Something’s in the air. Could it be change? I love reading non-fiction. Lately there are several themes I keeping reading over and over. The first one is sharing. There’s been a lot of books about sharing and community published lately. The creation of neighborhood tool libraries and sharing your garden space with neighbors are two popular examples. The idea that “We have enough resources. We just need to allocate them more efficiently.”, could really change our society. The internet is making it easier to connect resources with the people who want them. Also trading is becoming more popular again. Through the internet, you can find someone who has what you want and wants what you have making money less important.
Another thing I keep seeing everywhere is if you practice something for 10,000 hours, you will be an expert at it. It’s not about talent, it’s about practice. This fact keeps coming up. If you do something enough times, you will master it. The outcome is you are now an expert at doing something you already enjoyed doing. If someone needs your expertise, then you have a marketable skill doing what you love. And at the very least you have become very good at doing something that makes you happy.
The third idea is the fact that “people crave connection” and are looking for other people who have similar interests – this isn’t really new. What is new, is that the internet has made it possible for people to find others who have the same specific interests they have. Communities based on interests are popping up everywhere. It’s much easier now to find people who are interested in the same things as you. According to FindtheBest.com, the social network Meetup.com has over 3.8 million users per month. Now you don’t have to “do what you love” by yourself. Are you infatuated with writing Harry Potter fan fiction? There’s a group of people doing that and sharing their writing online. Do you want to find other people who love to go out dancing? There’s a Meetup group for that. Do you love making art with recycled objects? It’s easy to find other artists doing the same thing on Deviantart.com. The only thing keeping you from connecting with others is you.
The final theme I keep reading about is organizations are “out” and the individual is “in” but not in a selfish way. It’s now hip to be weird, different, and original. The more willing you are to really be yourself and embrace your true gifts, even if they include things that make you very different than everyone else, the happier you will be. Manifesting your particular gifts has become more important than doing whatever it takes to support the organization. It seems that the world is craving original ideas and is rewarding people who are brave enough to boldly be themselves. It has become normal to create a blog and say what you think or produce a video of yourself doing your thing and inviting the world to watch.
So the themes are do what you love, be yourself, collaborate and connect. It seems that people are recognizing that a diverse community of experts doing what they love is a happy, healthy, vibrant community. The idea of finding happiness through following your passion, helping others and being your authentic self are not new but seem to be catching on. At the very least, these ideas are selling a lot of books! Some of the books that discuss these ideas are “The Mesh” by Lisa Gansky, “What’s Mine is Yours” by Rachel Botsman, “All That We Share” by Jay Walljasper “Tribes”, “Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?” and many other titles by Seth Godin, “The Talent Code” by Daniel Coyle, “Talent is Overrated” by Geoff Colvin, “Daring Greatly” by Brene Brown, “Quiet” by Susan Cain , “Flow” by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and “Abundance” by Peter Diamandis. There are many more. If these ideas continue to spread and infiltrate the mainstream, the changes to our society and culture could be amazing!
Deb kauffman 