The Magic of Breaking Bubbles
the magic of breaking bubbles
While the first thought when reading the title might be about actual bubbles, that you create with soap and that sparkly shine in the sun, the bubbles I’m referring to are the social bubbles.
A good number of months ago, I believe during the previous summer holidays (but my memory is not that well), the extent to which my life is actually taking place within bubbles came as a realisation to me. If you would look up the definition of a social bubble, it would be described as ‘a small group of people from more than one household who socialize together but do not meet members of other households’ (https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/social-bubble). Though I believe it can be shaped a bit broader than that, and we actually partake in a wide arrange of social bubbles based on what we occupy ourselves within our daily lives.
For me, my bubbles for example are my work bubble, my friend group bubble, my university bubble, my family bubble, and my living area bubble. These bubbles fill my daily life most of the time, and only rarely do I find myself out of that. So actually I am quite limited to those daily social bubbles. However, when I realised how much I live in a bubble and of who that bubble is made up (not as diverse as I would prefer), I almost felt a bit saddened as well as shocked. Not because I do not like the people in there, as most of them are amazing and great people. But as there are so many different types of people, cultures, knowledge and perspectives we can experience outside of our own bubbles! Things completely outside of my own world of knowledge and experience.
Ever since I hence try to pay more attention to connecting with things and people outside of my bubble. For example, when choosing a voting office for the municipality elections I decided to go for Overvecht, which is generally a neighbourhood where less financially fortunate people live and where the voting turn-up was around 40%. A significant difference with the inner city of Utrecht (Binnenstad) where generally more financially fortunate people live, and where the voting turnup was 89% in previous elections; which is where I live. I will not go into detail on the socio-economical differences between the two neighbourhoods, seeing that this is merely a blog and no research essay :), but you can imagine that the two neighbourhoods differ quite significantly regarding who lives in them. Therefore I thought it was a great opportunity to get in touch with people I would otherwise never encounter in my existing bubbles.
In the end, I am glad that I did, though perhaps I did not have as many deep conversations as it was a voting office and not a market square, I still got to get in contact with a lot of people different to who I encounter in my daily life. With different cultures, social norms and values, which I found very valuable.
I believe there is much to be learned and discovered by trying to break outside of your bubbles, and that can provide even more colour and content to your lives. When I have more time after my year as Board I certainly hope to be doing it even more. Hence I hope this small piece inspires you (at least a bit) to be more mindful of the bubbles. Perhaps it even gets you to break the bubbles more often and experience the magic of getting to know completely new things. How exactly? I am not sure either, maybe through charity work or just starting a conversation with a random person in a shop or on the streets. As long as you try and show interest, I am sure you will encounter many ways to do so :)
Fun fact: I used the word 'Bubble' 25 times (now 26).
