When you attend a party you get to show up, participate, and simply walk away at the end of the night with an experience and an opinion. It might be fun, stimulating, exciting, connective, too long, boring, awkward…but all you had to do was show up. Not a bad deal.
Meanwhile, when you throw a party, you know every detail of everything going on. And you’re paying attention. If people don’t seem happy you wonder if the food went bad. If they’re not talking enough maybe the drinks are low. If they’re talking too much maybe the drinks are low. Maybe they’d be having more fun if they were standing over there rather than over here. Should the music be louder? Is there enough laughing? And you put a lot of effort into making this thing whole thing happen.
So if you’re an attendee, enjoy it knowing that the simple joy of the party was a lot of work for other people.
And if this is a hard concept to grasp, throw your own party. You’ll get it.
»» Party= show, event, gathering, dinner, meet up, rally, exhibition, parade…
