Within the many facets of communication, there is diversity in how distant and connected people feel and how this changes.
Eric Berne, the founder of Transactional Analysis, described what he called the hunger for structure with 6 different ways we have to structure our time. He called them withdrawal, rituals, pastimes, activity, games, and intimacy.
They all describe a specific state of how people relate to one another. It’s how connected they’ll experience themselves in a conversation. At the same time, they describe how we navigate our relationships. When using all six of them we can establish healthy relationships. By using those appropriate to the relationship as it is present in the moment, the variety of situations experienced in a day-to-day are well addressed.
Rituals are based on formalized and scripted exchange. It is, for example, easily recognizable in the way people greet one another. Most often they are followed by pastimes. These are less ritualized but remain within known or familiar patterns. It’ll be talking about the weather, our jobs, hobbies, the state of the world, local and recent events, etc. Socially one would describe them as small talk. Berne liked to use a vocabulary that one can call down-to-earth and would be easily grasped by people. Pastimes thus do contribute to passing the time, sometimes in a way that seems rather trivial and on the surface. However, they serve two important tasks.
One is to exchange positive strokes in a rather safe way. People are stimulated by the conversation and find themselves seen by the other, allowing them to feel better about themselves. Notice how small talk highlights day-to-day details that are appreciative of one’s experience and allow those involved to recognize things we’ve done or said. At the same time, they don’t touch challenging experiences or feedback.
The other task pastimes allow us to address is the ability to find the things we have in common. It sometimes depends on the courage people have to explore a variety of areas or inquire into the person’s interests, network, or opinions to create more opportunities to find things that are shared. It may also depend on one’s ability to listen to what others share to discover how to transform the quality and content of explored topics. But it’s upon discovering things that people have in common, that the connection between people transforms itself. Finding shared interests or things one has in common contributes to the existing trust and opens the door towards more depth.
