I touch people more often than most. Is that really such a bad thing? Of course, there is the conventional kind of touch, like handshakes or fist bumps, air kisses (carefully not touching each other), the jovial masculine shoulder hitting or sporty one-armed embrace, and of course the ever so tentative ladies hug. All those are done very deliberately, and they are really not enjoyable encounters, just confirmations of a social cohesion. Casual touch is not about etiquette, but about a personal connection, an acknowledgement of a need in either of the concerned parties. When you see someone you may not know but clearly recognise they are in some sort of distress – maybe crying on a park bench, or looking lost and confused – would you approach them and start a conversation? You just might. Would you go as far as putting a hand on their shoulder to console them, or even holding their hand, thus providing a human connection for someone in need? Most likely you wouldn’t. It’s a sad state of affairs that political correctness withholds that joy of non-sexual physical touch from most of us. We stop in our tracks for fear of repercussions and don’t even go down that road. I call bullshit on that one! I believe that everyone in distress has the right to be consoled, and being told that is not the done thing smacks of being inhumane. Besides this reactive example to another human being in pain, let’s also look at casual touch for purely practical reasons. As a student, many of my buddies were North African students and I learned a valuable lesson from them. When someone want to talk to someone who was engaged in a conversation, rather than interrupting or waiting for a good moment to do so, they gently touched that person on the upper arm, the hand, the back, the shoulder, … to indicate they are there. When that conversation then hit a natural breaking point, they would turn around and engage with the new person to find out what that was all about. Touch was used for communication, in a very efficient way that did not interrupt anything, but still managed to convey a message: “I’m here, waiting for you to make the next move”. I believe there are many more opportunities to introduce this non-intrusive way of communication into our daily lives, and more specifically in the way we deal with people we know and love. Communication involves compassion and empathy.
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About me
These are my own thoughts on aspects of my work I feel strongly about. Archives
September 2021
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