Honest question - why would you wait until the next draught or plague to get to know your neighbors well? Why not start getting to know them today, before you "need" them?
Honest question - why is it considered so inherently important to spend time with your neighbors? I don't understand why I'm supposed to have a natural connection to certain individuals just because we chose to live in the same area. If my social circle consists of people who don't happen to live on my street, is that so bad? We don't really need to worry about having someone to come check up on us from next door because modern communication has extended our reach far beyond our own street.
I've never really been comfortable getting to know my neighbors. I feel like they see and hear too much about my private life as it is, it's actually awkward for me to see my neighbors.
You have time and have nothing better to do with it than to kill it? My condolences. Try having kids; it rids you of free time quite well! :)
Really, with current online life, people have contact less with random strangers and more with like-minded or otherwise interesting individuals. If in an [abstract] countryside you have to talk to you neighbors because there's no one else around, on the Internet the choice is wider.
OTOH your neighbors may be nice and interesting people; some of my neighbors are. Also you might have some local common interest, or could e.g. lend power tools or kitchen utensils to each other sometimes.
It's not about staring at the screen. It's about using that screen to contact your friends who live beyond your street to come over and sit around your fire.
People forget that 100 years ago that wasn't really an option.
You really don't see the benefit in being social be to the people around you? It doesn't have to have an intimate relationship.
Do you just ignore the people you work with as well for similar reasons?
OK, one reason off the top of my head. Say something suspicions is going on outside your flat. Someone that could be checking out your house wanting to break in. A friendly neighbor may go up and ask in a non threatening way if you were expecting to see John in just now, and could he take a message for you. Ignore your neighbor to the point he doesn't even know your name, and guess what. He won't give a shit. Which scenario is more likely to get your place broken into?
> why is it considered so inherently important to spend time with your neighbors?
It's propaganda disseminated by unhappy single women. :) I said it that way because not all single women are unhappy -- some prefer being alone, just as some men do. Recent statistics tell us that almost 1/2 of Americans are single, and they're about to become an absolute majority.
> Why not start getting to know them today, before you "need" them?
Maybe they're completely boring. Maybe the person under discussion prefers being alone unless and until the entire neighborhood is going up in smoke. It's not as though large groups of people are what nature has in mind, regardless of environmental and biological changes -- evolution doesn't work that way.
About 1/2 of Americans are now single. Is this a disease, or a result of personal preferences, by people who tried the alternatives and then made the least objectionable choice?
I wish my neighbours well, but for me socialising is a distraction from work and family. Those are my contribution to the (wider) community. Besides, I have trouble enough keeping up with relatives and schoolmates without introducing new, geographically-oriented relationships.
I agree with coldtea. Our consumerison is why it we get isolated. What is intresting, tendencys in DE show that people go back in the cities for shopping (it's more socializing).
http://www.presseportal.de/pm/8664/2804458/innenstadt-bleibt...
Maybe when our kids getting in adolescence find that this is the way to be diffrent than us.
Good Practise:
Start greeting people when you are in your neighbourhood. That's what I did. I got very fast in contact with above-, below my floor and people around in that block. We had big times (even with the very old folks!). Friendliness and courage (to do so) is the key to start a relationship. The cause of the problem is our missing culture (even neighbourhood parties) to get connectd.
g start flash-mobs!
I'm not a consumerist. Nor do I suffer from social anxiety. Who are you talking to, and giving advice to? Nothing in your comment addresses any of my points. Why not engage -- otherwise you remain 'isolated', surely?
I've never really been comfortable getting to know my neighbors. I feel like they see and hear too much about my private life as it is, it's actually awkward for me to see my neighbors.