Traveling by air has suddenly become a very risky experience given that the current situation has produced a perfect storm of overcrowded airports, overbooked or canceled flights, and passengers disturbing staff members.

With that in mind, the last thing you’d want to do is make an already tense situation worse by making the person sitting next to you on the aircraft uncomfortable.

The specialist notes that when in an aircraft, don’t tell the person next to you, “I’m a huge talker,” and then keep chatting as it is the worst worst thing you can do along with actually talking the whole flight or saying “I’m a nervous flier, therefore I talk a lot!'”

If you do begin a discussion, keep it brief and light as sitting next to someone does not oblige you to keep the communication going.

Only continue with the chat once you’ve been invited and unless it’s evident that both sides are eager and wanting to keep it going, it’s a lot of oral exchange with a stranger on an aircraft.

“Do not press them if they look to be impartial. Put your headphones on, put your phone on quiet, and remember that just because we’re sitting close to each other’s doesn’t mean we want to be forced to make a conversation,” adds the specialist.

“From then, if they need to speak, keep it light, listen a lot, and talk about them a lot more.”

She recalls spending twelve hours on a flight with someone  who plainly did not want to communicate.

“They thanked me when we were boarding and said that they were going through some personal issues and that they needed some peaceful time. They liked the fact that I did not force myself on them as they had expected.”

Sometimes the worst thing to reference someone on an aircraft is anything outside of the range of ‘hello’.

“Mutual respect is the kind of collaboration we really need in this world,” the specialist concluded.