love

The rewards of social network activity

The rewards of social network activity are often realized within the human psyche — in the emotional and spiritual realms. One need only observe the delighted faces of fellow travelers in an airport or train station looking into glowing tablets and mobiles.

Use social networks to grow your heart and spirit

The personal life deeply lived always expands into truths beyond itself. ~Anaïs Nin

One huge possibility for the individual, for the community, via social networks is embracing transparency as a road to mystery. Out beyond the one’s edge, beyond a community’s mores, there lies a possible “other” way of doing what has always been done a certain way.

I’ve been pondering “edge generators”: machines that learn one’s edges in search + content generation AND THEN suggest content + experiences to push one “over the edge” into new “unknown” territory. Edge territory. Edge territory is the location where one finds answers to the questions that remain unsolved in one’s life. Edge territory is where others live that have been where you are AND have THEN found a path to subsequent locations.

Humans want to expand, want to grow, want to deepen. And social networks are a giant example of this expansion, this growth, this deepening. TO BE CLEAR: As humans we are expanding and deepening into multiple dimensions via our social networks, our apps, and our niche communities.

Following is a very simple set of steps for discovering a community of people surrounding an issue you may be wishing to deepen within. This involves diving into the Interest Graph (Twitter) via a multitude of simple social intelligence tools.

1. FIND YOUR COMMUNITY via social intelligence tools. Try http://www.listorious.com and http://www.peoplebrowsr.com as first steps. Use Listorious first to find key influencers in your area of interest and then use Research.ly (PeopleBrowsr tool) to track with what is being said and dialogue with others.

2. BUILD A FOCUSED TWITTER ACCOUNT. The purpose of this account is to aggregate those you feel akin with and or curious about. You can then follow or track with these thinkers, fellow journeyers, and dialogue with them. Once the account is built, divide it into lists segmented to even finer degrees or shades of specificity. Use this Twitter guidebook to start off.

3. CONNECT IN THE FLESH. Through this Twitter account you will learn of conferences, venues, and in-the-flesh meeting places where this tribe you have assembled meets. Here you can take in the full experience of “your people”. Start with MeetUp, as an example.

4. RESOLVE TO CHANGE. The first three steps will change you, no doubt. But now you have the very important task of changing your everyday life to go on the journey you have created for yourself in the digital realm. There will be a single step, a single first moment, when you get how your life NEEDS to take on this new meaning, this new identity. And it’s a leap you will probably remember forever. It’s a leap into depth!

Six Ways To Be Likeable in Social Networks

(Adapted from How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie)

1. Become genuinely interested in other people.
• Follow them on Twitter and DM them on what they tweet.
• Become their friend on Facebook and comment positively on their wall posts.
• Subscribe to their YouTube or Vimeo channel. Like, Share and positively comment on their uploaded video content
• Follow their blog via RSS and positively comment, share their posts with your community via Twitter, FB and your blog.
• Follow their Slideshare account and share their presentations.
• Get connected on LinkedIn and connect them to individuals and LinkedIn groups that are helpful and specific to their industry.
• Share their photos from Flickr, Picasa and Photobucket, along with positive comments.

2. Smile.
• Like others content and be positive in your comments.
• Share uplifting content that brightens others days.
• Share a variety of uplifting content, including music, video, photos, blogposts, product reviews, events, good news, tweets and others’ FB posts.

3. Remember that a man’s name is to him the sweetest and most important sound in the English language.
• When you connect with others use their first name in the body of your messages!
• When you share another’s content, use their full name and share their weblink, YouTube channel, Twitter handle or FB link.

4. Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves.
• Send others private messages with questions that are not nosey but helpful.
• Let your comments show that you listened to what they said and in their post, Tweet, video, photo or music share.
• RSVP on events you are invited to.
• Share other’s posts on your wall or Re-Tweet them, furthering dialogue on their content.

5. Talk in terms of the other man’s interest.
• Identify what was important to the other in what they posted and orient your comment around that. This will foster friendship AND engender further conversation that is positive and helpful.
• Ask questions about the other’s posting in a way that is kind and identifies their post as an asset to you and others.

6. Make people feel important, and do it sincerely.
• Comment when it comes form your heart and gut. That’s usually a good sign that you are being sincere.
• Elevate the person by speaking about them in your content.
• If you don’t have anything to say, then don’t comment!

The single greatest resource humanity has is the imagination

The single greatest resource humanity has is the imagination, an endless watershed of light, love and power. What your critic calls a tangent, the creative calls the golden road of enlightenment! Stories of real wealth almost always contain individuals who mined the collective heart and soul of humanity and the cosmos.