Thanks for signing up to all the new readers! Here are some nuggets about how networks shape your wellbeing, relationships and community to help you actively cultivate yours.
Latest News
Season 2 of The Reliants Project podcast has launched! While the 1st season looked at networks through the eyes of academics, season 2 focuses on innovators that are using their intuition and experience in networks to build products, services and even communities. In the first episode, I share some of the exciting new products and services I’ve come across to help us meet people, nuture relationships and cultivate our networks.
Wellbeing
Many appreciate the value of meditation to our wellbeing, but far fewer realise the impact it has on our compassion. A team of researchers from Northeastern University and Harvard University actually devised a study to measure the impact of meditation on compassionate behaviour. I couldn’t agree more with this sentiment from Headspace:
“If compassion is indeed infectious in this way, the potential benefits of meditation are obvious. If just three weeks of 10-minute meditations can lead to an increase in friendly, helpful behavior, it’s not difficult to imagine what mindfulness on a massive scale could mean for relationships and communities.”
Relationships
If you haven’t had the pleasure of reading anything by Theodore Zeldin, I highly encourage you to pick up An Intimate History of Humanity. It’s filled with fascinating examples of how humans have related to each other throughout history. I particularly enjoyed these two examples of friendship, first between young men in Guatemala:
“These were not sexual relationships, for they helped each other in their amorous advances with the girls; but marriage did not offer all that they wanted in terms of intimacy. A man was made to feel that he needed a camarada to ensure that he did not stand emotionally alone. Choosing one was like a courtship, and a formal contract sealed the union.”
And another between men and women in Cameroon and Ghana:
“…men and women enter into close friendships which last a lifetime…The friendships continue after they marry someone else; they intervene to protect each other in their quarrels with their spouses.”
Community
This framework from Community Canvas is designed to help you build meaningful communities. They have organised the considerations into three key areas: Identity, Experience and Structure. It comes with a guidebook and worksheets to help you and your fellow members think through all the aspects and characteristics that make up a community. Their ‘why’ really resonates with me:
“Communities have been around for as long as humanity exists, but in today’s global world, where many feel isolated, lonely and divided, strong communities are more needed, and can be more powerful, than ever. Allowing like-minded people to come together and interact can help us tackle big challenges, bridge differences and unleash creativity.”
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About The Reliants Project
Reliant is my word for a person that someone depends on, an essential component of our social networks. With each edition, I’ll share useful nuggets about how networks shape your wellbeing, relationships and community to help you actively cultivate yours. Whether you want to cultivate your relationships, make better introductions, or activate networks to make an impact in the world, let me help you reach your goals.
You can find more about The Reliants Project here.