# mingling: i can do only work related interactions

i'm useless at informal social interactions. i fail even at informal penpal emailing: people stop responding to me after a while. i guess i have an overly annoying, unhelpful style. or maybe it's because i just can't seem to be able to care enough about others, and thus can't really connect with them.

on the other hand at work people seem to be content with my communication skills. i answer people's questions, follow up on my todo items, etc. i really like completing tasks and then seeing people happy with the result.

during work i interact with people. and sometimes such interaction has casual elements. the nice thing is this: if i'm not in the mood for casual stuff, it's easy to switch to work matters. i don't have such a fallback in non-work relationships so i just stay silent for most of the time.

so for me to casually interact with another person, i really need a common task or goal with the other person. then i can talk with them about that and slowly open up for some casual interactions.

it's impossible for me to go to a bar or a dinner party and "mingle". but if i have a clear task with clear expectations (like what you usually have at work) then i can maintain a facade of a reasonably-behaving adult.

i have been working from home since about 18 months thanks to the covid pandemic. during this period i often thought about maybe getting new friends and doing some socialization, but nothing really works for me. now the company is pretty lax about being remote vs working from the office. while i like being at home, i think that when the office world returns to normal, i'll probably start going to the office 1-3 days a week just to get some of this social life. i feel significantly more productive at home so this will come with some productivity loss. it's not that i really need this social life, but it's nice if you can rant/vent about things in person during lunch and other breaks.

i wonder if this realization could help me with some of the non-work interactions. maybe during such an event i just need to find a common task or goal with my conversational partner. that would transform the interaction into a worklike one and maybe then i could function. hmm. something for me to think about.

published on 2021-11-21

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