Reaching Out
*Full essay at http://www.willbamberg.com/blog/reaching-out *
//tk update this note post-essay
Reaching out is the primary bottleneck of making friends with people
Reaching out takes energy. It's scary. It's vulnerable.
But reaching out is imperative if you want to make connections. You can't rely on people to reach out to you. Everyone is busy, preoccupied, scared, and wanting to be reached out to.
There are tons of people who would be down to hang out if you reached out to them, but won't reach out on their own (for all of the reasons above). That's not wrong of them. Think on your own life—there are probably many people you know who you fit this for as well.
So if you want to make connections, you need to learn to reach out.
Reaching out gets easier the more you do it.
Ride the waves of impulses—when a compliment rises to your lips, when you have the urge to hit up a friend, when you have the impulse to invite someone to get coffee.
Try and release your expectations of other poeple. What they do is their business. All you can do is reach out.
Keep reaching out a hand, and the right people will take it.
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The world is vast, and you are tiny. To find people and have people find you, increase your surface area by reaching out.