Health & Wellness Running . LSU Lakes with "Slow Mode Runners" tied in to promoting better social communications and The Beatles, "Good Morning," song!
Montage Pic: Public Domains
“Good Morning!” - is certainly a catchy song from the Beatles “Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band” LP.
And it is a very simple, engaging and endearing phrase to greet someone whom you may encounter in your everyday life.
But I've noticed that I don't experience it much anymore, and it recently prompted me to realize that I didn't always initiate that and share it enough myself as I was taking a jog this morning around the LSU Lakes.
Well, then I started saying “Good Morning” to everyone I passed by, whether face to face or otherwise, and it was neat to hear some replies and smiles on faces that may have previously been expressionless.
Certainly, it is important to respect people's privacy needs and not cross basic space boundaries we all have, but I have found in my professional social work career and private life that isolation, especially heightened by COVID, had led to increased depression and other mental health concerns for many folks.
So I make a modest proposal that you join me in this “Good Morning Outreach” wherever you can use it appropriately, including and especially now in social media – a major means of communication for many of us nowadays.
This reminded me of a great lesson that I learned about email etiquette back in 2006, after Hurricane Katrina, when I had worked as a Supervisor with the NOLA Bound Program sponsored by the Louisiana Family Recovery Corps in a "Telephonic Case Management" service at the Call Center of Survey Communications, Inc., which was lead by John Boston.
We would not only give out multiple referrals to callers but also develop a Care Plan for those individuals whom we thought could reasonably achieve a successful return to the New Orleans area then.
A few times when I had communicated by email with John about programmatic concerns, I had noted how he had always started his email with some pleasant salutation like “Good Morning!” or likewise.
Subsequently, John constructively gave me some important feedback that I needed, as I would usually then just begin an email without a name or salutation and just go right to some type of directive statement.
Sure enough, I found that a simple salutation like “Good Morning” at the beginning of an email really set a positive tone for any communication needed and it seemed to prompt more openness and responsiveness from the recipients of the email.
So when I had completed my jog around the LSU Lakes and met up with some other “Slow Mode Runners,” - a group that I became aware of recently - I felt like it was indeed was a VERY Good Morning!
As a tie in to the Beatles “Good Morning” song, I'll end this piece with a revision of John Lennon's last lyrics in the tune, since some pretty gals happened to pass me by and asked me for the time:
“Somebody needs to know the time, glad that I'm here
Watching the (LEGGINGs) skirts you start to flirt now you're in gear ...
Go to a show you hope she goes
I've got nothing to say but it's OK …
“Good Morning! Good Morning! Good Morning! ….”
FB Note today for "Slow Mode Runners:"
Spider-Man, aka Keith John Paul Horcasitas, today joined Kimberly Rogers Davis , Ryan Rogers & Aniko Nowakowski for Slow Mode Runners this morning . LSU Lakes, 7 A ... we try to run every Saturday at 7 A at LSU Lakes if you want to join us.
I got on my Alien medal that one of my Social Work friends, Pam Pioth, LCSW, gave me ... see the little Green Man I'm wearing? ... since the government has finally acknowledged Roswell, etc. ... LOL!!!
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I'm glad that I got to your post, finally. I need to get back to calling out "Good morning, Vietnam!" to my Vietnamese partner, instead of begging her to turn on Good Morning America. And oh how I wish I could get out and run in the mornings or even walk in the neighborhood, saying Good Morning to everyone I meet. Like I used to do when I walked campuses of universities.
Wherever I've gone, I loved talking to strangers. And a simple Good Morning, or "Hello, how are you?" Can start a conversation with a stranger or even a neighbor that you haven't connected with yet.
But you failed to mention one thing. While in the past, I found it hard to interrupt those talking on their cell phones, because it would be impolite to interrupt what seemed to be very important discussions, it is even harder today to get people to look up, look at and smile or frown at what they see or hear. This is especially prevalent in waiting rooms where I always liked to talk to people while waiting. Before it was magazines that kept people from engaging. Now it is browsing or texting on cell phones that has everyone in their own little lonely bubbles afraid to engage fellow humans in a meaningful and conversational way… Very sad.
But I remain hopeful. Hopeful that my wheelchair and my happy and carefree attitude will break the ice again with a few people as I offer them my books for free.
Ron