Humans enjoy expressing, listening, helping and being there for each other in need, but a mix of good and bad experiences make us choose the safest ways. We choose safe ways to protect ourselves, our integrity and peace of mind so that casual or momentary expressions are not used or manipulated against us. We may want to share, contribute, and participate in several circumstances but some unpleasant experiences tend to push us away.

In the Maritime industry, working with new people in every contract, away from the comfort of personal relationships, is a well-accepted fact. Sometimes we feel the connect quickly with the new colleagues and hence feel enthusiastic to work with them, or sometimes we don’t connect so easily initially, taking more time to understand them.

I still remember my first impressions about my new teammates on the first day at the new workplace. HR was introducing the colleagues, and while everyone gave a warm welcome, I couldn’t help but notice that there was this one person who had a poker face and the smile felt forceful. I thought to myself that he is going to be the last person to be friends with in the organization. Time went by and as we interacted more and I got to know his kind nature better, he became the best-work buddy in few months. By the way, he still has the poker face and gives forceful smile, but as an individual he is much beyond that.

We may not have first good impressions every time, and we may not like or love working with few colleagues, but we still can maintain harmonious and respectful relationships. Learn to accept people with their good qualities and flaws. People with whom we bond well have flaws too and similarly people with whom we have interpersonal challenges have good qualities too. Rather than taking all unpleasant encounters personally, let go off certain things in phases and if possible, talk it out politely, and maintain respectful distance if it cannot be sorted at all.

Connect with people beyond workplace discussions, where you can develop other meaningful conversations to feel secure, happy, and positive. One can always make a choice to either focus on negatives or positives. Developing social connection is irrespective of having introvert and extrovert personality attributes. Number of friends really doesn’t matter but the quality of the connection does. As long as one feels connected and secure even with one person around, your happiness index will be on higher side.


The other benefits of high social connection as per studies are:

  • 50% increase in longevity
  • Lower rates of Anxiety and Depression
  • Better emotional regulation skills
  • Positive feedback loop
  • Improved Emotional, physical, and social well-being

Let’s consider an example – let’s say you requested for a dish to be cooked for you, and your request was fulfilled. Now reflect – did you feel happiness and loved only for the dish on your meal table or also towards the person who fulfilled it? Acknowledging the gesture and expressing your level of pleasure creates a tighter bond gradually.

Whether on-board or in our day-to-day life we show and receive simple gestures to and from people around us. Simply saying ‘thank you’ ‘you made my day’, ‘this feels good’ etc. goes a long a way in developing healthy relationships around.