Building Relationships IRL

Recognizing that people are more than what they post

We used to meet people at work or meet somebody at a bar, and all we would know about them was what they shared with us. It might have taken years for us to learn certain things about their history. But now, our co-worker may have shared every detail of her relationship with her partner, from the first date to the breakup, on Instagram. 

The way that we learn about people nowadays is new and different. There is so much we can learn from social media and internet searches, but that doesn’t mean we need to let people know everything that turned up when we googled them. We can’t presume to know people just based on what we’ve learned on the internet. 

What people post is a part of them, but it’s not all of them. Unless they are doing The Truman Show, what you’re seeing is only a snippet of their lives. It’s important that we have conversations with people to understand what’s going on in their lives and who they are. When we connect the dots before we give ourselves the chance to really get to know a person, we miss out on real connections. 

When navigating relationships in real life we need to remember:

• People are more than their profiles and posts.

• Our work is to take our time learning a person and allow them to show us who they are.

• Oversharing what we know about a person from the internet can be weird.

Some of the information we’re able to pull up has made us a little lazy about getting to know people. It’s also made us a little lazy about sharing. We may feel like people should know certain things about us because we posted the details on social media. 

There is something special to me about getting a phone call or a text message saying, “Hey, I’m pregnant.” It conveys the type of relationship that we have. We need to ensure that we’re not allowing our online connections to take the place of connecting in real life. We should not assume that people are following us. We need to still make the time to reach out and share our lives with the people in our circles (as feels comfortable). 

And if we do happen to learn something about someone on the internet, when they take the time to share it with us in real life, we need to just let them tell us. If a friend calls to tell us they’re moving, and we say, “I know I saw your post,” it may shut down that point of connection. I have learned something about this from having friends who are twins. When they share information about each other with me, I always have to act shocked when I hear it from the actual person. I don’t say, “Oh, your sister told me that earlier.” I gasp and say, “Oh my gosh!” or “I can’t believe it!” People appreciate that from us. They don’t always want to hear, “Oh, [so and so] already told me that.” There is something special in the telling. We need to give people a chance to tell us their story. 

Journal Prompt

What is something about yourself that people wouldn’t know from looking you up on the internet?

A Few Things That Caught My Attention This Week

• Love on the Spectrum: Season 2. You can watch it on Netflix.

• Reframing Procrastination on the Life Kit podcast. You can listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you stream podcasts. 

• Clarity, Communication, and Capacity on This Morning Walk podcast. You can listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you stream podcasts.