> After she’d been talking for about 20 minutes, I began to get an unpleasant, familiar feeling: I bet if I stop asking her questions, she won’t ask me any.<p>> Sure enough, she wrapped up one answer, then looked at me expectantly, like a dog waiting for a treat. Oh hell no, I thought. No way. I turned to the person next to me, a friend. “She’s a non-asker,” I said.<p>I use to wait for other people to talk to me. I didn't feel like I knew how to do the social conversation thing, especially because of my dislike of generic small talk.<p>At some point I made it a point to "practice" this skill, the same as I would practice a sport, messing up terribly at times, but others executing as planned. Thus, I have some grace for people that know how to talk when asked, but lack the thought to ask back. Maybe they only want to talk about themselves, maybe talking to new people makes them nervous or self conscious or whatever it was I felt most of the time. Who knows. Being the one asking the questions puts that person in charge of the flow and direction. You can steer it back or away or around.<p>I will give it a bit and try to probe for common interest or something that I can talk about as well. If that can be found, then the ones that are simply "bad" (or more likely, un-practiced) at social situations will flow into a give & take conversation if you can find the route to a mutual topic first, hopefully by picking up on small details from their introduction story (the simplest more nature flow, without having to do a hard pivot to the environment context). Think of it as a choose your own adventure book, with you in the driver's seat. For the ones that just want to talk about themselves, that adventure will swiftly end on its own.