Almost every day, I come across someone’s proclamation to quit Twitter or Facebook, or both. Every other day, I’d read about the power of social media tools in connecting people and changing lives in small and big ways.

Once, in a workshop on Ayurveda and the Indian system of dosha, the teacher, Dr. Robert Svodoba, said emphatically, “We all have our addiction.” He didn’t mention tech toys or tools or any specific drugs. Everything is a drug, so long as we’re psychologically dependent on it. Or, as Pema Chodron would say, so long as we “bite the hook.”

History has shown that the pendulum always needs to swing to the extremes first. The Buddha had to starve himself to near death to find out that Happiness was found in neither hedonistic indulgences or self-mortification. So, I’m just thinking, are we going through this process collectively as a society? Am I as an individual? It sure feels like it.

The lute string must be tuned neither too tight nor too loose to produce a harmonious sound. – Wikipedia, The Middle Way

LinkedIn Attach a Link

What might you expect when clicking on “Attach a link”? This is what LinkedIn shows:

Linked In Attach a link leading to... Add News?

I was confused for a second. I clicked the X to close it, thinking I clicked on the wrong link (it’s Saturday morning and I’m still waking up.) Nope, that was the link. Now I’m confused. What if I’m not adding news? And furthermore, am I *really* attaching a link? Or just merely copying, pasting, and clicking Share?

“You’re not gonna last a day,” he supportively predicted. I laughed because he knows me too well. I am a child of the internets/multitasking age. I’m a child that grew up with the radio on, the TV blaring, I’m on the phone, on IM, and doing my homework at the same time. I’m the generation where ADD, diagnosed or not, is a common disorder.

On top of that, the temperament, or constitution in the Indian Ayurvedic system, I was born with is characteristic of the wind: airy and fast-moving. Working with the ADD tendency is hard enough, it’s even harder in a culture such as ours, where everyone and everything seems to be all about distraction (for example: a cable news screen would have stock ticker at the bottom of the screen, weather, traffic on top, headline news running across, and four political commentators in separate locations on the main screen, and a tweet stream on the side).

In other words, I’m SOL when it comes to cultivating any ability to concentrate and focus for long periods of time. And yet, focus and concentration is the very thing I’m working on as a dedicated meditator.

Now what?

So, I’ve decided to give myself some bitter medicine. I’ve decided to go without Twitter and Facebook for a while. How long of a while? Well, I lasted seven days this first round. The first day was the hardest, when I would go and justthisclose to opening TweetDeck, when I’d stop myself. I do realize that there are many many useful uses for Twitter. I’d use it if I were stuck in storm in the middle of nowhere. I’d use it if I were at a conference and looking for fellow conference goers.

I had very many normal, ordinary uses for Twitter this past week, like asking for recommendations for places to eat and stay when I was in Portland, Oregon, or wondering if an event I was going to was cancelled or not. I made do without Twitter, however, in keeping with my vow.

So, I’ll be keeping track of my experience, and no doubt write about it here.

I just read this: Meet Leroy Stick, the man behind @BPGlobalPR and just had to copy and paste to my blog the part that got me going, “liberté, egalité, fraternité!” (okay, not quite, but you know what I mean.)

So what is the point of all this? The point is, FORGET YOUR BRAND. You don’t own it because it is literally nothing. You can spend all sorts of time and money trying to manufacture public opinion, but ultimately, that’s up to the public, now isn’t it?

You know the best way to get the public to respect your brand? Have a respectable brand. Offer a great, innovative product and make responsible, ethical business decisions. Lead the pack! Evolve! Don’t send hundreds of temp workers to the gulf to put on a show for the President. Hire those workers to actually work!

Don’t dump toxic dispersant into the ocean just so the surface looks better. Collect the oil and get it out of the water! Don’t tell your employees that they can’t wear respirators while they work because it makes for a bad picture. Take a picture of those employees working safely to fix the problem.

Lastly, don’t keep the press and the people trying to help you away from the disaster, open it up so people can see it and help fix it. This isn’t just your disaster, this is a human tragedy. Allow us to mourn so that we can stop being angry.

I think this made me feel inclined to write a blog post because I’m a little worn out from all the “top 5 ways to use Twitter to increase your brand value” blah blah blah. At times, it can feel awfully empty to me. So, thank YOU, Leroy Stick, @BPGlobalPR, guy in boxer shorts, whomever you are. Yes, the issues are always more complex that meet the eyes. But above it all, the ability to make another human crack a little smile in the midst of a tragedy, that, is something I can raise a glass to.

For the record, I don’t have an altar for @twitter (or @biz, @ev, @dom). I also don’t have any death wish for the medium and pray for the return of Life BT (Before Twitter).

What I’m really interested in is what it reveals about us, and by “us”, I mean me. And by me, I mean humanity. It’s this little pet project called twentysomething existentialism that’s got me asking all these questions, namely, what does it mean to be human? (Oh yeah, full cheese ahead, get your wine bottle(s) ready.)

So what I want to talk about here is this article I read and heard on On the Media: The Point of Twitter. You can read and listen to the whole segment in all of its glory, including who’s using it for what and how and where, but here are some highlights that are interesting to me.

Well, there is something kind of hilarious about people constantly interrupting their lives to transmit 140-character factoids and random banal thoughts to people who must interrupt their own lives to receive them.

…people simply like to share, not only what they think is cool that you should check out but the reality of what they’re doing or seeing or just thinking right this second.

Hmm, malaria angst and lunch orders, the terrible and the trivial. What do they have in common? Well, what they have in common is that they are variously in Ferreira’s thoughts, and sharing thoughts is something people do, fulfilling a primal human need for keeping in touch, even virtual touch, with other humans.

The magical, exciting, calming, life-affirming charge of human contact. Sociologist Elizabeth Pullen has made a study of Twitter’s attractions. The main one, she says, is community, and especially communal experience.

The most popular events are live events that are televised, that people are watching Miss America or the Oscars or European soccer, football games and tweeting about live events while they’re happening. And that’s just kind of interesting to me – that people want to share the moment.

So that’s kind of a communal experience shared online that I don’t think the people at Twitter ever anticipated.

But data mining is like any other. The deeper you dig, the more value you bring to the service, and that value is enormous.

10,000 Joys and 10,000 Sorrows

And perhaps we have always known that old Buddhist saying to be true, that there are 10,000 joys and 10,000 sorrows in the world, but nowhere is it more obvious than on Twitter. I once heard somewhere, probably from Pema Chodron, that the difference between you and that crazy person saying random things on the bus or on the street corner is that he/she’s saying it out loud. We are not that adept at controlling our thoughts either, we just know better not to blurt it out.

Touching the Void

Besides amplifying our inability to concentrate (sorry to paint such a bleak picture of our psyche), Twitter enables the ability to virtually touch. Reading this concept made me do a double take, because touching is something that no one’s really talked much about, though we all know how powerful the feel of a human touch can be. Years ago when I worked on a project with Microsoft Research to explore ways that people communicate, it was something that we mulled over: how do we emulate touch in a virtual environment?

To Err… er… Share is Human

As the population of Social Media gurus outgrows world population, (although, there are rumors that they are being killed off by ninjas), as we are told to obey more rules and tips and tricks for SM (not to be confused with tips and tricks for… uh… you know…), I wonder how often, and how much money we’ll have to pay, to be reminded that To Share is Human? (Oooh, that’s good, I’m trademarking this ).

Humans can't fly like us, so they tweet instead.

Facebook Survival Guide for Awkward Adults – What you need to know to avoid embarrassing your kids (and yourself) by Daniel Harrison

First Daniel started out by explaining what Facebook is:

Anyway, it’s fun! The two tricks to getting along well on Facebook are, don’t trust anything, and if you want to remain hip, don’t try so hard. Preserve that hard-won dignity you earned by surviving puberty, the prom, and possibly parenthood.

The rules for profile picture:

For instance, if you’re not an actor or model, use a glamour shot at your own peril. You don’t look reflective, brooding or perky. You look like a narcissistic jerk. Sincerity is (always) hipper than hair gel, you smug peacock.

How to manage friends

Besides, you don’t have to accept or reject “friend requests” as soon as you get them. Wait until the requester does something useful like hit the lotto.

How to update your status

Your sainted Grandma never threw wide the shutters and bellowed, “What up haters? I’m pregnant!” to the assembled townfolk, now did she? Use some judgment — it’s the Internet, not a barnyard.

How to deal with applications

To recap: Applications are irritating; you get them from your friends. And they’re easy to spread inadvertently. This is how venereal diseases roll, too. So there’s that.

And groups

Don’t presume just because a digital Teddy bear was enough to get you interested in curing malaria that we’re equally shallow.

And the best advice of all: Nothing stays in Vegas – nothing!

Best Xmas Decoration Ever

Okay, it’s December, and surely you’ve seen all the typical Christmas decoration going up in your neighborhood, and you’ve probably even seen the house with the Ditto Christmas lights. But I’m gonna say this one took the cake for making me laugh until I rolled around holding my stomach crying: The Fallen Ladder Decoration (thanks to my friend Brett McCully’s tweet.)

Don't worry, it's a Christmas Decoration!

Well, my feeble attempt hasn’t been successful. Somehow, one way or another, I find my mind circling back to it. So here I am, writing this down, and hoping that this will help lay it to rest.

To be honest, I can’t really quite pinpoint what it is exactly that keeps nagging me about this notion. It’s a perfectly valid concept, and David makes a solid point that most professional business people would nod their head and raise their glass to:

My activities and interactions in this “social media community” have the primary goal to succeed as a professional. If my time spent here doesn’t help me to perform my job better, and to benefit my career, then I am wasting my time.

Does that mean I can’t make friends during the process? Of course not.  I have made amazing friendships along the way… I didn’t engage with them to become friends though. I engaged with them to benefit my career, and the friendship resulted from the process.

Hmm…

From the northeast corner, I have nothing to say to that. Another businessman saying that he’s here for business. It’s another day, another pay. Nothing new, nothing earth shattering here. But yet, from the southwest corner, I want to say, “Waaaait a minute. Really? Can I offer another perspective?”

What It Means To Work

Perhaps the crux of this issue is David and I probably have different ideas of what it means to work. For David, it might be a career. It might be for “building relationships for business purposes”. For me, work is, or should be, something that lets you express your life force, or prana in yoga. If that’s a little too mystical schmystical, perhaps what Dr. Evil said will make more sense: it’s the “Mojo: The libido. The life force. The essence. The right stuff. What the French call a certain… I don’t know what.”

I think we all long for meaningful work that we’re connected to, something we care about, something that brings us joy and satisfaction. I’m going to bet that we long for freedom, not freedom *from* work, but freedom *to* work; the ability to choose work not merely as a mean for survival, but as a way to express our authentic selves. Further, I also believe that there is something innate within all of us to want to help others, to want to contribute to our community, if not the world.

(Notice that I didn’t say job, I said work. You may be working, or you may be having a job, or both.)

And so, if we stay with the definition that work is an extension of ourselves and our creative process, would it follow that we would want to share it? Give it away for others to enjoy it? Musicians do this. Dancers do this. Programmers do this. And if so, the work that we’re doing benefits not only ourselves, but others as well, does it not? And if we can bring success to others, then is it not inevitable that we bring success to ourselves?

A Friend, A Community, A Market – What Relationships Mean

I think I know what David means. He’s here to work, not to mess around, not to hang out, not to shoot the breeze and waste time. Fair enough. This is completely reasonable for a professional, just like it is reasonable for any professional to not to roll out of bed and stroll into the office in their pajamas.

Well, sorta.

Relationships are not made through status reports and Powerpoint presentations. Relationships are made through, well, honestly? A little bit of hanging out. And if we’re talking about the role of a Community Manager, we’re talking about someone who deals with the social. (Microsoft lawyers, please don’t knock on my door.) In this role, if you are not here to engage with people on some personal level, well, what are you doing here?

Actually, let’s forget about what the job is for a moment, let’s just talk about any interaction in our work, personal and professional. No matter how loosely you define the word “friend”, whether it be someone you could call at 2 a.m. in the morning if you’re too drunk to drive or if your car broke down in the middle of nowhere, or it’s a Facebook “friend” that you really could care less what they had for breakfast (but they are soo excited to share it anyway), anytime you’re in contact with another human being, you are engaging with a whole person.

Sure, we all have our titles and roles we play on some stage we’ve been put on or chosen to be. We are this Mr. Senior Manager and that Mrs. VP of Marketing. But we are much more than that, I hope. And if we don’t ‘fess up to that, we continue to trap ourselves in a system that views us solely as business suits and cubicle addresses.

In her famous blog post, “Open letter to CEOs, COOs, CIOs and CFOs across the corporate world“, Pam Slim advised:

3. Spend a moment walking around the halls of your company and look at your employees.  I mean really look at them.  Don’t just pat them on the back and pump their hand while looking over their head at the exit door. Look directly in their eyes.  Imagine what their life is like.  Who is waiting at home for them?  What are the real consequences to their health, marriages and children when they have to work yet another 13 hour day?  What kind of dreams do they have?  What makes them really happy?

So, if we can identify with someone, if we can see there’s some “me” in “them”, and some “them” in “me”, it’s possible that we begin to form some sense of “us”, some sense of a community. And then, we might ask, “What can I do for my community?”. If you are getting itchy and punchy at the word “community”, think of it this way: another name for a “community” is a “market”, as Dr. Rick Jarrow said in his book: The Ultimate Anti-Career Guide: The Inner Path to Finding Your Work in the World.

Do You Come Here Often?

I don’t think I disagree with David entirely, and though I don’t know him any more than through his online persona, I don’t think he’s all about cold, calculated business moves (I mean, look at his Jake Gyllenhaal smile). I want to write this post, first of all, as I said, to get it out of my head, and secondly, to propagate a point bear repeating from author and senior yoga teacher Judith Lasater: if we are connected, to ourselves and to each other, we can solve anything. If we are not, if we think we must step on each other to reach the top, well, it’s gonna be a long night.

In the specific role of a Community Manager (yes, it’s really a job), sure, I don’t expect that you should be best friends with everybody, you couldn’t. True friendship requires certain amounts of tender loving care that necessitates time, a limited resource to all of us. However, for companies to succeed, and for careers to soar, there ought to be some friendliness towards the people, the community, the marketplace. How many of us have at some point felt awkward and slightly slimy at those business networking events? For an authentic community to form, you can’t just collect business cards, you need to connect on a personal level. (And I don’t mean “connect” in the corporate lingo sense here.)

I personally think this is an exciting time, frightening perhaps, for some, but very exciting for all of us, in all walks of life, in Fortune 500 companies or corner mom and pop shops, in corner offices or cubicle-land. It’s a time where we are experimenting with so many things so fast, trends are coming and going as fast as the morning stars. We’re colliding and mashing everything together to see what turns up, like Ashton Kutcher’s latest project of “influencer marketing,” which, according to Fast Company, is “a squishy hybrid of entertainment content, advertising, and online conversation that finds its audience via video, animation, Twitter, blogs, texts, and mobile.”

In this feeding frenzy, snafus, oopsies, epic fails are all but inevitable. But inevitable also, are “epic wins”. We didn’t just all of the sudden “get social”. We have *always* been social. The challenge now is to use the tools that we have at our fingertips to put our sociality to some good use, to improve our lives, ourselves, our world, our job titles, etc. May the mojo be with us. Or if you prefer, may that sense of je ne sais quoi guide us. (Just had to let the Frenchie in me out for a moment )

Some mooar links:

• Book: What We Say Matters: Practicing Nonviolent Communication by Judith Lasater and Ike Lasater
• Book: Escape from Cubicle Nation: From Corporate Prisoner to Thriving Entrepreneur by Pam Slim
• Blog post: Social Media Community Manager job description by Marty Weintraub (not to be confused with Apartment, Condo, or Building Manager)

Oh hai kitteh! We can has frendz?