Young children are brilliant at wandering up to others they don’t know and, within two minutes, are running around as if they’ve known each other forever. As we know, it gets harder with age.
A thirteen-year-old who changes schools can have a nightmare making friends because of that “we were here before you, and you’re not one of us“ mentality. “You’re not from around here, are you?” strikes fear in most people. So, what’s the solution? How do you make friends when you’re new? It’s easy to say that if you want new friends, be friendly. In the real world, it probably means you end up hovering around a group of people, smiling and hoping that you’ll be accepted. Pretty daunting for anyone and nigh on impossible if you are carrying anxiety.
Some people we like at first sight; some we instantly dislike. It’s a minefield, as we know. Fortunately, most people are essentially nice once you get to know them, and it’s our fear that holds us back. The luck of the draw also comes into play. That and persisting, just being there every day, means at some point you’ll be accepted. I once taught at a school where no one would speak until you’d been part of the furniture for two years, and that was only the staff! I kid you not – that’s what it felt like.
At a performing arts group, you get an “in.” The work gets everyone moving and interacting together from the off. Newcomers are welcome, and they bring new energy. If you work on a show, you are suddenly thrown into a situation where you are rehearsing together, you go through the rehearsal process, perform the show and bingo, you have a shared past, something in common to refer back to. In a short space of time, you usually bond on some level. That process is accelerated if you work hard at what you’re doing, then it becomes “I’ve found my tribe.”
That said, some people still find it tricky. Maybe they are challenged socially. Some children seem only to be interested in themselves and expect the world to be as they see it. Now that is difficult. You want to rush in and say to them, ” Be more interested in the others, less about you.” That rarely works; in fact, they resent you for it. It’s one of those skills they have to learn for themselves – and sometimes it can take a lifetime.
People like that get helped in a performing arts school because their self-centredness gets worn down. When you’re in class, the work is between the participants, so there’s no time for someone to play “look at me.” If you’re all busy singing a Taylor Swift song, there’s precious little time for anything else.
It’s lovely to see the smiles and laughter that come from a shared moment of theatre and the friendship that it leads to. And we love the fact that some people who went to Theatretrain later ended up married to each other. And that’s another life skill.
