Using Your Social Media Connections to Build Friendships and Community
I signed up for a Facebook account in 2006 or 2007. It is hard to remember the exact year, but from those early days of social media, I remember spending a significant amount of time searching for old friends from as far back as junior high, high school and college. I have been active on the platform for approximately 15 years, and I have connections with people from every part of my life. I recently discovered that all of those connections are opportunities to build community and friendships.
These two things (new friendships and community) are what I wanted most during this long and drawn-out pandemic. I often read articles and posts on the Nextdoor App. inquiring how people make friends once they are out of school or don't have children, as going to school or having kids often bring many opportunities for meeting and engaging with others. In any case, I know I'm not alone in my desire to reach out; reaching out is precisely the thing to start building friendships and community.
If you are like me and most of my contact list, you all returned to your lives after the initial connections you made with friends from your past - discovering their jobs, which city they live in, seeing pictures of their spouses and kids, etc. Now you occasionally like a post or comment on their page, but you haven't rekindled a friendship.
After getting over my curiosity about whatever happened to Carla, Nadia, Bob, Rico, I no longer went to their pages to see their children's pictures, their spouse's pictures, their vacation, new car, house or job. But now, I see these old classmates as potential friends and people with whom I could begin building community.
The great thing about looking to this pool of people to cultivate relationships with is that you already have a history and something in common to help form a bond. That could be a gym class, a first crush, track team, freshman composition or Algebra.
During the early phases of the pandemic, I chose three to five of these people to write to daily. I kept this up for a week. I reached out to somewhere between twenty and thirty people. I wrote a personalized message that included something from our past, like a remember when scenario. For example, I sent one person I know to be fashion conscious the question, "Remember when we first started wearing straight-leg jeans?" I asked a couple of questions about their lives, usually about where they live and how they pass the time. In the first message, I avoid asking about their marital status or jobs because I don't want it to appear like I'm fishing for a date.
Not everyone I contacted was interested in keeping a conversation going, but a few were, and now I have some old/new friendships that are active, lively and rewarding. I have found some locations I want to visit on vacation (so we can have coffee or brunch), and a couple of people have visited the city where I live while they were on business. In this way, I am increasing my circle of friends and building a community, a desire I never knew I had so profoundly before the global pandemic. This way, I look forward to creating new memories that bond us beyond our past.
Rebecca Chamaa is a freelance writer, workshop instructor, and graduate student at Columbia University. She calls sunny Southern California her home.
