Step Outside and Look Up

The gas station attendant nearest your house, the Starbucks barista who knows your order (and your name), the elevator-mate who works on the floor above yours, the janitor starting their shift as you're ending yours, the fellow yogi whose "namaste" cadence mirrors your own. These are the casual acquaintances who bring us comfort in their familiarity and an outlet for common courtesy. As Gillian Sandstrom and Ashley Whillans write in Harvard Business Review, on an average day we interact with somewhere between 11 and 16 of these "weak ties." While they're no replacement for friends and family, there's something to be said for the less intimate relationships that require less of us but still feed us.

The pandemic and the move to remote work took us away from many of the routine, casual social interactions that, research says, we need. The smile and nod to a familiar face, a short exchange that ends with a laugh and well wishes for the day, intentional eye contact. Low investment, high reward, as we and the people we're interacting with feel seen.

I love working from home for many reasons, but when people ask if I miss the office, my answer is always the same: I miss seeing real humans. I miss the short conversations with colleagues I never would have had if we hadn't grabbed coffee in the kitchen at the same time. I miss stopping at the store or the gym on the way to or from. I think I just miss being outside my own four walls, and the casual acquaintances and friends that come with it.

To Sandstrom and Whillans' point, those relationships are still out there. It just requires us to step outside and look up.