How I built my network from scratch 2x over the last decade
The 2 core principles that have defined how I approach friendships for the last decade
This is part 6 of 8 of a series called, “From Nothing to Something.”
In case you missed it, here’s part 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5.
Principle #1: Initiate, Don’t Wait
I had just dropped out of college and I was feeling pretty lonely.
All my friends were still in college, so I didn’t feel like any of them could really relate to me. I also didn’t really have a history of confiding in friends either.
I felt stuck.
Felt like a loner.
I remember thinking:
No one reaches out to me. No one texts me. No one cares about me… I must be pitiful.
*sigh*
And then a new thought bubbled into my consciousness.
Wait… isn’t that what everyone else is feeling too? Isn’t everyone else just wishing and waiting that someone will reach out to them too?
That seemed reasonable to me.
And then something flipped.
Oh, then why don’t I just be that for others? Why wait for someone to reach out to me? I could be waiting for years and grumble about it. But if I just reach out now, I’ll hit two birds with one stone! I’ll meet someone else’s need and create a sense of connection for myself as well!
I was 20 at the time, and from then on, I made a conscious decision to initiate 99% of the relationships in my life.
No more waiting.
No sitting on the sidelines waiting to be called.
I chose to put myself in the game.
I started calling up old friends to see if they wanted to get coffee or lunch.
I started calling people I didn’t have the strongest relationship with, but thought there might be mutual interest to get to know each other more.
And it worked!
Over the next 6 months, I felt connected in a similar way that I had felt with my friend group in high school. I ended up moving in with a few friends who became my “core" group for the next 3 years.
In 2013, I decided to reinvent myself and decided to flip houses for a living, so my entire friend group shifted :(
None of my previous friends knew much about real estate, so I drifted off into isolation again so I could focus on getting the business off the ground for the first year.
In 2014, I joined a paid community for personal development nerds (it’s been shut down since) and the first thing I did was go through their member database and cold emailed people who lived in the same city as me.
In the span of 1.5 months, I reached out to 35 strangers, 25 responded, and I got coffee/lunch with most of them. In a matter of months, I went from being a “nobody” in the community to someone people knew and recognized. I started connecting people with each other, hosting community events, and inviting everyone I had met to compound the effect.
And lo and behold, eventually people started reaching out to invite me to hang out and attend interesting events!
I repeated a similar process multiple times with different communities over the years (One Salon, Hive) and the result was always the same.
The more I initiated and invested in relationships, the more connected I felt.
Two birds with one stone.
If you want more friendships and connection, initiate, and do it consistently! Don’t wait.
Principle #2: Give First
Years ago, I heard about this thing called WIIFM.
WIIFM = What’s In It For Me?
People are unlikely to give you time and attention unless it’s clear what it’s in for them.
It’s a useful fundamental for navigating any relationship when it comes to influence and persuasion.
In this context, whenever I met with people for lunch/coffee, I went with the intention to give:
The feeling that they are interesting
The feeling that they are worth my time, attention, and support.
Why? Because that’s how you win friends and influence people, and also because I’m a giver at heart. It would take a much longer post to talk about why I am the way I am.
But anyway. How? How did I accomplish these 2 intentions?
They are Interesting:
In every conversation, I was always proactively trying to understand:
What’s their story?
What do they care about?
What drives them?
What are they interested in right now?
What are they working towards?
How did they arrive at where they are today?
And after I asked questions, I’d set aside my prejudices and listened with unconditional curiosity.
They are worth my time, attention, and support:
And at the end of conversations I’d always ask, “How can I help you with [insert whatever it seemed like they were working on]?” Sometimes people would reciprocate the offer, sometimes they wouldn’t -- I didn’t expect them to.
That’s it! I did those 2 things every coffee meeting I had and over the years, I’ve found that people tend to like you, open up to you, want to spend more time with you, and support you if you’ve already done the same for them.
All of my close friendships are comprised of people who have a similar approach to life so the relationship naturally feels nourishing, enriching, and reciprocal.
I reflected about how nearly every major career decision and personal growth breakthrough I experienced was informed or shaped by the friends in my life as a direct result of the 2 principles I just shared about. If the positive impact on my career and personal growth is the “cake”, then Initiate, Don’t Wait and Give First were the ingredients.
Now, go bake your own cake!
What resonated with you? What questions come up for you?
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