Week 54 - Human connections equal survival 🌱

Hey my friend, this week I’ve heard from three different people that I’m good at listening to others (maybe they’re right). And not just listening, but also hearing and relating to what they say. That’s what's called “active” or “emphatic” listening nowadays (weird, huh? I thought it was just listening 😏).

On the other side, people love being heard so much that I get to learn a ton about them, while they know almost nothing about me. And it doesn’t bother them. They have an opportunity to share their story. They use it.

But to open up, they need to trust a person. Trust means feeling safe. And in a StoryBrand podcast, I heard this quote about safety:

“Why do families and tribes exist? They exist because they are survival assets. We are safer if we are together.”

And if we combine all those things, we’ll have this:
Listening ←→ Trust ←→ Safety ←→ Survival

Of course, it’s a simplified formula. There are a ton of extra layers. But the core is that if you make people feel heard, you basically help them to survive in this world 😉

And people always remember how you made them feel. That’s exactly why, if anyone asks me to reschedule a podcast at the last minute, or tells me “Sorry” for not answering my messages for a long time, I always say, “No worries, life happens, let’s just continue where we stopped any time.”

tl;dr Make people feel heard and at ease. Keep it simple and flexible. That’s how you make them feel safe and want to continue the conversation with you.

On a more practical side, I’ve recently started connecting with the humans mentioned in books. So I’ve read 2 books about community—“The Community-First Advantage” by Chris Catania, and one more that will be out on the 1st of April—and I took every person out of this book, and connected with them using a message like this:

“Hey Name, I've just finished reading Chris Catania's book, and since you're one of the amazing humans Chris mentioned there who helped him make such a great impact in the community world, I would definitely love to connect with you and keep walking on this community journey together 🤗🤓🤩”

I did it because if a person I admire is inspired by someone so much that they mentioned them in a book, I’d definitely love to connect with them! The friend of my friend is my friend!

It works very well so far! Out of nearly 20 messages, 15 people accepted my LinkedIn connection requests. And with some of them, we’ve even had coffee chats.

Why did it work? Of course, those are people from my professional industry (or nearby). And we already have one mutual connection.

I bet that less than 1% of readers of the book want to connect with anyone other than the author. Also, people like to be seen. And when you tell them you see their impact, you make them feel important, and they are open to connecting with you.

Still, I don’t know if it will work for other niches (I believe it will). So I decided to run an experiment and connect with more of those people.

Last week, I mentioned Joseph Stagliano’s example from the book Inspire, so I found him on LinkedIn and sent him this connection request:

So, let’s see 😉

tl;dr Book authors get much more attention than the people they mention in their books. People love to be seen. So when you message those people about their stories, you can start relationships with some great humans!

So yeah, that’s it for this week, and if you have any questions, thoughts, ideas, or personal examples of how to build better human connections, please answer this email, or connect with me on LinkedIn, and let’s talk 🤗🤓

💡 What influenced me this week 💡

Thoughts of the week:

• “We know not through our intellect, but through our experience.” - Maurice Merleau-Ponty, The Economist daily quotes

• “Why do families and tribes exist? They exist because they are survival assets. We are safer if we are together.” - StoryBrand podcast

• “Only the brave know how to forgive.” - Laurence Sterne, The Economist daily quotes

• “If it is a mistake of the head and not the heart, don't worry about it, that's the way we learn.” - Earl Warren, The Economist daily quotes

• “The more you know, the fuller your cup becomes. All of your accumulated experience, recognition, and success cements a set of beliefs on the way the world works. The full cup can’t accept anything new. There’s no room for new ideas. No ability to adapt. No space for uncertainty.” - Sahil Bloom’s newsletter

• “If you don't like someone's story, write your own.” - Chinua Achebe, The Economist daily quotes
  

Song of the week:

Book and quotes of the week:

The Richest Man in Babylon - George S. Clason

“If you desire to help thy friend, do so in a way that will not bring thy friend’s burdens upon thyself.”

“The hungrier one becomes, the clearer one’s mind works—also the more sensitive one becomes to the odors of food.”

“The soul of a free man looks at life as a series of problems to be solved and solves them, while the soul of a slave whines, ‘What can I do who am but a slave?”

Tools that I use with referrals:

• Descript - for anything around podcasting and video editing

• Beehiiv - for a newsletter (that’s what you receive 😅)

• Text Blaze - to access message templates with shortcuts (like “/ty”)

• Exali - promo “FROMYURII” - indemnity insurance for independent experts in Europe

• Manus - for building complex systems and projects

Daily actions:

• tell 1 person what I’m thankful to them for

• read a self-development book/listen to a professional podcast for 15 minutes

• make a valuable post/comment on LinkedIn

• tag 15 people in my connections database

• connect with 30 interesting people on LinkedIn

• invite 5 people to join the 👋Friendworking newsletter

Weekly actions:

• transcribe one new episode of the Creator Spotlight and Personal IPO (bi-weekly) podcasts, learn something from them, and connect with guests on LinkedIn

• connect 2 people who I believe need to be connected

• invite 30 people to follow the Community ROI podcast (and ask for some feedback).

If you have any thoughts, ideas, or questions, please 👇

And if you’d like to have more 👋 Friendworking in your life 👇

See you next week! 👋