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A simple system I’m using to stay in touch with hundreds of people
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Re: A simple system I’m using to stay in touch with hundreds of people
#92Earlier quoted context omitted.
"if you cared, you'd remember" glad you have this experience, i dont think all of us do. i care deeply but seem to forget people exist and that makes me sad and dislike myself. i wish i could just remember. id still have so many friends if i did.
Well, then ... why did you forget, when you (believe you've) actually cared?
Well, life?
Just managing your own home requires a lot of organisation, and even if you do care, you will have a hard time to cope for long without some tools to help you (calendars, notes, schedules, only to name those). Unless someone does it for you. Or unless you live a very simple life that can fit in your head all the time, of course.
Likewise, seeing your friends fading away, not responding to you might be because they've just forgotten you, or don't want to see you anymore, or they are just drowning in their own life. And maybe with time they will cope/react differently, maybe not.
Considering that friendship/care only can be spontaneous and not prepared/provisional, this is disingenuous and borderline toxic (to both you and others).
Re: A simple system I’m using to stay in touch with hundreds of people
#93Let me just point that the messages must be genuine and thoughtful. It is written in the article, but it seems that some people failed to notice it and accuse the author of objectivization and hypocrisy.
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You’re gatekeeping the authenticity of someone else’s relationships.
This tells us more about you, than it does about them.
Re: A simple system I’m using to stay in touch with hundreds of people
#94Earlier quoted context omitted.
"if you cared, you'd remember" glad you have this experience, i dont think all of us do. i care deeply but seem to forget people exist and that makes me sad and dislike myself. i wish i could just remember. id still have so many friends if i did.
Well, then ... why did you forget, when you (believe you've) actually cared?
This reads a bit like asking a depressed person why they don't just stop being sad.
Re: A simple system I’m using to stay in touch with hundreds of people
#95Something that really freaks me out about the world is how much power tech people have and that their sociopathic behaviour, like treating all your personal relationships as transactional data, is considered a "simple system".
It’s not a tech thing and is not sociopathic. Sells have been keeping cards on their customers for centuries and a whole category of software exists for that, CRMs. I personally can’t remember the names and ages of all the children of all the people I interact with. I still take the time to take notes about it when I can and review them before seeing someone. I still think it’s better than not caring at all. Reading…
> Sells have been keeping cards on their customers for centuries
And they've been seen as greasy, superficial, fakers for just as long.
Re: A simple system I’m using to stay in touch with hundreds of people
#96Earlier quoted context omitted.
"if you cared, you'd remember" glad you have this experience, i dont think all of us do. i care deeply but seem to forget people exist and that makes me sad and dislike myself. i wish i could just remember. id still have so many friends if i did.
Well, then ... why did you forget, when you (believe you've) actually cared?
There's poor memory, depression, ADHD, low-level addiction, social anxiety, poor memory and a great number of other things that can keep one from contacting friends.
There are many people in this thread who clearly do care and have trouble doing/remembering, so I'm not sure why you'd choose to respond this way to someone you're more likely to hurt.
Re: A simple system I’m using to stay in touch with hundreds of people
#97So he's treating people like assets, not friends, and these assets need to be checked on on a regular basis. If there were friends, he'd not need to be reminded of contacting them. He'd miss contacting them. So instead he needs a tool to remind him of that "friend" he needs to contact, because pretending to care is beneficial. One might some day need them. It's incredibly sad that his social life, or rather: the illu…
I see how it might look like that, but you are missing a critical point. Everyone is different. What comes naturally to some doesn't come naturally to others. For a lot of people (me included) keeping in touch with others doesn't come "naturally". We miss contact, and yet we sheldom establish it. There are many reasons for this: poor time management skills, low self-esteem, simple lack of practice, etc. In any case,…
Then why do they frame connection in terms of a habit that yields "unlimited upside" and prevents you from missing out on opportunities?
You are absolutely right that people are different, but this person comes across a little transactional and an exemplar of the Zuckerborg meme.
Re: A simple system I’m using to stay in touch with hundreds of people
#98Quoted post unavailable.
That was my first thought, too. Then I thought, I should probably make more of an effort to stay in touch with people. Just not this way.
Re: A simple system I’m using to stay in touch with hundreds of people
#99Earlier quoted context omitted.
For so long we were (and still are) called a human resource, whole departments and studies devoted for human resource management. Treating people like assest fits here.
Doesn't make it okay. At all. "Human resources" is dehumanizing. Treating people like assets is dehumanizing. If I told my friends that I had software reminding me of contacting them, they'd consider that we're not actually friends, because friends don't need to be reminded of friends . When there's no bond reminding me, then they're not friends. One cares about friends. When you forget about them, then you're not ac…
This lame take is like claiming a birthday gift is meaningless because someone used a calendar reminder.
Some people have busy lives but still have many friends (especially ones spread around geographically as you get older). It’s normal adult behavior to forget to contact them for months.
> When there's no bond reminding me, then they're not friends.
This sounds like some obsessive behavior. I think you may have a much higher bar for friendship than most people do.
I have 20-30 people I would consider strong enough friends to have them stay in my house for a weekend on short notice (to give you an idea of trust level here). I contact many of them no more than once every couple of months only when a shared interest reminds me of them.
> One cares about friends. When you forget about them, then you're not actually caring.
That’s not how that works. At least it doesn’t match the definition of “caring”. It sounds more like “obsessing”.
Re: A simple system I’m using to stay in touch with hundreds of people
#100So he's treating people like assets, not friends, and these assets need to be checked on on a regular basis. If there were friends, he'd not need to be reminded of contacting them. He'd miss contacting them. So instead he needs a tool to remind him of that "friend" he needs to contact, because pretending to care is beneficial. One might some day need them. It's incredibly sad that his social life, or rather: the illu…
I see how it might look like that, but you are missing a critical point. Everyone is different. What comes naturally to some doesn't come naturally to others. For a lot of people (me included) keeping in touch with others doesn't come "naturally". We miss contact, and yet we sheldom establish it. There are many reasons for this: poor time management skills, low self-esteem, simple lack of practice, etc. In any case,…
> We miss contact, and yet we sheldom establish it.
That's me.
that's why my friends are the ones who contact me.
they are my reminder.
if I start contacting them now, they would think I am going to die soon.
> I see what this person is doing as a way to remove the friction and create a new habit
It doesn't work like that though.
It's not like using an alarm to wake up at a certain hour and suddenly you realize your sleep cycle has adapted, what this person is doing is more like a grocery list, you'll never stop needing one, if you needed one in the first place.
Moreover, the simple fact that people are in different lists and lists have to be maintained and updated, it makes it more like a job than a habit.