What's New
You meet a friend or a group of friends for coffee. Maybe you go for your haircut and your barber or stylist asks you. It could be a relative you haven’t seen. Or, it could be the co-worker you used to have that left the company or works in a completely different department.
What’s New.
This is the question that will typically come out to catch up on. No harm in it. Especially if you have not seen or spoken to the person in a while. However, why the focus on what’s new? Why the obsession?
It’s just like when you’re asked if you have any big plans for the weekend. Why do weekend plans have to be big?
Why does anything have to be new? Nothing being new is a good thing and it’s the reality for most of us. We work. We have a partner. We may or may not have children and/or pets. Nothing has to be new. No news afterall, is good news.
It’s not to say that discovering what is new with someone is a bad thing. There are promotions. New cars. New jobs. New homes or apartments. A new person they’re dating. Maybe a divorce. A break up. Or the loss of someone.
I have seen that I get this asked regularly and I pride myself on saying, nothing. Why? Because it’s true. To avoid the pressure of chasing something new, just to have something to talk about. In that pursuit, we may find nothing. Just stuff. No true happiness or growth. No real advancement. Because chasing something new for the sake of having something to contribute at brunch with your friends, sucks. You become someone you are not. You do things that are not who. You may even chase something new because your life lacks purpose and meaning at this time. So the feeling of new is appealing. Just like shopping when you’re stressed.
Learning what’s new with someone is pointless. Just look at their social media feed and you’ll be brought up to speed. This, precisely the reason why, what’s new, no long has significance. Go deeper with your friends.
Build relationships. Don’t regurgitate what has already been seen on social media.
What are your thoughts on this piece? Comment below…
Thought Provoking Questions for Friends : What have you overcome recently? What lesson have you learned recently? What book are your reading/just read? What challenge are you facing right now? If you could get help with anything in your life right now, what would it be?
Daily I write and release a daily meditation. A quick read. Sharing wisdom and asking thought-provoking questions. Influenced by the obstacles, success and failures in my life and of others. Using history, books, current events, philosophy, and ancient wisdom. These writings are actionable, thought-provoking, designed to make your life better.
These writings are not to push a way of thinking on the reader or to force you into a certain philosophy or methodology. Rather to give you practical and real ways to handle life. This is an added tool. My writing is simply a discussion, a discourse, with all the material I read, watch, hear and consume.
Don’t agree 100% with this in regards to the social media aspect. We don’t always put everything out there on social. Often it is highly curated, so our lives look a lot more interesting. So if someone you haven’t seen in a while asks what’s new….. this opens the door to the more real parts of our lives. The less picture worthy, the unspoken, the difficult.
Another way of looking at the question…. It can be the doorway to more meaningful conversation.