3 steps to turn everyday get-togethers into transformative gatherings | Priya Parker

**Elise Hu** (0:00)
I've been thinking a lot about what makes a good life, and when I dig into this question, it really comes down to the people around us, neighbors, teammates, the friends and family we share a meal, a game, or a group chat with. It turns out our health and happiness may depend on them so much more than we realize. So for August's TED Talks Daily playlist, we've gathered five of our favorite talks on finding our people, our community, whether it's at a dinner table, in a video game, or in a garden growing in the middle of the city. Happy listening.
You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hue. We gather all the time, birthday parties, work meetings, holiday dinners, team gatherings. But do you ever wonder why sometimes they seem to fall a little flat?
Even after fussing over the food and the flowers, we lose sight of the part that actually matters. Building connection. Conflict facilitator and author Priya Parker thinks it doesn't have to be that way. She has spent years studying what separates the gatherings that take off from the ones that don't. And in this talk from 2019, she shares three simple steps to turn your everyday get-togethers, whether it's a party, a meeting, or a dinner, into something meaningful, even transformative. Because how we gather is how we live. That's coming up right after a short break.
And now, our TED Talk of the Day.

**Priya Parker** (1:41)
When I was a child, every other Friday, I would leave my mother and stepfather's home. An Indian and British, atheist, Buddhist, agnostic, vegetarian, New Age-y sometimes, democratic household. And I would go 1.4 miles to my father and stepmother's home and enter a white, evangelical Christian, conservative, Republican, twice-a-week church-going, meat-eating family. It doesn't take a shrink to explain how I ended up in the field of conflict resolution.
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 canapes.
And I set out and interviewed dozens of brave and unusual hosts, an Olympic hockey coach, a circus soleil choreographer, a rabbi, a camp counselor, to better understand what creates meaningful and even transformative gatherings. And I want to share with you some of what I learned today about the new rules of gathering.
So when most people plan a gathering, they start with an off-the-rack format. Birthday party, cake and candles. Board meeting, one brown table, 12 white men.
Assuming the purpose is obvious, we skip too quickly to form. This not only leads to dull and repetitive gatherings, it misses a deeper opportunity to actually address our needs. The first step of creating more meaningful everyday gatherings is to embrace a specific, disputable purpose. An expectant mother I know was dreading her baby shower. The idea of pin the diaper on the baby games and opening gifts felt odd and irrelevant. So she paused to ask, What is the purpose of a baby shower? What is my need at this moment? And she realized it was to address her fears of her and her husband's, remember that guy, transition to parenthood. And so she asked two friends to invent a gathering based on that. And so on a sunny afternoon, six women gathered, and first to address her fear of labor, she was terrified. They told her stories from her life to remind her of the characteristics she already carries. Bravery, wonder, faith, surrender. That they believe would carry her and help her in labor as well. And as they spoke, they tied a bead for each quality into a necklace that she could wear around her neck in the delivery room. Next, her husband came in, and they wrote new vows, family vows, and spoke them aloud, first committing to keep their marriage central as they transition to parenthood, but also future vows to their future son. Of what they wanted to carry with them from each of their family lines, and what would stop with this generation. Then more friends came along, including men, for a dinner party. And in lieu of gifts, they each brought a favorite memory from their childhood to share with the table. Now, you might be thinking, this is a lot for a baby party, baby shower, or it's a little weird, or it's a little intimate. Good. It's specific. It's disputable. It's specific to them, just as your gathering should be specific to you.