Do you own your relationships?
Do you have any sort of plan when it comes to those in your life? Have you spent any time considering such a thing? I believe many do not have a plan or approach, and generally operate with a ‘I should call X’ soon when it pops into your head/heart.
This is a default mindset operating.
A little less than two years ago, I began to consider how to own the relationships more effectively in my life. I set out to get a little more organized and intentional with where I was spending my time and energy when it came to those closest to me.
I am still learning about this idea of managing my non-work relationships intentionally, and many times – I am not always the timeliest of people when connecting (this is a future post – connecting and relatedness) with those closest to me. In spite of my languishing discipline on investing more time into all of the relationships I have in my life, I do now think of the relationships I have in a few simple categories or circles.
Before I run through the outer world of relationships – there is a concept of inner world and inner relationships. I’m not going to go into this concept today – that is likely a worthwhile topic for another time. Instead, I’m going to focus on the outbound relationships in terms of connectedness as the main determining factor for the categories with a secondary factor at play. The secondary factor is relatedness.
Let’s talk about connectedness for a moment.
Connectedness is all about ‘the daily’ and frequency of contact. I recently heard on a podcast from Sean Wes (he’s got some incredible material) that putting out daily content, particularly video, really moves you into someone’s daily consciousness. He took it a step further and talked about daily contact with loved ones also does the same thing. Contact in this context is more than a text that says the obligatory ’good morning’ – actual contact that is specific to the relationship that you have. ‘Good morning Dad, I love you’ is a better example that counts.
So what the hell does ‘daily consciousness’ mean anyway?
It means that you are very likely to be raised up in somebody’s conversation with those closest to them. You are front of mind for that other end of the relationship. I had never considered this, when I started this 84 day journey – that I’d possibly be topics of conversations. I did expect to some extent that my connectedness with my family, friends, colleagues, and acquaintances would deepen or possibly even advance. I’ll write about this later.
In the same podcast, Sean elaborated on weekly video content production, and that a weekly push of content keeps you in the consciousness of the consumer/community. I think this can also be applied to relationships. If you are maintaining contact on a weekly basis with someone – there’s a very, very high chance of a strong connection that will be deepened over time. The parallels in terms of his content production strategy and connections in the context of relationships became obvious as I was listening to his editorial calendar ideas on that podcast.
Now, relatedness as a very quick topic. I will be writing about this concept in the future, as it is something I’ve invested heavily into since December of last year. Let me give you an example, I have a childhood friend who to this day I consider one of my truest friends in the world, and he’s a brother to me. We went to the same baby sitter for a solid 8 years or so, and I can go years without an overly deep conversation. Yet, within 2 minutes of seeing each other – we slip right back into being brothers. Hell, it is quicker than 2 minutes – it is immediate.
You likely have these relationships in your life. This is relatedness. You are plugged into the other person’s vibe to a varying degree, and the level of effort to connect coupled with the speed of ‘ease’ are good barometers when considering relatedness.
So this notion of categories or circles – let’s take a spin through the categories of relationships:
Innermost Circle
- Connectedness: Very high to high
- Relatedness: Very high
This is made of the people closest people in my life, my immediate family, a handful of select friends, and an even smaller group of mentors/coaches. These are the people that would actually pick you up at the airport or pick up the phone if you were to call at 2am – just to talk. The need for 2am talks is nonexistent at this point of my life, although I think you get the point here. My sons for example are in this realm of relationships. This is where I spend the most of my energy today, and in a lot of ways – I could be spending more time here.
Then there outer bands of relationships that are exceptionally close friends (relatedness governs this category) , daily work colleagues / frequent friends (connectedness is very high, but relatedness is lower), outer social connections (relatedness could still be high here, but connectedness is low) that you can hang with occasionally. Then there are the intermittent and most casual relationships that are lesser in terms of frequency of contact and depth of relatedness. Finally, there are those that you may have met once or twice – these are truly acquaintances that would be willing to help out or grab a coffee. Typically, these are the relationships that are not as meaningful or as invested into as those that you share common experiences with. Finally, the outermost band is comprised of strangers – although affinity and connectedness can be informed based upon common interests, backgrounds, and even pursuits – such as online courses.
The gradation of connectedness and relatedness really help to organize the relationships you want to cultivate, maintain, or be willing to let atrophy.
A quick note regarding the notion of relationships in the digital world – these are many times a bit altered, and the connections that get established are done to juice connections. I know of a few people in my life that will accept any and all connections online believing that this gives them a better chance to further enhance their business goals. On LinkedIn – it may make sense, probably does on Facebook too. Facebook is super sneaky and largely unknown in terms of the effectiveness of the platform for business. Maybe there’s a post in this topic down the line.
Anyway, back to this notion of relationships and categories. These ‘circles’ are instructive as it illustrates an approach to take control of our relatedness, connection, and most importantly the relationships we possess in our life. In my mind, time is priceless and a second class of resource/asset that is nearly the same in terms of value is this idea of relationships. Again, many of us do not approach our universe of relationships in an intentional way, many times reacting to the relationships we have when a compelling event happens.
Why the default and reactive approach?
Likely because we were never really taught to manage our relationships in an intentional manner.
Now those in account management, sales, and leadership roles know that relationship management is a thing to be VERY planful and intentional with. In my worldview, relationships really are the key to success – not what you know, it is who you know AND how related AND connected to them.
Here are some practical thoughts you could start employing today to begin OWNING an exceptionally portion of your life – borrowing from some of the professional relationship management approaches I’ve used in my work life:
- Determine the categories of relationships you have – is it innermost circle, inner circle, casual friends, ‘work’ friends, colleagues, casual contacts, acquaintances, and strangers.
- Name names – actually look at the people in your life, and oh my God – label the relationships, as it stands today. I’d start with your inner core of people in your life.
- Determine gaps – Take a look at the names in the inner core of folks in your life, is there someone missing? Be honest. Is there someone there that really no longer warrants this much of your energy.
- Work the gaps – Where you have gaps you want to close – put a plan in place. Maybe it is starting up a daily text string after connecting on the phone. Maybe it is offering an apology that is way overdue. I don’t know your relationships and your gaps – the point is to own and work them.
- Easy Does It – What is the ongoing approach you will take with this category of relationship. Is it checking in at least once a month with a phone call? Is it a weekly meal together? Is it a daily FaceTime session regardless of the airport you find yourself in.
Now for a couple of guiding principles as you consider building this out for yourself.
- Start small and stay focused. You can go nuts with this sort of thing, and the scaffolding you built will catch fire and tip over within a month or two. Then you will likely get all self judgy and condemn yourself for being less related and devoid of connections you intended to nourish. I did this, and beat the hell out of myself for failing. Now I’m focused on a handful of relationships, while being mindful of the outer bands of relationships in my life.
- Consider relatedness and connection in concert. Relationships take time and understanding. When you look at your list of names in the context of relationship category – look for patterns. When I started thinking of my relationships as an asset to be owned and cultivated – the relationships that were high in relatedness and low in connection were high on my list of targets to work. These were the people that I loved and trusted, yet had drifted. I’m still working this list.
- Keep it to yourself. This is an exercise for you. The choices you make in terms of categorization really ought not be greeted with judgement – rather take the it as information to be worked in the hopes of improving things. The approach you take to enrich or deemphasize the relationships you have – really does not need to be broadcast or shared with the other end of the relationship. I am a huge fan of doing and then explaining/telling after the fact on this type of stuff. The change will be noticed once it has been invoked many times.
- Give it time. Pressing to enrich relationships is weird, and the other person will feel it if you begin to make a change. Artificial weekly check ins will be setting off alarm bells and the weirdness will likely ensue.
A couple of closing thoughts here.
- The concept of happiness in life will be a topic coming up in a future post, and I’ll summarize one element of happiness – based upon this post – it is has been researched and it is now argued that the biggest contributor to our happiness is our quality of relationships in our life. In my experience, I believe this to be a truth. Relationships are not the sole factor, although considering it as a one of the larger factors makes total sense to me.
- Do something with this information. Give a shout out to that college bud you’ve been meaning to call. Oh wait, are you too busy?
Consider this relationship framework as a basis for action, and pick off a piece of it to get started with.
When I started this ‘relationship ownership’ journey a little under 2 years ago, I had no idea if it would work or not. It’s worked alright for me with uneven results given my uneven focus and increasingly prioritized approach to a handful of relationships. Perhaps for you – it is all about ramping the connections you have with the people in your life with a broader set of folks? Everyone has a unique situation.
Finally, my hope here is that you take this and do something – anything – to get a more meaningful relationship rolling with one other person as a result of reading this.
Scratch that idea of hope…that’s too passive.
I am issuing you a challenge, are you going to do something with this info or click into the other browser window and continue with your surfing?
Let me know what you end up doing, even privately – I’d love to hear how this actually helped you out.