Apr 5
I Was a Connection-Whore. Here’s What I’ve Learned.
I’ve learned it’s not about the number of connections I have; it’s about HOW connected I am.
Duh, that seems obvious, right?
Yet back when social networks were coming online, it wasn’t apparent to me. My fragile Ego wanted to connect with as many new people as possible. Each new connection represented an opportunity to explore the unknown; perhaps a new adventure, project, or friend was another connection away. I was a connection-whore (yeah, that’s a thing).
God, it did wonders for my fragile Ego in need of recognition and self-worth. However, something happened once I crossed the line of 10,000 connections; I felt disconnected.
In my pursuit of building my network, I failed mightily in creating meaningful connections. With age came the perspective that my younger self was more interested in the transaction, not the person. I wasn’t seeing the person because I was too focused on the potential thing that person represented.
My perspective shifted, especially in recent years. That network of now 15,000 connections feels like a tangled web of poorly intentioned efforts mixed with remnants of my past self. Old business and personal relationships anchored in the past with nearly zero relevance to who I am and where I’m going.
One of my all-time favorite concepts is Robin Dunbar’s notion that we can only maintain 150 meaningful relationships. After reading Adam Grant’s new book, Think Again, I questioned my belief in Dunbar’s number only to find new research that said our networks could easily exceed that number.
Perhaps it’s my Neanderthal genome, but 150 real connections seems a stretch. By real connections, I’m talking relationships where I know something about that person, and we both won’t revert to discussions about the weather.
So I’m left with the questions of who I want to connect or reconnect with and why? That’s a values-based question, and it has challenged me to reflect upon my personal values. I’ve got the business values nailed, but not so much around the personal ones.
Our values are shown to us daily by what we do or avoid doing; we need the courage to acknowledge what we see in the mirror. So I’m going to start there and get in touch with my personal values and see what they say about the network of REAL connections I’m open to discovering. Covid is behind us; time to start rekindling real human connections.
