Can you sense it?
Are you at the brink of information saturation? Trying to absorb too much? Hearing a lot of noise and not enough signal?
Seth Godin, one of the most influential marketing bloggers, felt it yesterday. I have been sensing it for weeks, and fight it every now and then while sifting through an avalanche of material. Choice is great when you have nothing but time. But what if you don’t?
Time once was, 5 daily newspapers hit my doorstep each morning. I curled up with The New Yorker and Vanity Fair (great long reads the dailies didn’t have) at night. Well, newspapers as the agenda-setter wilted for the most part (NYT still going strong). And the magazines suddenly seemed dated with the Web and its immediacy.
The Web. It’s phenomenal, but shouldn’t we resist temptation to know everything instantly? It’s unnatural. That’s where great books come in. Reflection takes time. At least enough of it to evaluate what you just read so you can absorb — and maybe apply where useful. Right?
Reflection can happen right after that next conversation (a real honest-to-goodness in-person variety) with that trusted confidant, a conversation that makes you both better people as a result. Connecting is more than what we type, say on a cellphone or blog. It’s personal, face-to-face and heartfelt. It goes far beyond social networking.
Try this today: Seek out one of your best friends or colleagues and tell them how much you value the relationship. Watch what happens. That’s not only the value of connecting; it’s the reward.
1 Comment
April 30, 2008 at 2:06 pm
Connecting online occurs while using the right median. For the blogger it is the interface that offers the most search engine expsure. I can appreciate the benefits of blogging but there is a big gap between WordPress, which is too much work, too confusing for my marketing application, and Blogger seems to have a narrow view of the world. I’ve been playing with a new platform (http://www.moguling.com) that has some pretty cool features that include SEO and automatic directory listings, that I like a lot. Can’t wait to see what this baby will do from monetization standpoint. Has anybody used this platform? I have never heard of them…..must be under the blogdar!!
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