Even with all this technology, we still want to *feel* connected

I am amazed with how many people who are surprised by the amount of ‘in person’ 1:1 networking that I do and evangelise about. Me, on the other hand, am not surprised at all. I come across so many people who don’t feel connected at all even though they are active on so many of the social media platforms available. Whist technology has made it possible and convenient to stay in touch with your first friend at kindergarten, it doesn’t necessarily make you feel more connected to them in any meaningful way unless you interact intentionally and actively, regularly and often.

This is the words that are missed out with all this technology around us. It is not the connectivity we need, it is the intentional interaction, actively, regularly and often. This is the basis of any good relationship. The technology (or not) that you use doesn’t improve anything on its own.

We read all the time about how more and more people are feeling more lonely and less happy with their lives because of what they see people doing online. This broadcasting of a great life that we all do, some more than others, is a way to make us feel better, but doesn’t manage to achieve that as soon as we someone else’s bigger and better post 2 seconds later broadcasted to the masses. When we speak to that person 1:1 we manage to get to the bottom of the bigger and better and find out a little more about the work involved to get to it. It makes us relieved, or with an action plan or example to follow. Something we have the chance to achieve ourselves. That connection is what people crave.

Technology is giving us another way of doing what people have been doing since time immemorial – finding others who we have something in common with. Technology is not making it better necessarily. It is making it possible in different ways. We need to remember this when we consider the world we live in. The same senses apply, the same mechanisms of humanity, the same need for company, connection, warmth and interaction. Some things cannot be replaced with technology, no matter how close the robot resembles your mother. We need to remember that when we consider a new platform for this or that, or the new Facebook of this or that. In the end, it is still a human at either end, trying to make friends with each other in some way or another.

Don’t even get me started on how this relates to trolling and the negativity we see on the internet!