My Zaadz Friends list
M. Alan
When I first went on-line around 1996 I was interested in meeting people and concept of internet chat was interesting and exciting. After the initial disappointment that people on line were not like characters from, nor interesting in anything about, (cyberpunk author) William Gibson's novels (i was already several years too late, the pioneers had been swamped by a "second wave" of Internet emigres) I was able to appreciate the experience. I used mIRC for internet relay chat, went on active worlds (an early predecessor to "Second Life"), used ICQ, and so on. Wjile I made some good friends, many of the people I would talk to I basically had no common interests in, beyond the most mundane trivial chit chat. Once the novelty of meeting and communicating with people and making friends all over the world wore off, I felt I had to return to more creative work. I was still involved in on-line communities (mostly Yahoo email forums), but only involving my special interests or with common interests. Most of my communication was and is with people via email.
Joining Zaadz in 2006 has been an interesting experience because it harkens back to my very early days on the web a decade ago. But at the same time here are people I would have loved to have known in my more sociable phase! But now I am only interested in hanging out with like-minded people, and this brings us to something I feel uncomfortable with on Zaadz - the subtke and unspoiken idea that everyone is your friend. Often people here would send me a friends invitation, people I have no common interests with, who I haven't communicated with, and who haven't emailed me since being added to my list (and I to theirs). But I would still feel obligated to add them and be friendly because, well, this is Zaadz . (of course this stupid idea has absolutely nothing to do with Zaadz or Brain Johnson, a man I have great respect for because of what he has built up here. It is really more about my own personal baggage and false feeling that I have conform to peer behaviour, along the lines of when in Rome do as the Romans do).
Then I discovered I'm not the only one who feels this way .So I've decided to and only keep people on my list who fit into one (or it may be more) of the following categories
o Really truly are a friend, someone I feel warmth and love and a connection with, and they feel towards me likewise, even though we may never have met outside the internet
o Who are friendly acquaintances or people who I have exchanged emails with, or have commented on my blog posts or essays or website and we have some spiritual commonality
o Who have followed my work and found it useful, inspiring, helpful, or whatever, even if we have never communicated beyond a single friends invitation
o Who share common unique spiritual interests, e.g. they may be attracted to the teachings and spiritual path of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, or be interested in Max and Alma Theon
So if you find you have been removed from my friends list, or that I haven't accept your friends invitation, it doesn't mean that I don't like you or don't approve of what you're doing. It just means that I am trying to keep my friends list as authentic as possible. And I wish you all the best with your own friends list!
Access: Public
activeworlds
July 2008 
love it. I won't take it personally. :)
to friends!
-bri
Cheers Brian :-)
:)
what if ken wilber asked to be your friend?
now that would be interesting!
lol Zak :-)
Actually I would be most happy if Ken Wilber wanted to be my friend, provided that we would be corresponding as two equals, so that he would consider my constructive criticisms of his work and ideas, no matter how provocative, just as likewise I would consider any critiques he might have of my work.
You know there is an old mideast aphorism that goes like this, maybe you have heard it.
There are two kinds of sages: the one made by god(reality); and the one made by the world.
Get one or two of your books published, then Wilber will consider you an equal
Good night
Zak, I couldn't agree more :-)
very inspiring blog, dear m.a.
I will tune into my own ‘friends’ list and see if there is something for me to take a look at.. perhaps the ego desire to have ‘lots’ on my list.
Yes, that’s there ;-)
Love,
Sandra
p.s. I’m sure you will get published. Your work is just wonderful.
Hi Sandra!
Yes it's amazing how many “issues” are lurking in the innocious “friends list” :-)
(just like life in general!)
Thanks for the words of encouragement as well. I'm making good progress with my writing so far, and also have a very positive feeling about it
love & light
m.a.
I can understand what you are saying. I also think sometimes when people respond that on the surface dont seem related, perhaps they at some level enjoy what we say and speak about, and if they find inspiration, then maybe that's a good thing.
When I think about the blessings of MOTHER, then it makes me realise that I need to love all, even those I at present can't feel an afinity for. From the wider state of mind no-one is really excluded, so I hope that one day I will be able to learn this lesson from Mother and Sri Aurobindo.
ESOTERICS UNITE in the LOVE of friendship
Hi, M. Alan,
love that you put your thoughts and cleansing process concerning your friend's list out here. I've had some similar thoughts since I signed in, taking care that I don't get carried away by wanting to fill up my list, but tune in before offering or accepting an invitation.
On first sight, there's not too much we have in common, but I'm attrackted by your directness, I share many of your thoughts about The Secret, and l'll keep an eye on what your're up to next!
Dear Gabriele, well one thing you have in common, is me! Us both feeling attracted here, to m. alan's work, and to him as a being…
you are a dear friend Gabriele, beyond Zaadz, and now in Zaadz, and m. alan, although I have not met you, you are indeed a friend 'beyond' – deeper than just this, and perhaps there is nothing deeper than just this, depending on how deep into This we go ;-)
Glad you said this publically, before I did. Zaadz is not a copycat of MySpace. I too have accepted an invite from a member. I will send off a well thought out email in reply, only to never hear from the person again. Members like that are only Head Hunters, looking to build a huge list of friends.
One way I would like to see Zaadz evolve is to really develop our personal networks into an incredible vehicle to fulfill our common mission to Change the World for the Better. My focus is on the problem of extreme poverty in Central America. Clovis is a Zaadzster with his focus on poverty and suffering in Africa. Others just want to introduce more members to their world of Yoga or Meditation. Works for me!
I'm reading the book “The Tipping Point”. The chapter I just finished was discussing the near impossibility of managing a group greater than 150. Workers, a Church Congregation, or a network of friends. The average person becomes less effective when their “group” exceeds 150 members. We might all get more done to change the world, if we spend less time head hunting and more time cultivating our current network.
Yes, having Sandra in common is indeed relevant. As is sharing a common opinion on things like The Secret. It's things like this that matter, even more than intellectual interests!
Hi Jeff, good comments!
Yes, Zaadz's real strength is as a personal networking forum, linking up with spiritually-minded like-minded people. I've met some fantastic people here so I can vouch for that.
The cap of 150 people is interesting; it makes sense. Any friendship or relationship requires some measure of emotional input and comittment, so it's logical that the more friends and associates one has, the thinly spread this becomes, and the more superficial the connections.
I liked your comment too, Jeff. For me, 150 probably would be too much already.
This discussion has made some things clearer for me, like in which way I want to be in touch with people I find interesting, inspiring and in a very wide sense of the word like-minded… like kindred spirits…
So for staying in touch with what my zaadz friends put out, commenting, emailing, responding, doing my own stuff AND keeping an eye open on what everbody else is doing - pheuw! - 150 would be FAR too much already, it seems.
What I have realized is that not everybody I find interesting in whatever way neccessariy belongs on my list of friends, when I want to keep that for people I'm really in regular, personal contact with.
So far, so good.
Thank you all for helping enlightening me on this subject.
I also resonate with what Sandra said about the depth of this depending how deep we go into this. right. (hi love! :)
Heheh Gabriele! Well, for me even 20 or 30 would be too much, if i wanted to do other things too! :-)
Althoiugh I haven't read the book Jeff refers to, I get the impression 150 means more of a network of aquaintances, or a workers and manager type thing, rather than friendship proper. Celebrities and extroverts who have hundreds friends probably don't even know most of the people they claim are their friends, except on teh most superficiallevel,
Just to clairify, in The Tipping Point, they use Gore Industries as an example. Gore is the makers of Goretex fabric and other stuff. They live by this rule of 150. There are 150 parking spaces available at a location. As soon as they have more than 150 people in a division, they split it off. There was a Christian Demonimation (sorry can't recall) that splits the congregation as soon as the membership exceeds 150. A military “Company” is 200. They know from hundreds of years of experience that you can't build a cooperative “fighting machine” if the group is greater than 200. One Zaadzster who will go un-named currently has 7881 “friends”. How many of them do you think he is in daily contact with?
I wish I had 150 friend in my network completely deveoted to a common cause and then do something about it!
A Company however is broken down into Platoons, and each Platoon in turn into several Squads. So a Company Commander (Captain, whatever) would be unlikely to have the depth of interpersonal connection with each man under his command as we would in refrence to friends here. I would say that the reason that 150-200 works so well for business or military or exoteric religious units, is that a certain emergent structure appears when you have that number of human beings working together in a cooperative way. Just as ants display emergent behaviour (the “group mind”) when there are a certain number active. But I myself can't imagine anyone actually having 200 friends. Acquaintances, sure. But friends?
But I do agree with you Jeff that having 150 people all working together and dedicated to a noble spiritual and/or activist cause would be pretty awesome!
I wish I had 150 friend in my network completely deveoted to a common cause and then do something about it!
I love this Jeff. And perhaps the 'truth' is we want those 150 people to be devoted to a cause we believe in!
I think it is one reason why I haven't stripped down my 'friends'. I do believe in what I write about on my blogs, and I hope that by making contact every so often with my friends, they might pop by and have a read.. and maybe what I write will speak to them.
And, there are definitely some on my own list (155, oh dear..) who are not there to connect or listen. My sense is that many write “batch' please be my friend emails and then that's that.
I've stopped saying yes to anyone who doesn't write more than “please be my friend” in their invitation. And I do check profiles before I say yes, if it doesn't speak to me at all, then I say no. But it's rare that there isn't something I like in another being….
I know there was much discussion on the ThinkTank pod about being able to 'sort' friends …. I don't know where we are on this, I don't think anything happened. Perhaps it's for the best, as with no 'sorting' option, we do have to tune in more deeply to who is there, and why.
Love to all,
Sandra
This is a very interesting blog!
The Secret, The Law of Attraction…
Having many friends may not matter. Among the many, there are always few true ones. And having few, I think the sample also lowers and so the true ones get fewer.
I like few devoted friends but you won't be sure who of the few are devoted.
I believe there are many worth-friends zaadzsters that would be devoted and have a lot of constructive issues. What do you think?
Hi Saidi
Yes I agree, there are many wonderful and spiritually mnidned people here on Zaadz. In fact I have never found a forum I like as much, as this one.
And you are totally right, the few true friends are the ones who matter.
But for me at least, the friends list is not just about friends but also about aquaintances who I share a spirituality commonality with. Or perhaps they have appreciated mny writings and want to follow my blog posts
Yous ay we can't be sure who among our friends are devoted. Well, I think when you get to know a person well, you can be sure if they are a real friend or not. As regards meeting people over the internet, my position is that it is better to get to know a person first, on a virtual forum just as much as in real life. In Zaadz, and on other forums like Myspace, Livejournal, etc (and ICQ in the old days), it seems like it is the other way around - people are added to each other's lists in the hope that they will then turn out to be friends. But what happens is that once they are added, there is no more communication. I noticed this on Zaadz too, and started having misgivings about the whole thing. Then as I mentioned I saw a post by a zaadzter (that i found by accident using google), and he said he had deleted most of the “friends” from his list. What he said resonated with me. Now I'm a friendly guy, but I also want to be sure there is some spiritual commonality. In the old days when i first went online, 10 years ago, i would be friends with anyone. But now that social chit chat phase is over, and spiritual transformation, and linking up with like-minded lightworkers, is what matters.