How to break the ice in a conversation? Of the dozens and dozens of tools that I could share in this video, the reason I’m picking apart this idea of positive social risks is whether you’re an introvert or an extrovert. This mindset is immensely useful in helping you break the ice in a conversation.
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There are lots of ideas and ways to break the ice in that conversation. I’m actually going to rewind back to 2013 where I was invited to give a TEDx talk on this idea of positive social risks. I want to break down what that is with the intention of giving you a really practical mindset to break the ice in your conversations.
Quick synopsis
The idea of a positive social risk is anything that stretches you outside of your own comfort zone, outside of what is familiar and normal and safe. Stretches you outside of that so your heart rate might go up a little bit with the intention of having a positive impact on somebody else. When you’re thinking about how to break the ice in a conversation, let’s apply this idea of positive social risk and let’s say you’ve just jumped into an online meeting 10 minutes early and a colleague or a student that you have never met yet or you don’t know really well is there and you’re both twiddling your thumbs. There’s a lovely chorus of and you need to know what to do to break the ice.
Positive Social Risk
We’re going to break it down each word. Positive social risk. Positive speaks to the intention that you have. I think when we think about breaking ice in a meeting, we’re typically thinking about ourselves and we’re worried about how we’re going to look or how we’re going to show up. If you want to break the ice in a conversation, you need to let go of how you look and focus on what the other person is thinking, feeling, caring about because if your intention is focused on them, no matter what you do, it will probably break the ice. The point of breaking ice is to chip away at this cold outer layer so that you can get to a more comfortable area. I can’t film the rest of the video like this because this is terrifying me. That’s positive. It speaks to the intent that you have in how you’re breaking the ice. The word social, it relates to people. Okay, that’s pretty obvious. Nothing’s super brilliant there. But it’s important because when you think about how to break the ice in conversation, sometimes people bring in things into the conversation. They’re like, “Oh, did you see that baseball game last night?” And they pulled that into the conversation. That’s not about that person or about you. That’s about something separate and outside. That’s fine. You can break the ice with things that are external to the conversation and yet, I think a really good way to break the ice in a way that actually promotes meaningful connection and not just fills time with small talk is if you’re breaking the ice with something about you and or about them. That’s the social component of that idea.
Inherent Risk
Then the last bit is perhaps the most important, risk. When you are talking about breaking the ice in a conversation, there is inherent risk. In any social interaction, there’s inherent risk. There’s the chance that somebody you’re going to do something, say something, ask something. They’re not going to like it and you’re going to feel like they don’t like you. There’s that risk.
Perceived Risk
Now, what I want to say related to risk is that the perceived risk is always way higher than the actual risk. Always. Unless you’re like in a dark alley at 2 am and maybe the actual risk is actually a little bit higher than the perceived risk. But the perceived risk in social interaction is almost always higher than the actual risk. When you think about breaking the ice in a meeting, taking this entire mindset, just do something. I know that’s terrible advice. This video is totally worthless have I just left you with do something.