Speaker 1: Of course, there are benefits to solitude, but according to
Speaker 1: the National Institute on Aging, the health risks of prolonged
Speaker 1: isolation are equivalent to smoking fifteen cigarettes a day. Social
Speaker 1: isolation and loneliness have even been estimated to shorten a
Speaker 1: person's lifespan by as many as fifteen years. All the
Speaker 1: studies show that the quality of our relationships makes a
Speaker 1: huge difference in our life. Hey, everyone, welcome back to
Speaker 1: on Purpose. I am so genuinely grateful that you chose
Speaker 1: to spend some time with me today, whether you're walking,
Speaker 1: whether you're driving, whether you're cooking, whatever you're up to.
Speaker 1: Thank you for choosing on purpose always. I love the
Speaker 1: connection we're developing, and whenever I bump into any of
Speaker 1: you and you tell me you listen it on purpose,
Speaker 1: all I want to do is give you a big
Speaker 1: ug and say thank you, because it truly, truly means
Speaker 1: the world to me. I bumped into a few of
Speaker 1: you who even came to my shows recently at some
Speaker 1: restaurants when I was in LA and it just warms
Speaker 1: my heart to know that we're building this community without
Speaker 1: even knowing how deeply it's impacting all of us, including me.
Speaker 1: So your feedback, your love, your support, your reviews, your
Speaker 1: subscribing to the podcast means so much to me. Now,
Speaker 1: I want to talk today about something that I know
Speaker 1: a lot of us are struggling with in different ways.
Speaker 1: Let's just start with a quick poll. How many of
Speaker 1: you have ever felt lonely? I'm guessing there's quite a
Speaker 1: few of us. How many of you have ever felt
Speaker 1: disconnected from the people around you. I'm guessing there's quite
Speaker 1: a few of us as well. And how many of
Speaker 1: you felt that you don't feel authentically connected to your community,
Speaker 1: that you find yourself having potentially negative judgments, or even
Speaker 1: if it isn't going down that way, you may just
Speaker 1: feel a bit distant from the people around you. I
Speaker 1: want to take a moment to point out that it's
Speaker 1: so natural and normal to want to feel connected. It's
Speaker 1: so normal, so natural, so real to want to feel connected,
Speaker 1: but we don't often know what that means. Right. We
Speaker 1: say things like I don't feel connected to you, I
Speaker 1: don't feel connected to the people around me, I don't
Speaker 1: feel supported. But really, what it means to be connected
Speaker 1: is that you feel seen, you feel heard, you feel understood,
Speaker 1: and you feel valued. Plus you make other people feel seen,
Speaker 1: You make other people feel heard, you try your best
Speaker 1: to understand others, and you intend to make people valued
Speaker 1: for real. This isn't just a technique or a hack
Speaker 1: or an activity. Wanting to be connected requires it to
Speaker 1: be sincere and genuine and real. Now, I want to
Speaker 1: start off by just pointing out how normal it is
Speaker 1: to feel disconnected. Only fifty nine percent of Americans say
Speaker 1: they have a best friend, and twelve percent say they
Speaker 1: feel they have no close friends at all. I'm taking
Speaker 1: this from the rootsof loneliness dot com ridden by doctor
Speaker 1: Christy Hartman, a pH d in psychology, who shared this
Speaker 1: incredible research that she found through the National Library of Medicine,
Speaker 1: the Centers for Disease Control, YUGOV, Health Resources and Services Administration,
Speaker 1: SAGE Journals, Taylor and Francis Online, and others. Fifty two
Speaker 1: percent of Americans report feeling lonely, while forty one percent
Speaker 1: report their relationship with others are not meaningful. So you
Speaker 1: can see those two things there. One is us feeling
Speaker 1: disconnected and removed, and the other one is saying, actually,
Speaker 1: I'm around a lot of people, but I don't feel
Speaker 1: like it's meaningful. How many of You go to a
Speaker 1: lot of parties or a lot of events, you come
Speaker 1: across a lot of people, but you don't really get
Speaker 1: that depth of connection. Right, We've got so lost in
Speaker 1: this breadth and scale of connecting that we've often lost
Speaker 1: the gift and depth of connecting single or not. Fifty
Speaker 1: seven percent of Americans report eating all meals alone. Now
Speaker 1: we've gone from doing an activity that we used to
Speaker 1: do potentially even with your parents. So just like ten,
Speaker 1: fifteen years ago, or maybe just five years ago, you
Speaker 1: were eating every meal surrounded by your family, your siblings,
Speaker 1: your parents, and all of a sudden, now you're eating
Speaker 1: all of your meals alone, whether you're single or not.
Speaker 1: That takes a while to get used to. And as
Speaker 1: we look at the trail across the world, of course
Speaker 1: we're living more separately now we travel across the world.
Speaker 1: Like me and my wife when we moved to New
Speaker 1: York and then we moved to la we now have
Speaker 1: lived without family around us for seven years. If we
Speaker 1: lived in London, we would have been able to visit
Speaker 1: our family every weekend or even in the evenings, whereas
Speaker 1: now we're seeing them after so much more time. So
Speaker 1: there's a lot of shifts also in the way we
Speaker 1: live and the way we conduct our lives that impacts
Speaker 1: how we feel. Fifty two percent of Americans have felt
Speaker 1: left out at some point in their lives. Now, it's
Speaker 1: really interesting, how I think if you thought about the
Speaker 1: first time you felt left out, it might be on
Speaker 1: the field at school, or it might be in the playground.
Speaker 1: And it's interesting how when we get left out as
Speaker 1: an adult, we're triggered back into that mindset of a kid,
Speaker 1: and instead of using our rational, logical brain to make
Speaker 1: sense of it now, we often go back to using
Speaker 1: that child brain to adapt or react or respond to
Speaker 1: what we're experiencing. And we're going to talk about that
Speaker 1: a little bit today. Fifty three percent of Americans cite
Speaker 1: shyness as the reason why it's difficult to make friends.
Speaker 1: How many of you feel shy? I can relate to
Speaker 1: this one. And I know you think you Jay, you're
Speaker 1: not shy at all. Trust me. If I'm in a
Speaker 1: new environment where I don't know anyone, I give you
Speaker 1: one of the shyest people in the world. And at
Speaker 1: the same time, if I'm in an environment where I'm
Speaker 1: flourishing or thriving, I can be the most confident person
Speaker 1: in the room. But I realize that shyness blocks so
Speaker 1: many of us. We've never been taught how to approach someone.
Speaker 1: And what's really interesting is that shyness often gets seen
Speaker 1: as ego or coldness, and often social anxiety gets seen
Speaker 1: in the same way. And so we're looking at other
Speaker 1: people going, oh, they don't seem to care about me
Speaker 1: or find me interesting. They're thinking the same about us.
Speaker 1: Fifty eight percent of Americans reported that they sometimes are
Speaker 1: always feels like no one knows them. Well, maybe you're
Speaker 1: someone who's traveled country. Maybe you've traveled, you know, across
Speaker 1: the world, and no one speaks your language where you live,
Speaker 1: no one really knows your heritage, no one really knows
Speaker 1: your background. It's so fascinating for people to recognize the
Speaker 1: reasons why it's natural for us to feel this way. Now.
Speaker 1: Of course, there are benefits to solitude, but according to
Speaker 1: the National Institute on Aging, the health risks of prolonged
Speaker 1: isolation are equivalent to smoking fifteen cigarettes a day. Social
Speaker 1: isolation and loneliness have even been estimated to shorten a
Speaker 1: person's lifespan by as many as fifteen years. All the
Speaker 1: studies show that the quality of our relationships makes a
Speaker 1: huge difference in our life, and this episode is all
Speaker 1: about the habit needed that we need to reconnect with
Speaker 1: to create connection. So this segment about connectivity is brought
Speaker 1: to you by AT and T. AT and T believes
Speaker 1: connecting changes everything. I recently went on tour for my
Speaker 1: second book, Eight Rules of Love, and brought so many
Speaker 1: people together from all over the world. Part of the
Speaker 1: show was inviting people from the crowd up on a
Speaker 1: stage to reconnect with a loved one they haven't spoken
Speaker 1: to in a long time. We had parents reconnect with
Speaker 1: their children, fathers reconnect with their sons, siblings reconnect with
Speaker 1: each other, and so many more. Deep human connections are
Speaker 1: vital for mental and physical health because they fulfill and
Speaker 1: innate human need to belong. Connected relationships allow you to
Speaker 1: open up, be authentic, and feel truly supported by those
Speaker 1: around you. If your relationships seem to be lacking depth,
Speaker 1: improving your capacity for connectedness can make you feel closer
Speaker 1: to friends or loved ones. Build your emotional support system,
Speaker 1: increase your social charisma, help you approach conversations in a
Speaker 1: more meaningful way, expand your social group improve your profet
Speaker 1: sesational success, increase professional productivity, improve your financial success, Provide
Speaker 1: a feeling of belonging in safety, reduce your risk for
Speaker 1: mental health issues, and reduce your risk for mental health challenges.
Speaker 1: If you're feeling isolated from your loved ones, family, or friends,
Speaker 1: I encourage you to reach out to them today. It
Speaker 1: will inspire you to grow and ultimately improve your connection
Speaker 1: with them and others. Take advantage of having access to
Speaker 1: Wi Fi calling and texting. There are so many ways
Speaker 1: you can use a phone to stay connected, even when
Speaker 1: you're traveling or living in a place that is far
Speaker 1: from your friends and loved ones. Here are four common
Speaker 1: methods you can use today besides apps for staying connected
Speaker 1: with others. Number one video conferencing when you're away from
Speaker 1: your significant other, friends, your family. This is a great
Speaker 1: way to celebrate birthdays and adversaries in special moments by
Speaker 1: sharing a moment over video and seeing their face. I
Speaker 1: know it's not the same, but I love having the
Speaker 1: opportunity to face down my family and friends who still
Speaker 1: live in the UK. Number two emailing. Sending an email
Speaker 1: is a great way to stay connected to old colleagues, professors,
Speaker 1: or even bosses. It may not sound like the most
Speaker 1: intimate way, but I found it can be a great
Speaker 1: surprise for a professor or teacher when you also use
Speaker 1: it as a way to explain the impact they had
Speaker 1: on you. Now, texting, we all text. It's simple and easy,
Speaker 1: but if you use text to send a thirty second
Speaker 1: to sixty second message of gratitude to one person personally
Speaker 1: and one person professionally a day, it can change the game.
Speaker 1: And of course calling, I mean we don't do enough
Speaker 1: of it anymore. When someone calls you just for a moment,
Speaker 1: even if it's just to check in, hearing someone's voice
Speaker 1: can make you feel like you're at home, and it
Speaker 1: can be so grounding. This has been brought to you
Speaker 1: by AT and T. AT and T believes connecting inspires, unites, heals,
Speaker 1: and helps us grow. Connecting changes how we live our
Speaker 1: lives for the better. So the first thing I'm going
Speaker 1: to ask you to do when we think about becoming connected,
Speaker 1: a habit that really makes it difference is checking in
Speaker 1: with yourself. Number one. Check in with yourself. Is your
Speaker 1: social brad tree drained or is your social battery charged?
Speaker 1: Are you ready to spend time with people or is
Speaker 1: that going to tie you out right now? And this
Speaker 1: is someone something you have to check in with yourself.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of us go through bouts of
Speaker 1: like overextending ourselves and then under extending ourselves. And usually
Speaker 1: when we're under extending, we feel lonely, and when we're overextending,
Speaker 1: we feel overworked. Right it's when social when your social
Speaker 1: life starts to feel like work, or when your social
Speaker 1: life feels like it's non existent. We don't really live
Speaker 1: in this balance state. And the balance state is not
Speaker 1: about how much time you spend with people. It's about
Speaker 1: how you feel energetically. For example, you could just go
Speaker 1: out for one night a week and feel completely socially
Speaker 1: battery charged, so you're really happy with that and you're
Speaker 1: okay with that, or you could go out for one
Speaker 1: night and feel completely drained based on what you do,
Speaker 1: And so I want you to check in with yourself
Speaker 1: right now and go this weekend, do you feel charged
Speaker 1: to spend time with people or do you feel drained
Speaker 1: and you need time alone? And I want you to
Speaker 1: base on how you feel, not what's going on, not
Speaker 1: how many events are happening, not what you've been invited
Speaker 1: to or haven't been invited to, because sometimes we get
Speaker 1: upset by things we're not invited to, even if we
Speaker 1: didn't want to go, Right, how many of you have
Speaker 1: ever felt, I'd be honest with me, how many of
Speaker 1: you have known you don't want to go out? But
Speaker 1: now you're offended that you're not invited. And that's why
Speaker 1: we need to check in with ourselves. We need to
Speaker 1: take a moment to ask ourselves, am I charged or
Speaker 1: am I drained? If I'm charged, who would I like
Speaker 1: to spend that energy with? It's almost like asking yourself,
Speaker 1: I just won the lottery, who am I going to
Speaker 1: spend this money on? Right? That's how you have to
Speaker 1: think about it. If you're charged, and if you're drained,
Speaker 1: you have to just be like, well, I just lost
Speaker 1: this time and lost this money and lost this energy.
Speaker 1: How am I going to get charged up again? Who's
Speaker 1: going to help me charge? If I'm going to charge
Speaker 1: with other people? Or do I need to charge alone? Right?
Speaker 1: That's how you want to think about checking in with yourself.
Speaker 1: And this self awareness is really where it starts, because
Speaker 1: if you don't make yourself feel seen, yourself feel heard,
Speaker 1: yourself feel understood and valued you will constantly expect it
Speaker 1: from someone else. And I think that's what we do.
Speaker 1: We walk around wanting other people to make us feel seen, heard,
Speaker 1: and understood and valued as a substitute for doing it
Speaker 1: for ourselves. So because we don't take a moment to
Speaker 1: check in with ourselves, to see ourselves or hear ourselves,
Speaker 1: or understand ourselves or value ourselves, we're constantly trying to
Speaker 1: fill that gap. Right If you've just drank water yourself
Speaker 1: and someone's offers you water, you'd say no, no, no, I
Speaker 1: just did that myself and you wouldn't overthink it. But
Speaker 1: if you hadn't got water and someone said, hey, do
Speaker 1: you want a bottle of water, you'd say, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: sure I want that because I haven't had any. So
Speaker 1: you're looking for someone else, you'll ask them, hey, do
Speaker 1: you have some water? We do the same thing emotionally.
Speaker 1: We emotionally ask for other people to check in with
Speaker 1: us and quench our thirst, as opposed to checking in
Speaker 1: with ourselves. So I want you to start there now.
Speaker 1: The second habit is expanding your emotional vocabulary. If you
Speaker 1: want to see here, understand and value yourself better. And
Speaker 1: by the way, if you want to see here and
Speaker 1: understand and value other people better. You need to expand
Speaker 1: your emotional vocabulary. And I want to point this out.
Speaker 1: Connecting isn't just about do I feel connected? Do I
Speaker 1: feel a part of the group. The questions also do
Speaker 1: you make other people feel part of the group? Do
Speaker 1: you reach out to other people? I promise you, for
Speaker 1: every party you feel you're not invited to, there's someone
Speaker 1: you're not inviting out somewhere and you may say, well,
Speaker 1: I don't want to spend time with them, and that's
Speaker 1: totally fine, But I promise you that feeling connected is
Speaker 1: as much something you have to do proactively as you
Speaker 1: have to be involved in someone else. When you're making
Speaker 1: an effort to make other people feel included, to make
Speaker 1: other people feel seen and heard and understood, I promise
Speaker 1: you that's going to make you feel connected as well.
Speaker 1: I think we think of feeling connected as being embraced,
Speaker 1: but not embracing someone else, And I promise you it
Speaker 1: does feel incredible when you take an opportunity to actually extend, embrace,
Speaker 1: enhance someone else's experience. Now, as I was talking about
Speaker 1: emotional vocabulary, this goes back to the Harvard Business Review
Speaker 1: and a source from Susan David and it's called a
Speaker 1: list of emotions. And the Harvard Business Review talks about
Speaker 1: how we use some very basic emotions to define how
Speaker 1: we feel. So we may sound angry, we may say
Speaker 1: I'm sad, we may sound anxious, we may say I'm hurt,
Speaker 1: we may sound embarrassed, and we may sound happy. Those
Speaker 1: are pretty much as far as our emotional vocabulary goes.
Speaker 1: But this emotion's list and you can literally google it.
Speaker 1: Just type in a Harvard emotional list. I call it
Speaker 1: emotional vocabulary. You can break down what type of anger
Speaker 1: you're feeling. So the list that I'm reading off right now,
Speaker 1: instead of saying you're angry, are you actually grumpy? Are
Speaker 1: you frustrated? Are you annoyed? Are you defensive? Maybe you're impatient?
Speaker 1: Are you disgusted? Are you offended or irritated? Notice how
Speaker 1: they are all these different types of anger. And when
Speaker 1: we don't diagnose ourselves effectively, we don't feel understood by ourselves,
Speaker 1: and therefore when we communicate to other people, they don't
Speaker 1: fully understand us either. So we'll be like, oh, I'm upset,
Speaker 1: but it's like, what does that mean? How are you
Speaker 1: feeling right now? How can I help you? How can
Speaker 1: I help you feel better? And we do a bad
Speaker 1: job of communicating what we're actually experiencing. They also do
Speaker 1: this for the word hurt. Are you feeling jealous? Are
Speaker 1: you feeling betrayed? Are you feeling isolated or shocked, deprived, victimized,
Speaker 1: tormented or abandoned? There are so many ways. Now, I'm
Speaker 1: not saying you're gonna go to your next conversation and
Speaker 1: be like, I feel really tormented today, right, That's not
Speaker 1: my point. But I want you to expand your emotional
Speaker 1: vocabulary so that you can really see your emotions for
Speaker 1: what they are. You can communicate your emotions for what
Speaker 1: they are. And why does this help you become more connected?
Speaker 1: Because you're becoming more connected to what's actually going on.
Speaker 1: Rather than having a shallow, surface level relationship with yourself,
Speaker 1: you now have a deep relationship. Rather than expressing yourself
Speaker 1: in a limited way, you're now allowing someone to understand
Speaker 1: the layers of what you're experiencing. Notice how the first
Speaker 1: two things are very much about you and connecting with
Speaker 1: yourself in order to do the others. Now, the third
Speaker 1: one is probably one of my favorite ones, and it's
Speaker 1: one that I've tried a lot recently and I love it.
Speaker 1: It's called old new and new old. Now, the way
Speaker 1: this works is when I meet an old friend, I
Speaker 1: try and connect on something new. A lot of us
Speaker 1: in our long term relationships we live in nostalgia. Oh
Speaker 1: do you remember when we went on that trip, Oh
Speaker 1: my gosh, do you remember the last day of school?
Speaker 1: Oh do you remember when you were dating so and so?
Speaker 1: And we use nostalgia as a way to build connection.
Speaker 1: Nothing wrong with that, Absolutely nothing wrong with that. But
Speaker 1: what's really important and special is making new memories with
Speaker 1: people that have been in your life for a long time.
Speaker 1: So if someone's an old friend, make a new memory
Speaker 1: with them. Stop making your relationship about nostalgia and the
Speaker 1: good old days and the past, and think about how
Speaker 1: can I go and build a new memory with this
Speaker 1: person that we can talk about for the next few weeks,
Speaker 1: maybe the next couple of years. But let's build new memories.
Speaker 1: Or what's something new I can discover about an old friend.
Speaker 1: It may be a new skill. I remember being with
Speaker 1: a family member that I hadn't spent time with since
Speaker 1: I was like sixteen years old. So it's like twenty
Speaker 1: years ago, and they kept saying to me. They said, Jay,
Speaker 1: you've changed so much, like you're so different. I'm like,
Speaker 1: of course I have. It's been twenty years and it's
Speaker 1: really fascinating to me that they were more interested in
Speaker 1: the change as opposed to who I am today and
Speaker 1: the newness. Right, And so I want you to think
Speaker 1: about who do you have who's an old friend, and
Speaker 1: how can you make new memories with them? How can
Speaker 1: you learn something new about who they are, what they do,
Speaker 1: what they love, what they value, what they believe in.
Speaker 1: Taking an interest in something new with someone old, building
Speaker 1: a new memory with someone old in your life can
Speaker 1: be really truly spectacular. And then it's the other way around,
Speaker 1: new old. So now with the new old, it's like,
Speaker 1: who's a new person in your life that you can
Speaker 1: connect over something old. Maybe you grew up in the
Speaker 1: same area. I was just doing a zoom keynote and
Speaker 1: the person who was talking to me was from near
Speaker 1: where I grew up in London as well and went
Speaker 1: to school, and we started talking about it. It was a
Speaker 1: new relationship, but we found an old connection. It was
Speaker 1: a new person that I didn't know, but we found
Speaker 1: an old common point to bond over to start a
Speaker 1: new relationship right, so old new, new old. It's one
Speaker 1: of my favorite things. When I meet someone new, I think, hey,
Speaker 1: what do we have in common? What's in our past
Speaker 1: that may correlate or intersect? And when I have someone
Speaker 1: that has been in my life for a long time,
Speaker 1: I think, oh, well, what's a new memory we can make, right,
Speaker 1: what's something new that I can learn about them. It's
Speaker 1: a really subtle art, but it's really really profound in
Speaker 1: how it can impact a conversation. Have it Number four
Speaker 1: kind of links to number three. But we have to
Speaker 1: ask interesting questions otherwise everyone will appear uninteresting. I really
Speaker 1: believe this. If you ask even the most interesting person
Speaker 1: in the world uninteresting conversations and questions, they will appear
Speaker 1: uninteresting and you will appear uninterested. And that's why we struggle.
Speaker 1: Because we've been taught to ask questions like, so, what
Speaker 1: do you do? How is your week? What did you
Speaker 1: do this week? What did you do today? We even
Speaker 1: do that with our partners. And by the way, every
Speaker 1: time you ask your partner what did you do today,
Speaker 1: it kind of creates an almost false pressure in them
Speaker 1: of them having to have done something or achieved something.
Speaker 1: So this doesn't even apply to new connections. It applies
Speaker 1: to the friends you see every week and you go,
Speaker 1: what did you do this week? And that question is
Speaker 1: something they've been asked for so many years that they
Speaker 1: have either a rehearsed, unconscious response or it puts pressure
Speaker 1: on them to have to think about what they did
Speaker 1: rather than a question that's more open and fascinating. I
Speaker 1: always like my final five from the podcast of like
Speaker 1: what's the best advice you've ever received? Or what's the
Speaker 1: worst advice you've ever received? I love asking someone like,
Speaker 1: what's the best conversation you had this week? Or what's
Speaker 1: the most interesting thing that happened to you this week?
Speaker 1: And it allows for them to reflect and think, or
Speaker 1: were you bored at all this week? The opposite, and
Speaker 1: if you could learn anything, what would it be? Or
Speaker 1: what did you learn? Did you come across anything new
Speaker 1: this week? And it may take them a moment, give
Speaker 1: them some time, but this is especially valuable for the
Speaker 1: people who've been in your life consistently and people you
Speaker 1: see regularly, and we need to disrupt the pattern of
Speaker 1: the conversation. I think what happens is when you know
Speaker 1: someone well and they know you, you fall into the
Speaker 1: patterns of the same questions, the same conversations, the same chores,
Speaker 1: the same activities, and the question being how do we
Speaker 1: create a method to actually shift the conversations so you
Speaker 1: actually catch the other person off guard, You surprise them.
Speaker 1: They hear something that they haven't heard before from you,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, they start diving into a
Speaker 1: new topic. Maybe they even get to reflect, and you
Speaker 1: give them the gift of introspection because they've not even
Speaker 1: had the time to do that, and now you've given
Speaker 1: them that opportunity. Number five, this habit deep versus shallow time.
Speaker 1: This is a big, big wig one for me, maybe
Speaker 1: counterintuitive to what you think of me, but I generally
Speaker 1: don't like spending time with people in large groups because
Speaker 1: it means I have to spend little time with everyone.
Speaker 1: It almost reminds me of my wedding reception where we
Speaker 1: had so many guests. Indian weddings are notoriously large, and
Speaker 1: OS was on the smaller side. Yet we still had
Speaker 1: like three four hundred people at our reception. Yes, that
Speaker 1: is on the smaller side, and I remember that evening
Speaker 1: having to go around table to table to thank everyone
Speaker 1: who came. Now, I was very grateful to everyone who came,
Speaker 1: but at the same time, I felt like I was torn.
Speaker 1: I felt like I couldn't be with the present, with
Speaker 1: the people that I wanted to be. I wanted to
Speaker 1: extend myself to everyone, but I wanted to make them
Speaker 1: feel valued. And all of a sudden, you start spending
Speaker 1: shallow time with everyone, and then you feel guilty for
Speaker 1: not giving time to the people who you've known a
Speaker 1: long time, and you feel guilty because you feel not
Speaker 1: like you didn't honor the people who turned up, and
Speaker 1: then you just kind of feel upset, right like shallow
Speaker 1: time doesn't help build a healthy sense of connection. And
Speaker 1: I'm not saying don't go to parties or don't go
Speaker 1: to events, but if all of our social life, if
Speaker 1: all of our connecting with others is done in big
Speaker 1: groups where we get three minute conversations with everyone, and
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, you're getting pulled in another direction,
Speaker 1: You're getting torn in another direction to talk to this
Speaker 1: person or that person, or someone else comes in late
Speaker 1: and leaves early, and all of a sudden, you realize,
Speaker 1: wait a minute, what did I even talk about today.
Speaker 1: I basically had the same conversation seven times this evening. Right, Hey,
Speaker 1: how's your week been, what have you been up to,
Speaker 1: how's it all going? Oh? Sorry, I've got to run
Speaker 1: off here. Okay, right, taking the time to say, you
Speaker 1: know what, I'm just going to do groups of eight,
Speaker 1: We're just going to do groups of five. You know what,
Speaker 1: I'm just going to do a one on one. How
Speaker 1: do you feel up? How do you feel connected? Some
Speaker 1: of us feel connected in bigger groups, some of us
Speaker 1: feel connected in smaller groups. Create the group. Don't just
Speaker 1: wait to be invited to everything else. Create the evening,
Speaker 1: create the invite, Create the moment that you need in
Speaker 1: your life. Think about whether all of your social life
Speaker 1: has become so shallow. And by the way, when I
Speaker 1: say shallow, I don't mean shallow people. I mean it's
Speaker 1: so shallow in surface level conversation because you haven't created
Speaker 1: an environment to have a deep connection. I had a
Speaker 1: friend that came over a couple of weeks ago. She's awesome,
Speaker 1: I love her, and she came over to hang out
Speaker 1: with me and Radian. Before she came over, i'd asked her,
Speaker 1: I'd said, Hey, do you want me to invite anyone else,
Speaker 1: and she said, you know what, I'd just like to
Speaker 1: sit with both of you, being so nice to have that,
Speaker 1: And I said great, because I was hoping for the
Speaker 1: same thing. I just didn't want you to feel bored.
Speaker 1: And even checking in in that way with a friend
Speaker 1: is so important, where I was like, oh gosh, I
Speaker 1: don't want it to be bored if it's just her,
Speaker 1: and asked, and maybe she'll want to hang out and
Speaker 1: see other people. And I realized that that's all she wanted,
Speaker 1: and actually that was all we wanted, and it turned
Speaker 1: out to be a great evening to connect. Habit number six.
Speaker 1: Look for patterns and connections where others don't see them.
Speaker 1: Don't look at things as disconnected. I think a lot
Speaker 1: of us look at our life as disconnected. So we
Speaker 1: look at our life as like, God, I've got to
Speaker 1: spend time at work and at home. I've got life
Speaker 1: and I've got my career. And what that starts to
Speaker 1: do is it actually starts to create distance between how
Speaker 1: your mind views things, rather than the understanding that if
Speaker 1: I'm healthier at work, I'll be healthier at home, and
Speaker 1: if I'm healthier at home, I'll be healthier at work.
Speaker 1: So often what we try and do is say, gosh,
Speaker 1: I need to spend less time at work and more
Speaker 1: time at home. But what we're doing is we're letting
Speaker 1: our absence at work bleed into being absent at home. Right.
Speaker 1: What's really interesting about the mind is we're constantly training
Speaker 1: it in the moment as to how we want it
Speaker 1: to be. So for training the mind to not be
Speaker 1: at work when we're at work, then the mind won't
Speaker 1: be able to switch into being where it is when
Speaker 1: it's at home. That way, we end up pushing away
Speaker 1: our work family and our home family, and both tend
Speaker 1: to become a bit disenfranchised with the lack of our presence.
Speaker 1: And so look for patterns and connections where others don't
Speaker 1: see them. Don't look at things as disconnected. Number seven.
Speaker 1: Smile it strangers say hello. I do a hike pretty
Speaker 1: much five times a week, different hikes, but sometimes the
Speaker 1: same one. And one thing I love is seeing people
Speaker 1: walk their dogs, smile, say hello, everyone wishes each other
Speaker 1: good morning. It just creates an entryway for connection for
Speaker 1: the rest of the day. If I walk around with
Speaker 1: my head down, ignore people, avoid people, guess what I'm
Speaker 1: disconnecting myself. Whereas when I smile at people, when I
Speaker 1: say hello, when I greet them, when I greet their
Speaker 1: dogs like it creates an energy of connection in your life.
Speaker 1: It opens you up to start and spark conversations in
Speaker 1: random places. I think we forget as to how we
Speaker 1: still go to grocery stores, we still go to coffee shops,
Speaker 1: but we've got our head down on our phone. We
Speaker 1: don't take it as an opportunity to say hello, to
Speaker 1: sparkle conversation with the barista, to have a moment of
Speaker 1: small connection, but authentic connection. It doesn't need to be
Speaker 1: this huge moment of deep connection. It can be these
Speaker 1: small moments that are add up and make us feel
Speaker 1: a part of a community. You can feel a part
Speaker 1: of a coffee shop. You can feel a part of
Speaker 1: a grocery store community. You can feel a part of
Speaker 1: these places you go through and walk through every day.
Speaker 1: If that's how you see it. Habit Number eight is
Speaker 1: how technologies helped me a lot. One of the things
Speaker 1: I still do a lot is play code names through
Speaker 1: horsepace dot com. And I love the idea of using
Speaker 1: tech to play games with people because it's a great
Speaker 1: way of reconnecting this week. I have a friend who's
Speaker 1: in Europe at the moment, and we hadn't talked for
Speaker 1: a while. We keep saying we want to see each other,
Speaker 1: and it's really interesting, isn't it. How like you keep saying, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I can't wait to see you, I can't wait to
Speaker 1: do this, I can't wait to do this, and you
Speaker 1: keep putting it off because you know, everyone has busy schedules,
Speaker 1: everyone has a lot going on. And for me, the
Speaker 1: easiest thing was like, let's just schedule a call, right,
Speaker 1: let's FaceTime. Yes, you may think it won't be good enough.
Speaker 1: For guess what. It was more than good enough. I
Speaker 1: felt reconnected. We spoke for an hour, and I do
Speaker 1: the same with other friends. I remember. I often like
Speaker 1: to just organize a games night with my friends back
Speaker 1: in London, or I have a WhatsApp group with some
Speaker 1: of my mates and I'll say, hey, let's just do
Speaker 1: a zoom and let's all just get on it together
Speaker 1: because I'm so far away, and it's so easy to
Speaker 1: keep postponing connection, right, we all have that ability to
Speaker 1: always postpone connection. We're like, all right, yeah, we'll meet
Speaker 1: up next week, Okay, yeah, we'll meet up next month.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, we'll meet up next year. And it's like,
Speaker 1: just get on the cour just do it, and it's
Speaker 1: so much better than messaging. I think that's one of
Speaker 1: the things that messaging is great to get a connection started,
Speaker 1: but shifting it to a call or a video conference
Speaker 1: or whatever it may be makes such a big difference.
Speaker 1: Having Number nine, giving giving creates connection. Now, giving doesn't
Speaker 1: just include gifts. It includes food, and it also includes vulnerability.
Speaker 1: When you give someone a part of you, a piece
Speaker 1: of you, a truth about you, it allows you to
Speaker 1: connect with them. And of course this has to be
Speaker 1: done with a trusted person, in confidence, in a safe space,
Speaker 1: with a person you feel safe around. It's very important
Speaker 1: to do that. But that is also giving. I think
Speaker 1: we think of giving as gifts, which is a beautiful
Speaker 1: way to connect. I think the art of gift giving
Speaker 1: has been so powerful in my life. And I receive
Speaker 1: a meaningful gift from someone, or when I give a
Speaker 1: meaningful gift from someone, it redefines the authenticity of that connection.
Speaker 1: Number ten one of my favorite ones invite people for
Speaker 1: ordinary tasks. My wife does this the best and it
Speaker 1: has inspired me. She'll invite someone on her grocery run.
Speaker 1: She'll invite someone obviously for one of her workouts. She'll
Speaker 1: invite someone for something random that she wants to check out.
Speaker 1: Invite people for ordinary tasks. I think we've made connection
Speaker 1: feel so high pressured, where it has to be like
Speaker 1: this big event or this you know, this moment of
Speaker 1: doing something, or maybe it's too boring. But it's okay
Speaker 1: to spend time with people in boring ways and find
Speaker 1: joy in it. Sometimes I've invited people to do ordinary
Speaker 1: things with me, and it actually leads to the best conversations.
Speaker 1: So please invite people for ordinary tasks because it's a
Speaker 1: great way of being connected. And Number eleven connecting with
Speaker 1: people of all ages. I think as time's gone on,
Speaker 1: we spend more and more time with people our age,
Speaker 1: which is important and useful because we may be going
Speaker 1: through similar things. But I was with a couple of
Speaker 1: my friends a couple of weekends ago, and they're in
Speaker 1: their sixties, and I don't consider them. Some people say, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's like my parents' friends, or that's like a family friend,
Speaker 1: But I really consider them my friends, and they love
Speaker 1: hanging out with us, and we love hanging out with them,
Speaker 1: and I think when you're with people of all ages.
Speaker 1: I also have a lot of my close friends from
Speaker 1: back in London are in their twenties and to me,
Speaker 1: hanging out with them is brilliant. I think hanging out
Speaker 1: with people of all different generations makes us feel connected
Speaker 1: in different ways. From our elders we can learn from.
Speaker 1: To the younger people we get an opportunity to give
Speaker 1: and serve and share. To the people in our peer
Speaker 1: group we get to support. I think trying to build
Speaker 1: friendships of different ages and different generations is actually a
Speaker 1: vital part of feeling complete as a human. I feel
Speaker 1: so much healthier in my connectedness when I'm connected with
Speaker 1: people from different backgrounds, different walks of life, and different ages.
Speaker 1: I really hope that these habits serve you and you
Speaker 1: try and practice them. Remember, just try and practice one.
Speaker 1: I want you to feel more connected, I want you
Speaker 1: to feel less lonely, and I want you to have
Speaker 1: the opportunity to build authentic community. Know that it is
Speaker 1: within your grasp. I'm sending you all the love. Just
Speaker 1: try one of these things and watch how your life changes.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for trusting on purpose and trusting
Speaker 1: me Jay, Sheddy and I'll see you again on the
Speaker 1: next one. Thanks everyone,