful adaptation in society, in addition to intellectual development in general. For example, if parents communicate a lot with their little child, who may not even have learned to talk yet, they will significantly contribute to his development, and accordingly this will be the key to his happy life. But in this article, dear friends, we will talk about communication between people of all ages and mainly about the benefits of such communication, in which, strangely enough, some do not see any point. From a philosophical point of view, everything always has a meaning, and from a psychological point of view, communication is as useful as a person can derive this benefit from communication, and from any communication, with absolutely any person.
Yes, in my previous articles I have written more than once about the circle of people around you, communication with whom will be positive for you, and about those people who need to be avoided. But just as in our world there are no unnecessary elements and there is nothing superfluous, there cannot be unnecessary and meaningless communication, you just need to grow to the level at which you can communicate with everyone without exception for your benefit. For a person at the lowest level of social development, communication with others like himself is, of course, an everyday occurrence. And it was no coincidence that I insisted on avoiding such communication, which should be replaced by communication with people of a higher status, because the benefits of communicating with weak and stupid people can only be for a person at a very high stage of his development.
This may seem strange, but the point here is to see the same person from different points of view, and accordingly perceive everything that he says in such a way as to see benefit and perspective in it for yourself. If you are a loser, then you need to communicate with successful people in order to grow to their level, since communicating with your own kind will not give you anything. True, there are people who love to communicate with those who are weaker than themselves and they take pleasure in this, seeing that not everything is so bad for them, there are also those who are even worse. This, of course, does not contribute to their own growth, although certain conclusions can be drawn from such communication, but more about them later, for now let’s return with those who are more successful in life and the benefits of communication for them.
Just as communication with his own kind gives little to a loser, so to a person who has everything and is located at the top of the social pyramid, communication with his peers gives just as little, and if there is no one else above, then what remains? And the only thing left for friends is to communicate with people who are at the very bottom, that is, with those very losers, the benefits of communicating with whom supposedly are not at all. After all, all they can do is complain about their fate and talk about their problems, for which, of course, there is no solution, what could be the benefit in this case? But, firstly, the problems of some are opportunities for others, and secondly, problems arise from mistakes, the analysis of which is always easier using someone else’s example. Any person with whom you communicate in your life gives you information, the application of which depends on your own level of development, somewhere you can see something that you have not seen before, somewhere you can find actions that are familiar to you from your own actions. , and therefore understand what all this can lead to.
To put it simply, in this case, people are divided into two categories - the benefit of communicating with some is that from them you can learn how to do the right thing, while others, accordingly, can teach you what not to do when doing This is primarily by your own example. But this is in general terms, but for a person who knows what not to do and how to do the right thing, that is, the person at the top, communication with losers can open his eyes to things that he simply does not see . In line with their prosperous social position, people stop feeling many things that would not hurt them to feel. Just as a person with high self-esteem ceases to see many threats to himself, being extremely confident in his own abilities, a person in greenhouse conditions may also not feel a lot, including he cannot understand his own behavior.
If you communicate with a homeless person, you can not only understand what mistakes you should not make in life, so as not to end up in his place, but you may also notice a completely unjustified risk, which often leads to a quick fall from a very great height , which for some people becomes tragic. A person at the very bottom of the social pyramid has an animal sense of smell that helps him survive, but as he improves his living conditions, he loses this very sense of smell. After all, surviving and improving your living conditions are fundamentally different things. In one case, a person fears for his life, while in others he reaches for comfort. Communication with a person for whom life is very difficult gives a person who is in a more privileged position in society the opportunity to awaken in himself all his natural feelings, which underlie the instinct of self-preservation. This will give such a person an advantage both over people of his position and over those who are stronger than him, because their position makes them less sensitive to many things and events.
But you need to grow to this point, because if you have not seen life from different heights, then it will be extremely difficult for you to benefit from communicating with those who paint this life for you in dark colors. You will not have an objective point of view regarding those who are stronger than you, who are above you, and whom you hate for it. You can, of course, imagine the picture that other people see, see the flaws in it, understand the essence of what they see and what is the benefit, but how many people have such an imagination? But here you also need to have the appropriate desire to put yourself in the place of others in order to better understand them. In most cases, it is very difficult to put yourself in the position of another person and even the desire to do so does not arise. We prefer to superficially judge someone and something, without delving into the details, especially unpleasant ones, which do not allow us to draw simple and unambiguous conclusions.
Remember the fairy tale “About the Fisherman and the Fish”? It is the kind of unbridled greed that it depicts that we are all susceptible to. But everyone sees the meaning of this greed in their own way. For some it is the norm, for others it is a vice, for others it is a measure of one’s awareness, when a person has a sense of proportion. But people often forget that someone else’s example also applies to them, that they demonstrate the same weaknesses as the one they condemn. And it’s not a short memory, it’s because people forget about the situation into which they can drive themselves, losing control over themselves and finding themselves with nothing. The fact is that we always consider ourselves better than others, we do not see in ourselves the same problems and weaknesses that other people have, we think in a limited way, judge everything from our own bell tower, thereby limiting our capabilities.
To see another life, you need to communicate with those who live this other life, even if you don’t really like them, for one reason or another. Communicating with people stronger than ourselves, we not only learn from them to think in a more practical way, sometimes getting rid of our naive illusions, we can also lose our sense of reality, forgetting what level we are at. To put it bluntly, being associated with an influential person can make us feel special. In a way, this is a plus. Another thing is that connecting with a person is one thing, but understanding him is completely different. Any person will teach you something if you communicate with him, but if you don’t hear him, if you draw conclusions about his words long before he says them to you, then you will simply miss another piece of the puzzle for your picture of the world . And without these pieces, the picture of the world is incomplete, therefore, you are not rational in your judgments, you may have a desire to jump up several steps, because you want everything at once, not realizing that those who have it all do not jumped on the steps and climbed them sequentially.
If you want to understand human psychology, which will give you a lot, then you must communicate with everyone without exception, because in different conditions, people have different thoughts, behavior, and attitudes towards life. And you can switch people from one wave to another only by having an idea about this wave. Just as I played the role of a person who has nothing in this life for my client, who needed to somewhat transform the picture of the world, everyone can do this for themselves, supplementing their way of thinking with those associations that arise under certain conditions in life . Sometimes a bird in the hand is more promising than a pie in the sky, sometimes vice versa, but how can you live so many lives to have enough experience to understand absolutely any situation, perhaps it’s easier to communicate with other people and learn from their experience?
After all, every new interlocutor in your life is a person with a certain destiny, this is the same life experience that we ourselves will not be able to accumulate in any lifetime, and by communicating with everyone, we will learn more and more about life and people . So friends, no matter what social level you are at, you can always benefit from communicating with all people, another thing is that you may have your own priorities in communication, depending again on your social status. If you are not entirely successful and your life seems gloomy to you, it is too early for you to benefit from communicating with weak people, you can only not do as they advise you, because their advice will lead you to the same position in which they themselves are .
But communicating with people of a higher social status, for you at this stage, will be a more preferable option; this portion of communication should be noticeably larger for you. It’s true that you can’t always trust people higher than you, you can’t trust anyone at all, but nevertheless, communicating with them will be very useful for you, and we’ll talk about trust some other time, in my next articles.
>What is the benefit of communication?
There are times in some people's lives when they are overcome by depression, the world is seen in the darkest colors, they don't want to communicate with anyone, and their health is acting up. It is usually believed that loneliness is a consequence of this kind of condition. But this opinion is only partly true. On the other hand, taking a closer look at successful, self-confident and healthy people, we will find that they have many friends and acquaintances. And in this case, do not rush to claim that good health is the reason for their active social life.
Doctors and psychologists have found that a person’s mental and physical state is strictly dependent on the nature and number of his social contacts. Communication is essential for each of us for the normal functioning of the body and good mood. Living in a team, having friends and acquaintances, success in love - these are some of the main stimuli under the influence of which the brain produces the so-called “happiness hormones”. People who have normal levels of these substances get sick less often, recover faster, and cope with life’s problems more easily. In addition, the blood cells of socially active people have an increased ability to resist infections. In this case, the number of types of social contacts also plays an important role. That is, someone who has a social circle limited only to family, friends and colleagues is more susceptible to life’s troubles than a person who has a wider circle of contacts.
This is why, for example, children who have lost their family early often experience delayed physical development. And a married woman, completely devoting herself to her family, having neither a job nor friends with her friends, causes harm to her health that exceeds the damage from drinking alcohol and smoking. It was also found that for socially disadvantaged people, job loss often leads to musculoskeletal diseases.
So appreciate your friends, acquaintances and loved ones. Constant communication with them is one of the guarantees of peace of mind, health and success in life.
