Finding Your Third Place

Finding Your Third Place

I read a book about 15 years ago by a sociologist named Ray Oldenburg. The book, The Great, Good Place, described what he called a "third place" which is that place between home and work where you feel anchored and part of a chosen community. A place similar to some of the TV sets of the hit sitcoms in the 80’s and 90’s like the Boston bar in Cheers, "where everyone knows your name;" Central Perk, on the hit show, Friends; and the booth at the corner diner on Seinfeld. Oldenburg's book inspired me around 2002 to want to create a so-called third place in the Northern Virginia area where we were living at the time, a place of driven and upwardly mobile professionals in ulcer-making jobs, most of them under the age of 40, with little or no sense of community in their lives, no connectedness to others, no place for conversation, no place to feel "rooted." A place where way too many people were on anti-depressants. Witnessing this, and having read Oldenburg’s book, I developed a passion for creating a coffeehouse to fill the perceived void - a place with no internet, with open mic nights and featuring live local musicians, a place for clubs and artists to congregate, clusters of seating to encourage conversation, game nights -- you get the picture.

My vision of a coffee shop third place never happened, but that passion still bubbles up from time to time when I see people who seem isolated and disconnected from community even though physically surrounded by people. It’s a longing you can see in the eyes. I get my connection primarily from my church and from the relationships with friends I have there. We get together in small groups to go out to eat, walk on the beach, or just hang out and chat. Meet-ups have become popular as people with common interests find others with similar interests to spend time with. In England social ties happen in pubs; France has cafés and Austria has coffee houses; Sweden has a national tradition called “fika” which essentially means break time where locals take a pause in the day to come together to drink coffee and eat pastries, discuss the news, and generally just catch up with each other. Once upon a time in America, back in my grandfather’s day, common third places included country stores, public parks, barber shops, hair salons, soda shops, taverns, and even large front porches where neighbors gathered. Where can those third places be found today?

I have a theory that social media, the great forum of the ego, has unfortunately become that place for a lot of people - especially young people. Conversation is becoming a lost art. We live for “likes and retweets.” We hashtag our thoughts and opinions. We walk, eat, and live with a smartphone or tablet in our hands spiritually separating us from each other. It is the great “dumbing down” of intellect and discourse. You've seen it - a family out to eat at a nice restaurant, each member sitting at the table looking down at a 2x4 inch rectangle instead of being in that moment with each other. I've even seen people on a date in the same posture of self-involvement. Then there are people who, obviously fearing insignificance, enlist obnoxious and narcissistic “selfie-sticks” to document and post every waking moment in their quest to be an "influencer"; do we really need those kind of influencers in our lives?

It's my feeling that social media is crippling us as a community of humans in ways we don't yet fully comprehend - perhaps fated to eventually becoming a clinical disorder or syndrome. It may have broadened our social interactions, but they have become shallower. Our friends, therapists, and validators have become faceless people with screen names in chat rooms. What effect is this having on young people and their healthy socialization, and developing sense of self-worth and character? It’s too easy for socially awkward teens to have insincere virtual relationships and avoid social interaction that would actually help them to develop more fully and give them a healthy perspective. It’s too easy for bullies to become cyber-bullies. It’s too easy for intimacy and privacy to be violated by a compromising photo or video. There is already evidence that young people absorbed in hundreds of social media transactions per day are becoming less and less empathetic and more egocentric and superficial. Some are also becoming more and more depressed with a vague undefinable sense of hopelessness and disconnection.

Years ago I was sitting in a coffee shop close to the college where I worked in Virginia where I observed two female students who were friends, sitting at a narrow table facing each other with their laptops open in front of them, not speaking. At first, I assumed they were each doing their studies, but soon discovered they were actually texting back and forth while facing each other with less than 30-inches separating them! I found it astounding at the time, and that was 10 years ago.

Then there were the husband and wife who lived next door. I went to visit the wife but ended up talking to her back as she would never disengage from the virtual world in which she was fully absorbed. Her husband, downstairs on his computer, and she upstairs, communicated through computer messages. I eventually left but I’m not sure she ever noticed.

There are lots of people who judge their social success by how many Facebook friends they have. But are these people really friends or just loosely defined acquaintances at best? Will these virtual friends show up for you, even when you are going through a hard time or at your worst or will they just text a sad face emoticon? We need friends who will hold our hand when we cry, or lay down beside us and just listen. That kind of friendship takes investment – sending a text just requires opposing thumbs. We all have an innate need to be heard and validated, for people to care about what we have to say or how we feel. We likewise need a place to give of ourselves in unselfish ways in the give and take of true integrated community. It helps us have a sense of our place and worth in the world. To feel grounded.

Social platforms meet a need but are poor substitutes for the kind of face-to-face interaction that we really crave. Being too immersed in a digital world can almost become pathological and makes us not present in the real world, not present with each other. True third places are a face-to-face phenomenon, places that nurture discourse and foster friendships. Places of emotional connection and social integration. A place to touch and be touched in a warm hug or friendly handshake. The pace of life has increased and our time seems scarce and precious, but we need to slow down – we need a reason to slow down – a place to slow down - to satisfy that human craving for connection and true community. Perhaps in disconnecting occasionally from our devices and looking up we would find what we’ve been missing – a friend, instead of just a contact. There is an Irish proverb that says, “It is in the shelter of each other that people live." Find your place - Find your people - and CONNECT.