Creative Highlight - Photo by Sou Jest
I recently joined an app built for women to connect with each other. My favorite part is that you can create your own groups and start conversations around whatever topics you care about. The one thing I noticed is that most of the women on it seem to be in Europe. I can only assume that has something to do with where the app started.
Either way, it got me thinking about how much I want to create space to connect with people across different communities. I love that the world is finding more ways to come together. I also recognize that the sheer number of platforms has made it hard for some people, and plenty of us have needed to step away from our phones for a while.
There’s a real tension between balance and needing to be on our phones, depending on where we are in life and how we connect with others. I’m not sure there’s a way around it when it comes to staying in touch.
For those of us millennials who grew up with a phone on the kitchen wall attached to a cord, we know what it meant to be somewhere when you SAID you’d be there. Now everyone has the flexibility to change plans and move things around. I’m not sure if that’s a gift or if we’re all just playing Tetris with our schedules, our friends, our families, and our creative peers.
I started this as a free-writing exercise today, as a way to get out some of what’s been on my mind: the things we take for granted, and the things we’ve gotten so used to that we’ve forgotten the older, more natural ways of connecting with each other.
I am grateful for these platforms. I’m glad to be alive at a time when I can connect with more people and travel the world more easily than most people ever could.
I’m also grateful for the communities that put themselves out there and show up. But I keep wondering what we need, as people, to go beyond showing up and reading, and to actually respond and share. Engagement is everything. Once we’ve stepped into a room, vulnerability can be what keeps us quiet. So here’s my reminder to all of us: when you say something, you’re offering someone a thought, an idea, or a perspective they may never have heard before.
I have no idea what the next ten or twenty years will look like. What I do know is that the rest of my life revolves around connecting with people and connecting them to each other. That part isn’t going away, and I’m okay with that, because it fulfills me.
I just hope everyone keeps showing up, the way I’ve had to pull myself out of my own comfort zone at times to keep going for myself and for the world.
— Brandi
Question for us all: What keeps you from speaking up once you’re in the room? Tell me in the comments. I’d love to hear from you.
