<p>Remember that you have something in common with everyone. You are each in the same place or observing the same things, hearing the same sounds. You each have an opinion about … (fill in the blank), you each got up this morning or at breakfast. Use those as starting points. I like what someone said earlier about making a non-judgmental observation.</p>
<p>I always feel like if I’m worrying about what to say, I’m filling the space in my brain that can be used to actually think of something to say. The best bet is to say, “well if this conversation doesn’t blossom into the stuff of scholars, thats the worst that can happen”. So just dont force it and always inquire about the other person, building off of that.</p>
<p>One overlooked possibility: pay attention to what other people are saying in class and remember who said things that you thought were interesting. Later you might try: Do you mind if I ask you a question? It’s about something you said in class the other day…</p>
<p>People like it when you actually listen to them. If your conversation reflects that, they will usually form a good impression of you.</p>
<p>I have the same problem sometimes, but I think it’s just that</p>
<p>I sometimes give no f how someone’s weekend went/party was/test went/day is</p>
<p>Be confident and positive lol. Even if am not applying to college yet(rising Junior in High School) just be open right of the bat. :D</p>
<p>Just ask questions about the person, even if you might not care for the response. It might blossom into something worth mentioning</p>
<p>Try to be at least somewhat up to date on subjects like sports, movies, music, etc. Obviously, pick things within those categories that you like. For example, I’m not exactly a devoted fan of basketball but I enjoy watching important games with friends and keep tabs on major events. Example of such a conversation:</p>
<p>Me: So, what do you think of Miami winning the [NBA] championship?</p>
<p>Person: Man, you have NO idea how upset I am.</p>
<p>Me: Really, why so?</p>
<p>Person: OK, first off…</p>
<p>…and then the conversation could deviate to whether one of us has ever been to Miami, which cities in general we have been to, which of those are our favorites, favorite places within such and so on. Honestly, I think that the hardest part is finding an ice breaker topic, and that’s precisely what mainstream events are best for. From then on it’s a lot easier to find common ground and establish a natural flow.</p>
<p>P.S. If you don’t have positive opinions about, say, a movie, then it’s best to keep them to yourself until you find somebody who you’re sure is on the same boat and/or won’t mind your ranting (I seem to have the opposite problem as you, I tend to talk too much). I’ve had to bite my tongue quite a few times about the Twilight series (books and movies).</p>
<p>Try to talk to the next person about what he or she is doing these days. This mainly gets the conversation going. And drive things further. You can alternately tell about what you are up to. Or future plans can be discussed.</p>
<p>You want to succeed at this so challenge yourself to draw out 3 conversations each day. </p>
<p>Practice talking to strangers while waiting in line to get coffee, lunch, etc. You could start with a comment about the weather, baseball, how long the line is, etc. Take a quick look at the paper or morning news before youleave the house to help with conversation starters. Everytime you buy something talk to the casher. The more you practice the better you will get and if you practice on strangers you will never see again you don’t have to worry about it working or feeling weird. </p>
<p>I was a huge introvert when I was younger. Having kids has helped pull me out of my shell, because I did not want them to be introverted. I modeled extrovert behavior even though it still to this day takes me out of my comfort zone. You will be glad if you can kick this inability to carry conversations. Good luck</p>
<p>At a party or other gathering where there are tons of people you don’t know, look for someone who may be like you…awkwardly sitting on the sidelines. You may find you have a lot in common, (besides being introverted.) :)</p>
<p>I always find this easier than trying to break into conversations already ongoing among social butterflies.</p>
<p>And when you walk into a room, force yourself to smile and stand up straight (just guessing that may not be your usual mode of operation.) People will want to talk to you instead of pegging you as a loser. People can be mean or just thoughtless.</p>
<p>Take an interest in them and what they’re doing. People love talking about themselves, and love people who let them do it (although they may not know that’s why they love them). Ask them how their [insert name of sporting event, class, or other activity they may have attended or taken part in] went, and build a conversation about it from there. Or ask them about favorite music or something if you don’t know them that well.</p>
<p>So I used to be exactly like this. Here’s how I got rid of it:</p>
<p>First I figured out how to ask questions of people. If someone brings something up they obviously care about that topic, so they will appreciate questions. Here’s an example:</p>
<p>Me: What’s up?
Person: Well I had a pretty bad weekend.
Me: What happened this weekend?
Person: Oh not much. My parents forced me to clean my room so I spent most of my time doing that.
Me: Oh, was your room really dirty? Did little children get lost among the heaps of trash (my lame attempt at humor :p)
Person: <em>laughs</em> Yes, there were a ton of clothes on the floor and a huge amount of books to sort through. I also had to vacuum everything and dust all of my shelves.
Me: Oh dear, that’s awful! How often do you clean your room, it would have to be a while if its that dirty… (I realize you don’t know exactly how dirty it is but the person took a while to clean it so obviously it was either pretty dirty or they were just lazy).
Person: <em>laughs</em> I only clean it about once every 6 months, or when my parents force me too. I’m really lazy.</p>
<p>At this point, asking any more questions would probably be more like an interrogation (which was a problem I had once I learned how to ask questions) so it’s time to either change the subject or talk about your experiences with cleaning the room. The next thing I learned how to do was have some sort of response to anything the other person might bring up.</p>
<p>(continuation of first conversation)
Me: Yeah room cleaning is very difficult if you’re not the type of person who has OCD.
Person: Yeah I definitely don’t have OCD.
Me: (more questions, statements).</p>
<p>If they bring up a topic I have only vague knowledge of, I learned to still ask them questions about it, but tell them about things I had heard (key point being heard, not think because I may have been wrong) and ask them to confirm/deny.</p>
<p>Me: What’s up?
Person: I had a bittersweet weekend.
Me: What happened over the weekend?
Person: Well I saw the Desperate Housewives finale and thought it was pretty good.
Me: I’ve heard about that show, but never really watched it. How was the finale?
Person: It was spectacular! I was almost crying at the end, it was so emotional, and the drama of the show was expertly woven in.
Me: Oh yeah, I’ve heard the show is very over-dramatic and the women are very vapid. Is that true?
Person: More or less. The men are just as dramatic as the women, and there is a ton of drama. It really is a good show though because the drama provides many laughs.
Me: Ah. So were you sad that the show ended?
Person: Yes.</p>
<p>Then as my conversations got longer, I realized we would be talking about multiple topics. If the other person didn’t bring up any new topic, it was up to me. In the above conversation, Desperate Housewives became a stale topic for the other person, as evidenced by his terse “yes.” I learned to follow up with a question about a related topic, but really you could follow up with anything. I couldn’t think of topics off of the top of my head at this point, so I related it to the last thing the person said, and this makes the conversation flow better. You could follow up with a question like:</p>
<p>(continued from above conversation)
Me: Do you think you will find another show to fill the void left by this one?
Person: Well that show Modern Family looks really good. I’ve been meaning to check it out.
Me: What have you heard about it? I’ve heard it’s pretty funny but some of the characters are very stereotypical.
Person: I heard the humor is great and is based around family drama.
Me: Why does family drama appeal to you? (new topic).</p>
<p>If they brought up a topic I know nothing about, I learned to ask questions about it, admitting I knew nothing about it. I would relate the things they said to personal experiences.</p>
<p>Me: What’s up?
Person: I had a bittersweet weekend.
Me: What happened over your weekend?
Person: Well it was pretty sad since my favorite show Desperate Housewives ended.
Me: Oh I’ve never heard about that show. What it it about?
Person: Well it’s about this group of lady friends who are neighbors. They are very dramatic and are constantly getting into squabbles about basically any little thing that might go wrong.
Me: I’ve had some pretty bad neighbors. Is the show anything like real life?
Person: Some of it is, but there are some downright weird things that happen, like a plane crashing into the street!
Me: Oh wow that is weird. I can’t imagine a plane crashing in my neighborhood haha.
Person: Yes that would be quite a sight.
Me: You say it ended. Why is that?
Person: Well the ratings were falling. I guess the quality of the show went down, but I still thought it was pretty good.
Me: Aww. I hate it when things I like are discontinued. Did the ending satisfy you?
Person: It did, but I would really like to see more of their lives.
Me: (new topic) Do you really think that character’s lives would be interesting to watch after the show ends? I’ve always wondered that.</p>
<p>At this point, I could pretty much hold conversations with normally social people. However, conversations tended to revolve around them and their experiences. Conversations like this are okay, but ideally they would be half and half. So I learned to talk about my experiences, and this basically boiled down to paying more attention to the things that happen in my daily life. </p>
<p>Interesting things happen to everyone every day, although they may not seem important to the person. For example, you may have seen something funny on the internet, like you do every day. You could probably get a few laughs out of someone you talk to with that. Other things could be an outing with friends and what happened, a doctor’s appointment, or even what you had for dinner. The thing to remember is the things that seem mundane to you are probably at least somewhat interesting to other people and they make great filler even if they’re not exciting. However, exciting things work best. </p>
<p>If all you really do is sit inside all day, just look for interesting things in the stuff you do. Like something interesting on TV, or the internet, or in a book you read, or in a video game you played, or literally anything. The key here is paying attention to what happens in your life and remembering it for use in conversation.</p>
<p>I’ll continue off of a quote from earlier:</p>
<p>Me: What’s up?
(us talking about his weekend cleaning his room)
Person: <em>laughs</em> I only clean it about once every 6 months, or when my parents force me to. (person may or may not ask what you did with your weekend, doesn’t actually matter)
Me: Well this weekend me and my friends went out to see a movie and then went to the beach.
Person: Oh that sounds fun. What movie was it?
Me: We saw Ted. Pretty funny movie, if you ask me.
Person: I heard it’s bad. What did you think of it?
Me: It was corny at some points, but it was good for a laugh. If you need a little humor, I’d recommend seeing it.
Person: Oh maybe I will. Anyway, how was the beach? Was it nice?
Me: Well it was pretty good, except the water was pretty cold. It was nice though because it was really hot and the cold was refreshing. After dark, we had a bonfire and roasted marshmallows.
Person: Oh cool, did you make s’mores?
Me: Yep. They were delicious.
Person: I love bonfires. This one time, my friends and I had a bonfire right when the school year ended where we burned all our notebooks and binders. It was awesome. (person started a new topic)</p>
<p>Okay great. So now I was having good conversations with normal people. But you will encounter people who are awful conversationalists and leave it to you to hold the conversation up for whatever reason. Maybe they don’t have social skills, maybe they’re tired, maybe they’re sick. (I think this is the type of person you’re most concerned about). Paying attention to your life details is essential here, and the more in depth you can remember them the better. Basically what I learned to do was talk about things that happened to me and sprinkle in related questions that would hopefully spark at least some conversation with the other person.</p>
<p>Me: What’s up?
Person: Not much. How about you? (Don’t say “same” when they ask this. If they don’t ask this then they probably don’t care about you or are tired and don’t want to talk or have some other reason for not wanting to talk to you. You can continue by talking about yourself but be cautious as it may be that they don’t like you or might get annoyed. A better alternative would be to continue with questions like “What did you do today?” or “How was class?”)
Me: Well I had an exciting day with friends yesterday. We went to the movies and afterward we went to the beach.
Person: That’s cool.
Me: Yeah, it was pretty fun. We saw the movie Ted. Have you seen it?
Person: No.
Me: Well it was pretty funny. If you need a laugh I’d recommend seeing it.
Person: Okay, maybe I will.
Me: Anyway, we then went to the beach. Do you like going to the beach?
Person: Yeah it’s alright.
Me: Well what did you do yesterday?
Person: Nothing much.
Me: You must have done something!
Person: No it was a boring day.</p>
<p>Hopefully one of these questions would have sparked a good conversation. However, if not,I know I’d want to give up at this point, but there is one last option that I learned to do, and that is ask them if there is anything wrong. It is quite likely given their behavior. You could ask it at the beginning as well.</p>
<p>Me: What’s up?
Person: Not much.
Me: How was your weekend?
Person: Pretty boring.
Me: Something must have happened!
Person: No really.
Me: Is something the matter? You don’t seem to be very talkative.</p>
<p>(quote from above)
Me: What’s up?
Person: Not much. How about you?
Me: Well I had an exciting day with friends yesterday.
(me talking about my day and trying to spark something out of the other person)
Me: Well what did you do yesterday?
Person: Nothing much.
Me: You must have done something!
Person: No it was a boring day.
Me: Is something the matter? You don’t seem to be very talkative.</p>
<p>Now the person will respond one of three ways. They will either tell you what’s wrong, tell you something’s wrong and they don’t want to talk about it, or tell you “no, I’m fine.” In the first case I learned that I could talk about what happened, asking more questions and not putting my own experiences in because they probably want to talk about their problem rather than anything I might bring up.</p>
<p>Me: Is something the matter? You don’t seem to be very talkative.
Person: Yeah, my girlfriend just broke up with me and I’m pretty bummed.
Me: Aww. What happened, if you don’t mind me asking?
(He tells me about his breakup and I ask many questions)
Me: That’s really sad. Is there anything I can do?
Person: (yes or no)
Then I would do what he asks if he says yes or end the conversation with “I’m glad you told me about this. See you later, hope you feel better soon.”</p>
<p>If they respond saying that they don’t want to talk about it, I would simply end the conversation.</p>
<p>Me: Is something the matter? You don’t seem to be very talkative.
Person: Yeah.
Me: Want to tell me about it?
Person: Sorry, but it’s private.
Me: Okay, but if you need anything let me know. See you later.</p>
<p>If the person simply responds “I’m fine” they’re either really bad at conversation, they don’t like you, or something is wrong and they don’t want you to know. It will probably be obvious which one it is. I would end it same as above.</p>
<p>Me: Is something the matter? You don’t seem to be very talkative.
Person: No, I’m fine.
Me: (if they seem sad)Okay, but if you need anything let me know. See you later.
Me: (if they don’t like you or are bad at conversation) Okay see you later.</p>
<p>So I had mastered one-on-one conversations, but talking in groups was still a problem. I learned to use the same strategies above, only to be more quick about things. I’d recommend getting really good at one-on-one or at least decent before diving into groups. So with the strategies, I ask questions when people bring things up, provide experiences, bring up topics when there’s a lull or switch topics when I can (but not too quickly). The benefits of group talking is you probably won’t have to come up with topics of the top of your head and you can simply ignore people who respond with basically nothing. The hardest part is knowing when to talk, and where you fit in. Chatrooms with multiple people on the internet could help you with this, but the key is practice.</p>
<p>Yikes this was a long post. Tedders’ guide to conversing haha. I hope I helped! :)</p>
<p>I think you shouldn’t stress about it, these are the learning years and as you grow you will become more confident in yourself and then the conversations will come naturally. It’s good to be involved in something (your sports) extracurricular, that always provides more to talk about. But don’t be too hard on yourself, you will move forward with this when the time is right.</p>
<p>I recently got back from my freshmen orientation. For the most part I was nervous about holding conversations with others. I guess being random was the best way for me to hold a conversation to be honest! I basically spoke whatever was on my mind and the conversation carried from there. Just have fun when you’re talking to someone! Don’t stress about how you’ll hold the convo. That will take care of itself.</p>
<p>Good advice!</p>
<p>I’ve also heard that it’s really important to smile a lot so that people will think you’re approachable and friendly. But walking into a room packed with students and just smiling to yourself hoping that you’ll find someone to talk to just seems kind of strange. There’s nothing really to smile about, and pretty soon it will seem fake. Does anyone have any suggestions on what to do to help? Thanks!</p>
<p>The great thing about college is there are so many different types of people. You’ll find yourself talking to your class neighbors, forced into group work. Join study sessions. Lots of other social and academic groups. </p>
<p>Find someone who talks a lot, if you talk to little. They’ll love you to death since they get to run the stage. </p>
<p>Of course I have class friends from all walks of life. Even a ton of foreign visa students. </p>
<p>Try to talk about all that deep introverted thinking you’re doing. You are having plenty of conversation with yourself, elicit others opinions on what your ruminating.</p>
<p>Instead of saying “nothing much” say what you are thinking – a poem, an image, your hunger, whatever. :)</p>
<p>You should read the book How to Win Friends and Influence People. It’s quite old but one of the best books a person can read in your shoes.</p>
<p>I’ve read it a few times and I remember one tip in particular that stuck with me and that is you need to be genuinely interested in other people. If your friends tell you they’re doing well and all you say is “Ok”, then clearly you don’t care about their day or your friend in particular. Stop thinking about yourself all the damn time.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Yeah, trying to find something interesting about a person and pointing it out to them or asking about it is a great way to start a conversation. But it definitely takes a lot of practice. It’s a lot easier to carry a conversation when you’re having it because you’re interested in what the other person has to say and not just because you feel some social obligation.</p>
<p>If you are an undergrad, see if you can slip in an Interpersonal or Small Group Communication class.</p>
<p>If you can’t then there are a few tips for you.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Be comfortable. Don’t fear embarassing yourself; be loose enough to soeak your mind. Your partner will likewise feel eager to talk openly wuth you too.</p></li>
<li><p>Find something in common. It can be a test, question on lecture, their fashion, accent, belongings, etc. Move from what connects you, into what makes you distinct. Apply that to any topic you have.</p></li>
<li><p>Continue what relations you have. Someone you’ve talked to before is much more open to talk to you again. The more you get to know someone, the more you grow close. If you reject these chances by tightening up, you instead create a barrier berween yourselves. Instead of creating a friend, you create a ‘distant acquaintance’.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>The biggest note is the first. Conversation does not have any restrictikns on topic or voice. There are no instances where you have a need to hide your personality.</p>