Making Conversational Blunders

Posted by Laurie Pawlik-Kienlen Mar 2, 2007

I shared my opinion yesterday at work yesterday, and was met with absolute silence. I killed the conversation! Has that ever happened to you?

I asked my coworker and her friend what they thought of The Secret (I knew they'd seen the movie last week). They smiled and nodded; they seemed to like it. I said I liked it too, but wished the movie had more practical and applicable information. For instance, I want to write books but I certainly won't get published by simply sending out positive thoughts. It's not as simple as grass growing (because in the movie, they said don't strive or work for what you want -- because the grass doesn't work to grow, does it?).

When I said that, there was total silence.

They both sort of looked at me, looked up at the ceiling, looked at their watches, and looked at each other. The friend started to back out of the office. The silence was suffocating and heavy, like a thick fog. I started to laugh, because it was so weird! Which made it funny. Now, was it me or was it them? Was I totally out of line, did they not understand what I was saying, or did we just not connect somehow? Or maybe they hate me, who knows. I'm hoping it's happened to you, too - because that means I'm not alone. I like knowing we're all in this together!

If I was more on the ball, I would have used my small talkin' charms to fire up the conversation again.........but the truth is when you don't connect with people, you just don't connect. It can be as simple as that.