Take a look at the friends you have who are the most important to you, as well as the ones who have helped you the most, and think for a minute about how you met them. Most of our initial contacts were chance encounters in a public place, and it may have been just as likely that we would have not made the contact. Think about all the things you have done and worked on with certain people, and imagine if you had not met them through a random encounter. This thought solidifies the concept behind why you want to get to know more people.
Your Close Friendships Started Because You Risked Starting Them
You have some friends that you have spent time with for years. You’ve gone here or there with them, tried things that were new for you and them at the same time, and have a historical time path of all these occurrences. In your mental timeline is a long set of events that you would not have partaken in if those specific people did not bring them up or agree to join. You might not have taken this car-ride, or gone to this meeting, or went to this sports match, or started this business venture, had it not been for them.
Create New Branch Points
Building off of this, you have the opportunity to create new branch encounters. Each one has the potential to become another mental timeline you have of events or items you took part in with one person. Networking events are so popular due to these random, or sometimes completely planned, encounters. Adding a new branch provides you with an added selection of opportunities that you wouldn’t have had otherwise.
People In Public Are Waiting Opportunities
Next time you are at a public place where you normally stay quiet and “go through the motions”, think of how one of the people in your view could be as valuable to you in a few years as a person you met a few years ago that you appreciate as a person in your current regular network. You want to think of it like the opportunities you can get will look something like the two example possibilities in this flowchart:
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Great article. I very much enjoy meeting new people and finding all of the nuanced similarities and differences. Even so it’s not always obvious to me that outside my close circle of friends there is a world of great potential friends yet to be met. I try to get out and about but it’s important to remember to cultivate those relationships, and not get over comfortable in our current circle of friends no matter how great they are.
I’m not saying keep your eyes open to trade up. Rather, I just try to expand my base of acquaintances, friends, and avenues of experience.
Matt: Thanks. It is pretty cool to find those nuances huh. We think of things a certain way, and either find that others think of them the same way, or think of them in a different way than we do each time.
That is a good reminder there about not getting comfortable with a certain set of people. Getting comfortable leads to decrease in options.