wooden dining table with chairs next to living room with big windows — Photo by Anjie Cho Architect PLLC

I’ve noticed that a lot of people are yearning for more friendship and community right now. The holiday season in particular brings up a lot of feelings around belonging connections with other people. It’s a time when many people are thinking about creating a greater sense of family, whether that’s with their family of origin or their family of friends.

There are a few places in your home that relate to friendships, and one important one is your dining table. A lot of people nowadays aren’t using their dining tables for the purpose of dining. Especially since the pandemic began, many people are using the dining table as a substitute desk for their work-from-home space. Even before the pandemic, I found that many people didn’t end up eating around their dining room table. While eating around the kitchen island is fine, it’s also important to eat around the dining table sometimes if you want to invite more friendships into your life. Your dining table represents how you connect to your community. It’s the place in your home where you can break bread and enjoy a meal with close friends.

If you are looking for more friendships, deeper friendships, or more community, take a look and see if your dining table is being neglected. If it is, one simple thing you can do is to just start using it. Even if you have to use your dining table for work or other purposes as well, try cleaning it off and giving it some attention. Then, start eating some of your meals there.

You can also notice whether there is enough space around your dining table for the friends you want to invite into your home. If there’s just enough room for you and your immediate family, you might want to make space for more friends by adding an extra chair.

If you live in a smaller home and don’t have room for a dining table, do the best you can with what you have. You might need to make accommodations when you do have friends over, and move some of your personal things out of the way to make space for them. You can also create smaller place settings so that there is more room for people to sit and move around. It also might be that you need to go out in the world more, and create connections with friends at restaurants or at other people’s homes.

by Anjie Cho