How to Be a Better Human - Throwing good parties and building community (w/ Priya Parker)

Episode Date: January 13, 2025

Many of us are entering the new year with a similar goal — to build community and connect more with others. To kick off season five, Priya Parker shares ideas on how to be the host with the most. An expert on building connection, Priya is the author of “The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why It Matters.” Whether it's a book club, wedding, birthday or niche-and-obscurely themed party, Priya and Chris talk about how to create meaningful and fun experiences for all of your guests — including yourself.For the full text transcript, visit go.ted.com/BHTranscripts. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You're listening to How to Be a Better Human. I am your host, Chris Duffy, and this is the first episode of season five of our show. Thank you so much for listening. I am so, so, so glad that we are back. On today's episode, we're going to be talking about what it means to gather together and to gather well. And that feels to me like a very appropriate topic for our first episode back, because what does it mean to reunite with you, the listeners? What does our audio podcast coming back together party look like? I'm kind of joking, but I'm kind of not.

Regardless of that, more importantly, what does it look like when you get together in person with your friends or your family or your co-workers or even with strangers? How do you do that in a way that is fun and meaningful but also builds relationships? In my life, I've been to a few parties that were so fun and unique that I will think about them forever. One example is my friend Will once hosted a dinner party where everyone was only allowed to bring different types of soups. And then after eating a bunch of soup, we all went home before 9 p.m. To me, oh, that was a perfect event. A truly perfect dinner party. Now I've also been to some absolutely horrendous, awkward events where I have felt so self-conscious

and uncomfortable that I thought I might explode. One time I went to this party where the host was trying an experiment, I guess, so we were forbidden to make small talk with any of the other guests there. But the thing is, we didn't know any of the other guests either. So everyone just ended up sitting silently in this kind of like foyer waiting room while we were waiting for more instructions. It was truly excruciating. Now today's guest, Priya Parker, is the author of the book The Art of Gathering. Priya thinks and writes all about bringing people together, and she knows how to do it

well. When Priya is involved, there are no excruciating, waiting-for-instruction moments. And from talking to people in my life and hearing from listeners to our show, I know that a lot of people in this new year are thinking about building and maintaining community. That that's a big goal that lots of people are working towards. And to figure out how to do that, to figure out how to gather well and to build community, Priya draws on her background in conflict management. Here's a clip from Priya's TED Talk.

Whether I was facilitating dialogues in Charlottesville or Istanbul or Ahmedabad, the challenge was always the same. Despite all odds and with integrity, how do you get people to connect meaningfully, to take risks, to be changed by their experience? And I would witness extraordinarily beautiful electricity in those rooms. And then I would leave those rooms

and attend my everyday gatherings, like all of you, a wedding or a conference or a back-to-school picnic. And many would fall flat. There was a meaning gap between these high-intensity conflict groups and my everyday gatherings. Now, you could say, sure, somebody's birthday party isn't going to live up to a race dialogue,

but that's not what I was responding to. As a facilitator, you're taught to strip everything away and focus on the interaction between people, whereas everyday hosts focus on getting the things right, the food, the flowers, the fish knives, and leave the interaction between people largely to chance. So I began to wonder how we might change our everyday gatherings,

to focus on making meaning by human connection, not obsessing with the canapés. We will be right back with more from Priya in just a moment. Until then, take a bite of the hors d'oeuvres and listen to these ads. cats. If you're at a point in life when you're ready to lead with purpose, we can get you there. The University of Victoria's MBA in Sustainable Innovation is not like other MBA programs. It's for true changemakers who want to think differently and solve the world's most pressing challenges.

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Helping make sense of the world when it matters most. Stay in the know. Download the free CBC News app or visit cbcnews.ca. Today we're talking about bringing people together, gathering and building community with Priya Parker. Hi there, I am Priya Parker. I am best known for my book, The Art of Gathering, How We Meet and Why It Matters. I'm also a facilitator, a strategic advisor and host of the Art of Gathering digital course. So it feels like the beginning of the year is a time when a lot of people are thinking about

putting new habits and routines into place. And a lot of people are thinking about wanting community and wanting connection with people. So are there special ways that we should be thinking about gathering and planning for gatherings in the beginning of the year that can make it last all the way to the end of the year? Fortunately, most of us, whether we think about it or not, are gathering all the time anyway. We gather in our classrooms. We gather in our workplaces, remote or in person. We gather to celebrate, to witness people getting married, to mourn, to vote, to dance it all off. And part of what is unique about gathering is that it's something that

we've been doing since time immemorial, but so often the ways in which we are gathering are no longer serving us. And it is a learnable skill to make the time that you spend with other people better, more meaningful. And sometimes that means actually gathering less. Sometimes in our workplaces, we need to be meeting less, not more. Often it simply means actually to pause and ask this very simple, but also radical question,

which is at the end of the day, how do I wanna be spending my time and with whom? I've heard a lot of people talk about how, if you want to like predict the kind of person you're gonna be or what's gonna happen in your life or what your professional successes are gonna look like, the best predictor is to look at the people who you spend the most time with.

Who do we want to be in our circle? Who do we want to have influence us? And I think sometimes we don't think about it like that. Like who do we want to be more like? Cause they're going to have an influence on us that we're not totally aware of in the moment. So at the deepest level, and it's not to say, you know, all of friendship is strategic.

It's actually saying some things slightly different, which is that in modern life, unlike our ancestors, we have the beautiful and terrifying opportunity to, at some deep level, choose who we pray with or don't, who we dine with or don't. The majority of us are living with, being neighbors with, working with, wedding people who are different from us in some way, shape or form. And so within that level of choice, what are the values of the people that you spend time with? What are they competing over?

Right? I often have a friend who says part of her confusion is she doesn't know who her Joneses are. And I said, what do you mean by that? And she said, well, everybody has Joneses. You know that old saying, like keeping up with the Joneses? You can't apparently escape the Joneses, but you can decide who they are. Do you want to be with people at a default level who are fundamentally reading more than you are and being like, oh my gosh, I haven't caught up on the latest, I haven't been reading it the way that they are.

Or is it that you want to have a free throw that's like better than all of your other friends free throw? Or is that not the currency? And at some deep sociological, simple, banal level, every set of group has its values, has its norms, has the things that they compete over, has the thing that make them laugh. And at some deep level to begin to pause and ask, who do I want to be my Joneses? Who are some people where you're like,

I don't want these to be my Joneses. One way that I would frame it is like, I like that my people around me are when we have like dinner together, we're bringing maybe not the best looking, but like a home cooked meal, rather than buying some sort of really fancy, expensive takeout and bringing that over

to someone else's house. I like that. And that's not to say that, look, if you love fancy takeout, good for you. But for me, I'm glad that I come home to people who are like, maybe we'll just make some pasta, you know? You know, groups have shared questions and I'm a conflict resolution facilitator and I work with groups.

I work with groups that are experiencing some kind of transition or crisis and help them have the conversations that they've been avoiding having. And one of the things that I find over and over again is that groups are relevant to the people in them when they share the same questions. So for example, the question might be in one group, how do I make the best arrabbiata pasta known to man? And in another group, it might mean in a church, for example, what does closeness to God look like? And part of the opportunity and, you know, at different moments in life, we choose the

groups that we are part of. But there are moments of transition, often at least in the U.S. after college or during college or at the kind of quarter life, what's that currently called, the quarter life crisis, you know, 25. Like, who are my people? Who do I want my people to be? Even if you think about your job, like, what are the organizations? If I enter an organization, if I enter a tech company, at the simplest level, it's like groups carry implicit or explicit questions. And as you are starting to navigate the groups of your life to think about, is this how I wanna be spending my time?

Do I wanna be thinking obsessively about like the shape of a collar in this season's fashion show? Yeah. For some people the answer is yes, I absolutely want to be thinking about that shape. But I've been thinking about how the collar shape has changed over 250 years and I finally found my people.

Or do I want to be thinking about the nature of a changing democracy? At some deep level, when you long-term communities start to have shared questions and contentment and group life is when their questions are also the questions you carry. It's really interesting that you frame it as shared questions and not shared values, which I know sometimes people talk about in groups. I feel like that's intentional.

You know, I am currently working on my next book and part of what I'm looking at is looking at long-term sustainable communities, particularly across difference. And again, in traditional communities, our values at some level are passed down, right? My great-grandmother's values, my great-grandfather's values are perhaps the same values as mine, or I've been told they should be. And part of modern life is we can enter and exit as many communities as you want. It's never been easier to exit a church or synagogue or mosque. It's never been easier to exit a friendship or a marriage. And so part of what

ends up becoming interesting and sustainable is when the way a group spends its times or the questions that it asks. And yes, underlying values are absolutely a part of it, but give kind of a forward momentum. They give a spark and a life that is the opposite of flat. They allow people to kind of know what the collective project is. I remember years ago hearing David Brooks speak and he said, no question worthy of pursuit is answerable in a lifetime. And I'm a facilitator.

I think of my core craft, like the thing that I have been working on for the last 25 years is how do you create and structure a conversation within a room that people are trying to avoid, but know that they need to have. And how do you do it in a way that creates breakthrough? That to me is a question worthy of pursuit. I really loved your book, The Art of Gathering I thought was so, it both is philosophical, but it's also very practical.

And you already brought up how you have worked in conflict resolution. You've worked all over the world. You've worked in Zimbabwe, you've worked in the United States, you've worked in the Middle East. Something that I thought that I hadn't really heard about before is the idea that obviously we know there can be unhealthy conflict, but that there can also be unhealthy peace. Can you talk about that? American. They met at Iowa State and I was born in Zimbabwe because it was the closest hospital at the time that would accept an interracial couple from the village they lived in Botswana. And they moved a lot. And eventually when they moved back to the U.S., to Virginia, within a year they separated. And within two years they divorced. And within three years

they each remarried other people. But when they announced their separation, everyone was shocked because they never fought. How could these people getting a divorce? They don't fight. And from a very young age, I began to realize that human connection is as threatened by unhealthy peace as it is by unhealthy conflict. I know that I'm a conflict averse conflict resolution facilitator. So like to this day, right?

20 years, 25 years into this, when the kind of, you know, things start getting heated, my palms sweat, my heart starts beating, you know, my body wants to flee. And I think one of the reasons I'm a relatively effective facilitator is because I have deep empathy for the people in the room who also want to jet, right? Get me out of here.

I've learned kicking and screaming that actually learning to hold healthy heat isn't only good for communities and for groups and for friendships, but is also a learnable skill. And that in a group, you can get better at this if you choose to try. What would some of the first steps to get better at holding healthy heat be? What would you suggest for someone who's listening? So first is to start becoming aware, to be observant of your own conflict style. Are you conflict-averse?

Are you conflict-seeking? Sometimes I use the language, are you a smoother-over or a peacemaker? Are people come to you to kind of like cool things down or bring things together? Or are you more of like a poker or a prodder or a troublemaker? Chris, do you feel like you know yours?

Oh, sir, I'm 100% conflict averse, smoother over peacemaker. Like that is, and also that's why I got into comedy too. It's like, if I can make you laugh, then we're all having fun. I've pierced the bubble of the attention and we let it out with a laugh. For sure, that is me.

That's amazing. Well, so many studies actually show that one of the most powerful forms of being able to hold healthy heat, can you guess? Is humor? Could be. Yeah. Yeah, I believe that.

It's humor. There was a study that showed there was a woman who could predict astronaut teams that were at NASA whether or not they'd be effective and the number one quality was humor. Interesting. I'll tell you I'd be the least effective astronaut of all time. They would have a great time as I was vomiting in space but I would not be someone you want to go to space with. Your jokes would be the social lubricant of them not killing each other. Yeah yeah they'd eject me, they'd really quickly shoot me out

through the airlock but in the moments before they did that, I would definitely be having them laugh. They don't clap. Yeah. Exactly. I mean, humor is actually an amazing way in to holding healthy heat. And as you know, as a comedian, it's actually a learnable skill. Like humor takes the heat out of certain things. So know your conflict style, become a comedian like Chris. And then third is starting to build the muscles, particularly within a group. Conflict is deeply cultural. There are societies that are conflict seeking and there are societies that are conflict diverse and one of the core principles between those that are able to have

conversations like these are the ones that separate people's opinions from their selves. And but within again, friend groups, within teams of, in the workplaces, you can actually create intentional cultures of healthy heat. There are two other ideas that I've heard you discuss before that have really stuck with me. And this feels very related to,

but one is as you're creating the format or the structure, especially when you're dealing with something like heat that can, you know, too much can feel dangerous and too little feels unproductive. I've heard you talk about this idea that as a host, you want to have generous authority. Whatever happens is going to happen. That you actually, it is more generous to take charge. So what does that look like in practice? So the biggest mistake we make when we gather is we assume that the purpose is obvious and shared.

Yeah. Oh, I know what a birthday party is. I know what a staff meeting is. I know what a wedding is. And because we don't pause, actually ask, why are we doing this? What is the purpose? Why are we getting married? We should ask that first.

Why are we having a wedding? We tend to repeat old forms. And the biggest shift is to first ask, particularly when it seems totally obvious, why are we doing this? What is the need here, right? If I'm turning 37 or 47 or 67, what is it in this moment in my life? What's a need in my life that I might be able to address by bringing together other people? Is it adventure? Is it curiosity? Is it nostalgia? Is it feeling a sense of loneliness? Those are actually different formations of a party. And part of the role of a host in modern life is particularly if you have, if

you're creating a sharper gathering, you're creating a gathering that might be a pickleball tournament for people who have never played pickleball before or a like rave, you know, fill in the blank. You need to really actually help people on board to begin to understand what that is. And a good host, you know, gathering isn't just about connection and love, it is, but it's also about power. It is the radical decision to say, I think a certain group of people should spend their time in a very specific way. Are you on board?

So a good host practices what I call generous authority, and that is using your power for the good of the group to help it achieve its purpose. And so often we abdicate our role as hosts because we don't wanna impose on each other. But when you actually have a specific idea, then to actually help people understand what is that world that you're building

and how do I be successful there, you need to actually help protect people from each other, connect them to each other and to the purpose, and temporarily equalize them. And to do that before anyone enters the room. So generous authority isn't like having people come in and be like, this is how this is gonna go. It's actually pausing well before and beginning to think

like, okay, what is the need in my life? How do I actually begin to tell a story that invites people? It's very simple way of thinking about it is, host a gathering you want to attend, but then bring people along. Okay, we're going to take a quick break and then we'll be right back with more from Priya. Whether you're in your running era, Pilates era, or yoga era, dive into Peloton workouts that work with you.

From meditating at your kid's game to mastering a strength program, they've got everything you need to keep knocking down your goals. No pressure to be who you're not. Just workouts and classes to strengthen who you are. So no matter your era, make it your best with Peloton. Find your push. Find your power. Peloton.

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and what that means for you and for Canada. This situation has changed very quickly. Helping make sense of the world when it matters most. Stay in the know. Download the free CBC News app or visit cbcnews.ca. From fleet management to flexible truck rentals to technology solutions, at Enterprise Mobility visit cbcnews.ca. And we are back. Enterprise Mobility, moving you moves the world. And we are back. People sometimes think like gathering is inherently an extrovert's game. And you've talked about how introverts are often the best hosts.

And it's because there are so many gatherings that they don't want to be at. So if you can get it, you can design the gathering that you do want to be at. It's going to be specific. It's going to be unique. It's going to be at. So if you can design the gathering that you do want to be at, it's going to be specific. It's going to be unique. It's going to be more thoughtful. So introverts are actually the same way that as a conflict diverse person, you're a better conflict mediator.

Introverts are sometimes the best hosts and the best planners of gatherings. Absolutely. I mean, when I began to research my book, The Art of Gathering, I started probably in 2012. And the book came out out in 2018 and one of the things that I interviewed over a hundred different types of gatherers from all walks of life, a hockey coach, a rabbi, a photographer who has ten minutes with a head of state and 19 bodyguards in the room, like what does he actually do minute by minute to shift the room.

And one of the things I found over and over again was that many of the people, other people told me who were amazing gatherers, self-identified as introverts, or often on the outside of things. And I asked one of them, why do you think this is? And she said, well, I don't know about other people, but I am so uncomfortable at so many of the gatherings I go to that I began to create the gatherings I wish existed in the world. And it seems like other people like them. And so these gatherings, and it's not sort of relying on the charisma of your personality, it's actually having deep thought, it's making structure into it. So it could be something as simple as a dinner party.

This is a real example where a journalist came to me at the, when I came out with the Art of Gathering, she was assigned to host a dinner party based on Art of Gathering principles. a real example where a journalist came to me at the, when I came out with the art of gathering, she was assigned to host a dinner party based on art of gathering principles. And I was like, I don't even know what that means. Ask this question, what is a need that by bringing together a specific group of people you might be able to address?

And she was like, I don't know if this really counts. Sounds a little weird. Okay, one note to self, if your idea sounds a little weird, keep going. Like you're moving in the right direction. That is such the rule for comedy as well. If it doesn't sound weird, it's probably boring. And if it sounds weird, people are going to love it. Yes. And so this woman was thinking, okay, what's a need in my life? She's like, I don't know. I'm exhausted. And I was like, okay, tell me more. She said, well, I'm a worn out mom. I'm a journalist, but I'm also, I'm totally exhausted. I was that she was like, in fact, the other day I was at a friend's house and she cut

me a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and she fed me baby carrot sticks. And I burst into tears. And she said, because it'd been a long time since I was the one being taken care of. I was like, okay, follow that thread, right? Found a need, found a pain, found an ache. What if I threw a dinner party for my other worn-out moms? Great, give it a name." And she called it the worn-out moms hootenanny. And I said, give it, right, make it tighter, make it more specific. It is comedy, make it more specific. And she said, if you talk

about your kids, you have to take a tequila shot. Right? And she's all of a sudden, it's like the building of a world. There's, and so the last thing I'd say is, a gathering, particularly when you're thinking of like, what, how could we spend our time? It's an idea, it's a promise, it's the creation of a temporary alternative world. And so part of gathering is you're telling people a story. You're inviting them to choose one part of their identity and heighten it just for a night, just for a morning, or take an entirely new identity. We also often think we have to success or meaning

or a beautiful night is to unify the group, but actually success or meaningful connection is when you complicate the individual. One of the things that I took away most from your book and hearing you talk and doing research about you is this idea that a good gathering is actually, you use the word disputable a lot, that a good gathering is something that someone could disagree with and say actually this isn't for me. That like when we go for everyone's gonna love it, often no one really loves it, everyone just doesn't have a problem with it.

So one example you gave is a woman who, it was her birthday and she decided she wanted to have more of an adventure. So she invited a bunch of people to wake up before the sunrise, go to the ocean with her, watch the fisherwomen pull in their fish and then watch the sunrise. And that's a thing where a lot of people are gonna go,

I do not want to be awake at 430 in the morning. So a no. But the people who do, it's a real thing. And it doesn't have to be that dramatic. But I think this disputable piece really, that really unlocks something for me because that's something I never thought about before. It's disputable.

It is not necessarily for everyone in the sense that they're like, I'll hit snooze on that invitation. But also counterintuitively, all of these cities show that actually when you have some amount of a little bit of shared struggle, right? The moment where at the wedding it starts pouring rain and everyone starts screaming and then laughing and then pops their umbrellas and then they actually start realizing those umbrellas have no point. They start just dancing in the mud, right?

That's the moments we remember. Those are the moments where there's like a little bit of like a rip in the universe. And so Disputable is both to sort of understand like who should emerge, but it's also to push us a little, is to help us get out of our kind of our everyday loops or tracks.

I also think if you're someone like me who is conflict diverse or doesn't want fears, a lot of like imposing on other people or making them feel bad. I just feel like it is such an important reminder and a gift to remember that people can say no. I feel like I always underestimate how much people love to be invited to things, even when they are going to say no. It's so rare that someone is like, how dare you invite me to that party that doesn't sound fun?

They're like, that's so nice. I don't want to do that. I'm not going to come. I still want to be invited. I will just say personally, if you invite me to an event that starts at 10 p.m., there is zero chance that I will be there. And I love to get the invite.

I love to know that you're about to, you're going to go dancing from 11 to four. That is absolutely unfathomable to me. And yet I love that to know that you're doing it. And so to actually have ties in which you're inviting each other to the things that you love, but also giving each other off ramps is the key to longterm sustainable, sustainable relationships and friendships

and to give people the dignity of letting them make the decision themselves. So I have a one-year-old, first child, and before he was born, I had a monthly gathering that I would do. I had moved to Los Angeles and I really wanted to get to know the city better. And I also wanted to spend time with friends. So we created this thing called the LA Adventure Club where we just went to a neighborhood that we hadn't gone to before. We'd spend the hours of 10 to noon exploring a neighborhood and then we'd get lunch. It was so fun.

It was great. I did it like clockwork every month since our kid has been born. I have done it maybe once or twice in a year. And I feel the loss of it. What happens when you have a gathering that really means a lot, and then you kind of can't do it anymore, or you're struggling to do it? First, congratulations.

Thank you. And second, welcome to life. Yes, totally. And you know, so what I hear and what you're saying is, at a very specific moment in time, you had, you saw a need, you had energy around it. It turned out to be a shared need. If people were like, yes, absolutely, I want to go to Chris's Adventure Club. And for a period of time, all of the variables worked. And then something changed. So the first thing I would just think is when you start noticing this loss to ask is it the exact form that I deeply miss and do you

need to talk to your partner about making if this makes if this is a really important part of you to continue to feel sane around? Are there other negotiations around the rest of the week that you are willing to kind of shift and that you actually do this? You realize this is a really important part of your identity and your sense of friendship. The second, is everyone else still deeply attached to this form? Is this a workable form that because of all sorts of different reasons, Saturday at 10am is disproportionately important and available to like the friends in our life.

Third, what is it about this form that I loved? Was it that it got me to different parts of the city? Was it that the frame of our mind, because of the time of day or because we just knew it was adventure, had me interacting with friends in a way that we don't normally over pasta on a Saturday night? Can I create this in a different form and what might that be? And then the last thing I'll just say is to give yourself some grace and parenthood is a leveling and there are massive shifts that are happening

between you and your little family of three that need some space to take new forms and zero to three is a really intense time for most family structures. And again it's just it's a different formation. And it doesn't mean that all of your energy should just go towards your family. Studies now show, surgeon general also issued a warning that parenting is in crisis, right? We need to have friends, we need to have other identities.

But all of this to say is become curious about why you love this specific formation and then run some experiments to see what is the current next form now and to also give yourself some grace to be able to realize like there is a unique chemical composition here and what of this is sparking in me and knowing that it might take a new form as you grow. Hmm that's really helpful I love that. It also makes me think an example I've heard you sometimes give when you talk about how an artful rule can make a big difference in a community is of an online community that is

actually a group of people who do not have children. There's this community, We Are Child Free, and they created a really thoughtful rule where they said, we are not for dating. We are not going to be like to meet a romantic partner. And that is just our rule that we are going to have all sorts of other connections, but it's not going to be a dating or singles romantic partner. And that is just our rule, that we're going to have all sorts of other connections, but it's not going to be a dating or singles community. And because that would change what we're going for here. This was from a monthly newsletter I do that's free and open to the public.

And I did a newsletter about how pop-up rules that are deeply and well-thought through, we think of them as deeply restricting or controlling. But a well-designed rule, as any game designer will tell you, actually allows the creation of a world and the protection of a world. If this began to become a dating site, it became a different set of questions, right? A different set of, a different geography of thought, a different geography of interest. And they wanted to protect this very unique space online that was a closed and private community that you could choose to enter by asking what does it look like to have in our adult life to not have

children and what are the unique conversations that people who share those questions can have. I didn't actually know that you were involved in improv and that was a part of your background but it makes so much sense to me now. That's a part of my background too and something I really love. I'm working on this book about humor and how we can have more laughter in our lives and develop humor. And part of the energy for that

has been talking to these two, I'm sure you know them, but maybe people listening don't. Two of the like most legendary improvisers, these Chicago improvisers, TJ and Dave, there's this kind of apocryphal story that they won an award, right? That Dave Pasquese won this award for best improviser. And then when he got up to get the award,

he said, I've always been taught that my job is to make the other people look better. So I'm sorry, and I'll try and do better. That was his acceptance speech. And it feels like so I feel that spirit, that energy so much in you and your work is really trying to use your time to use your gifts to help other people to look better, to do better, to feel better. And there's that there's a real generosity to this, which, again, I think is a little bit counter to the maybe popular understanding of what a gathering, what a birthday party is, right? It's like, it's about me, it's my wedding, it's my birthday party, it's my baby shower, it's whatever.

And I think you're really, you're trying to reframe this. It feels like in this way, that actually is not about centering the person, but rather centering the community. I really appreciate that. I'm very touched by that. I think you can absolutely gather in a way that is deeply selfish,

right? And I think that unfortunately in our like over commercialized, over capitalized, like deeply almost like branded life events, it can actually become that, right? Whether it's like the race to the sweet 16, but it's actually all about the stuff, right? Or how much money is spent or in weddings, like how much, again, how much money is spent and how it, and these are like shows strategically, historically, tribally of status. And at the deepest level, part of like our loneliness crisis, I believe it's for many structural reasons, it's for economic reasons, it's for historical reasons. And one of the norms, you said it earlier, that I think leaves us from each other is this convoluted, I don't know where it fully comes from, it comes from a good place of like a desire to not impose on one another. And that instinct to not impose, it's become distorted somehow,

that instinct to not impose quote unquote is leaving us deeply lonely. I had a friend, and all of the examples I share, I have permission to share, I had a friend, she lived in New York City, she, her father died, and her father was an Egyptian immigrant to Germany. And her father passed away and she went, she flew back home to Germany to, for the funeral. And she came back and I said, you know, how are you doing? And she said, it was really nice to be there for my mother. And, and that, I, but I still feel a huge loss. And it was sort of strange because none of my present life, none of my adult friends, none of who I've become living in the city for the last 15 years were there.

And so I feel this kind of like false limb of like, there was this funeral, but I wasn't funeraled. I was there. My primary role was as I wanted it to be, was to be a support to my mother and to see my childhood friends. And so I said to her, well, what if we hosted some kind of funeral? And she said, well, what do you mean?

And I said, well, and I also felt kind of a loss. Like I, as her friend, that one of the biggest things that has happened in her entire life has happened and I didn't have a way to engage. I struggled to have for language for it. We created this Shiva, sort of sitting Shiva from the Jewish tradition which she had within her

extended family, but it was also there's a death ritual in Islam which she also came from that tradition where she kind of put together these different deep wisdoms and instincts that we want to be together but in this modern way. And so very practically she invited I think it was 40 friends she invited she told them the story of what happened again tell the story bring people in she invited them to wear dark colors black or navy blue should they like she again she spelled it all out please come at 6 p.m. we will start at 630 we will feed you at 8 p.m. there will be a feast please do not come or leave between the hours of 630 and 8 because we will be gathering." And she sat in the

middle of this kind of circle is the wrong word we're all like in a living room and she sat in a chair and she just told us stories about her father and she showed us photos of him and she laughed and she cried and we laughed and we cried and we started to realize like oh my gosh we thought this was just our friend actually she's exactly her father's daughter and then at the end she played a Sora that he would listen to every morning in the shower and then we closed and then we ate and it was so beautiful it was so beautiful for all of us and her instinct in the beginning was like is this selfish I'm asking all these people to come and mourn for me? No, no, I can't impose. But at the deeper level, because

she was willing to sit there, she became a vessel. It was a deeply generous act. Half of us were in the room crying for her, but also for ourselves, of the people that we've left, of the selves that we've left, of realizing, oh we haven't necessarily mourned the loss of people in our lives that the friends of ours haven't been able to see. And part of what she was finding her way to was like a modern ritual and modern life where the people again, I know I sound like a broken record, you don't live or die or eat or breathe or in the same plot of land your entire life.

And so when we actually are deracinated and lose the rituals from which we came, we need to replace them with something. And part of that is experimentation. And when it is relevant and when it hits a need and when it's a shared need, it might begin to stick and invite new rituals into our common culture together. That's such a beautiful example you gave of your friend. But I want to just also point out that even in the simple gatherings, part of what can make it feel really elevated

and special and meaningful is just like having those rituals, right? Having the thing that you start. So for example, like at our family dinner thing that we do, one thing that we do is we always end by taking a blurry picture of everyone there. So it's just like you move the phone and everyone waggles their heads as fast as they can

and the picture comes out blurry and it's just like a move the phone and everyone waggles their heads as fast as they can. And the picture comes out blurry and it's just like a funny little ritual. And just that simple like ritual, which he was explicit. Like I am creating a ritual so that this will feel like a ritual. It has kept the thing going. Rituals give meaning to life. Rituals allow us to feel an obligation to something, right?

Like it's not rocket science, but for whatever reason, we humans need rituals to bind us to each other, to break us apart from each other, and that it is both the agony and the ecstasy of modern life that we craft the rituals. Priya, it has been such a gift to talk to you. Thank you so much for making the time and for being on the show. Thank you so much for having me and for modeling amazing hosting.

Wow. Okay. I'll take it. I'll take it. That is it for this episode of How to Be a Better Human. Thank you so much to today's guest, Priya Parker. Her book is called The Art of Gathering and she's got a digital course called The Art of Gathering on her website. She's also got the New Rules of Gathering Guide, and listeners of this show can get 15% off that course with the discount code BETTERHUMAN. Now, they are not sponsoring us. This is not an ad. We are just sharing that. I am your host, Chris Duffy, and you can find more from me, including

my weekly newsletter and other projects at chrisduffycomedy.com. How to Be a Better Human is put together by a team who gathers well, and I mean well, they gather. On the Ted side, we've got Daniela Balorazo, Ban Ban Cheng, Chloe Shasha Brooks, Lainey Lott, Antonia Lay, and Joseph De Bruyne. This episode was fact-checked by Julia Dickerson and Mateus Salas. On the PRX side, it is always an event when this crew assembles Morgan Flannery,

Norgil, Patrick Grant, and Jocelyn Gonzalez. And of course, thanks to you for listening. We are so glad to be back with this season. You can listen on Amazon Music or you can just ask Alexa, play How to Be a Better Human on Amazon Music. Wherever you are listening, please share this episode with a friend

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