My relationship with social media has been tenuous over the years.

I’ll work with it for a while, worry about its ability to fragment my attention (or pull away it completely) and leave it. During the leaving, there will be many self-assured moments where I’ll reference people who make do without any social media presence and are doing well.

However, I find myself boomeranging back in a small way.

Its ability to connect me with people all over the world, share ideas with those doing what I’m striving for and push me into new ideas is unmatched. Even with the mountain of reading I do, some of the insights I see in off-handed comments are uncanny.

It also helped with another realization–I’m not an island.

The things I want to do with my life and career have already been done, and are being done, by others. To think I have to embark on this alone is nothing more than pure ego.

The work still needs to get done and it’s still up to me to do it, but why wouldn’t I seek the extra support?

What’s going to make this time different (I hope) is the boundaries I put in place. My queries and my connections will be very specific and the time spent on the platforms will be minimal.

Of course, this is all precipitated on the assumption these platforms will even last.

If they fall apart, then I guess I go back to traditional forms of networking… ones that require actual effort.