The Unusual Benefits of Strong Social Connections

Hi everybody, I’m Paul Krismer. I’m your happiness expert, and this week’s video is going to be all about the perils of loneliness. Well, maybe it’ll be about the opposite, but let’s start with loneliness. We know for a fact that it’s very detrimental to our health. People live shorter lives, they’re more depressed, they’re more likely to be substance abuse, there’s all kinds of very consequential outcomes from loneliness.

We used to think that it was mostly a problem predominantly with men and that it was kind of epidemic levels of loneliness for men. There was one study some years ago out of the UK that showed that 25% of the male UK population said they had no one in their life that they could share deep dark secret with, not one. Another 25% only had one person, and that was either a spouse or their mother.

But here’s the alarming part, new research is showing that young women are rapidly catching up to the degree of loneliness that men have been experiencing historically. There’s no doubt about it that social media is a player in that and to the degree to which that’s true, we haven’t sorted out, but we know that that’s going to be a player.

And so while there’s five alarm fires going off due to loneliness, the learning for all of us is to lean into our social relationships and get the maximum value we can out of that. There’s just a ton of research showing the value and benefits that come from strong, regular, consistent social relationships in our lives.

So this video is going to give a few tips on how we lean into that part of our lives and get more reward and more of the benefits from social relationships. So stay tuned. Thank you. As international public speakers and best-selling authors, stay tuned to hear Paul and Jackson teach the practical science behind happiness and success.

Yeah, so loneliness is a huge problem. Then, that’s kind of the negative pathology that we see when we’re studying human condition. Then, the positive outcome though, when people are thriving and flourishing in a positive way, we know that comes with the opposite of loneliness which is strong connected social minds that tie us. It’s not a volume thing, it’s a quality thing. So it’s not again how many friends you have on Facebook, it’s how good the few relationships you have and how much you nurture and value them.

And there’s some really great research and in fact, I was just watching a webinar with a woman named Sarah Algo. She’s a PhD psychologist and she studies relationships that sort of thing, and she talks about some kind of fundamental mechanisms by which we enhance relationships.

And so I’ll talk about those first, then maybe a few ideas about how we can get more relationship benefits in our life. The first thing she talks about is shared laughter. You know, there can be situations when we’re laughing at someone, and obviously that doesn’t enhance a relationship. But when we laugh at the same time, we know is powerfully helpful for us. It’s sort of like there’s a mind meld if we’re both laughing together. It shows this degree of connection in a very physical obvious way.

And so people who are laughing together, they feel similar. It binds us, it tells one another that this person is my person, they’re like me. And so shared laughter is amazing. Shared good news is another fundamental quality of positive good social relationships. When we sometimes we’re reluctant in our society to do it, but when we feel that this is my person that I can share my good news with, that means that that person is really someone that you value a lot.

Because you know, we don’t really go to strangers or lose social ties. We’ve got this great news, and you want to share it. We tell that to the people that we trust with the stuff that’s most close to our hearts. And the trick is of course that in order to benefit from shared good news, the listener has to validate the good news and say, “Oh yeah, I hear you”, and then be happy for you. So it can’t be, I share good news and then, “Yo, what’s for dinner”. It has to be, “That’s fantastic, Paul. I’m so excited for you”, and “How did you get that done?”, and just some validation and some happiness that’s expressed as a result of someone else’s good news.

And then this one seems so obvious, we talk about it all the time in positive psychology, and it seems like it’s all just Sunday school stuff and so simple, but gratitude is huge. It is absolutely so powerful. And there’s this idea that we need to find the places that we are grateful to, and with, and for others, and then we remind that person of what it is that we found and said, “Oh, I found this, and I’m reminding you that I was so awesome what you did”. And in so doing, we bind ourselves together.

And there’s a really interesting thing about shared gratitude. Of course, it’s obvious how that connects us with the recipient of our gratitude. That they obviously are going to feel warm and closer to you because you took the time to acknowledge the good thing that they have done for you in your life. But here’s the other really interesting thing, if there’s a third party witnessing someone giving gratitude to another, that third party feels closer to the person who’s expressing the gratitude. So when we’re talking about communities of people at work or in our families or in our social groups, and I express gratitude towards person B, will person C who’s witnessing that feels closer, and their social relationship with me goes up. So gratitude is just this powerful, bizarre, fundamental way that we enhance social relationships.

And all of this is predicated on this idea that we have to actually work at it. Some of us are really lucky that we’ve got abundance great social relationships in our lives, but all of us can benefit from just having a pause and saying, “How do I get more of this in my life?”. And one way to do that is simply to prioritize it. To say to yourself, “I’m gonna shoot to have at least one positive social engagement every day”. Or whatever the number is, and again it’s not how many people we know and relate to, it’s the quality. So one enjoyable social connection per day might be a reasonable goal.

The research is also very clear that talking to strangers opens us up to a sense of more social connection. I talked about this in a prior video that this idea of weak ties, the relationship you have with your Barista at Starbucks. That connection that maybe is momentary, but if it’s sincere, you’re making eye contact, and you’re genuinely engaged with that person for a moment, we get those little shots of oxytocin which is the same love hormone that we have with our most important people in our lives.

And then, I’m not surprised by this, but it seems to come up over and over again in the positive psychology literature, that people who practice mindfulness tend to have better social relationships. I guess that’s just because it so grounds us in the now, that if I’m really witnessing you as the person standing across from me, then I’m gonna have much better ability to align with your emotions, connect with what’s really going on for you, observe the good in you, and be happy for your good moments and all that kind of stuff. Mindfulness allows all of that, it just grounds us in what’s happening right now. And if I’m having a good connection with somebody right now, then that mindfulness is going to allow me to express it, connect and just have social relationships.

And then finally, this one’s trickier, especially in our society today, but affectionate touch is a huge part of quality social relationships. You know, I remember speaking to an American one time at a conference and he said, “We Americans, we just don’t touch people like you. You don’t do that at work anymore. It would be if, unless it’s a romantic partner, or your child, or something, you just don’t touch people.” And I get why that’s arisen and why it can be a problem and all the horrible things that bad people do, and violating other people’s trust through inappropriate touch, but we are human first.

So, a pat on the back, a handshake that also extends to holding their forearm or touching their shoulder, that kind of stuff just, it matters. And you know, I’m trusting that the people who are listening to this video are well-intended people and take small risks in your social life, that you actually are affectionately touching the people that matter to you, and that you’re setting yourself up to receive that as well. And maybe if your partner’s not cuddly, you need to ask them to be cuddly if that’s a great way to get your physical touch needs met.

And I’m thrilled to be heading off to Calgary today. I’m going to see a whole bunch of friends I haven’t seen for a long time, meeting somebody I truly deeply love, and it’s going to be a bonanza of social connection for me. So, it seems apropos that my subject today was social relationships. Wishing you all the best, have a great week. If you like this kind of content, click the like button, share with friends and family, and we will see you next week. Bye for now.