The Importance Of Social Networking For Women In Midlife

7 STEPS TO MOVE FROM YOUR DESK TO CONNECTION

Women have always been great socializers. It is in the blood. We connect easily with other people, and with women in general, but something happens when we get to midlife. We get tied up in work, in family, and often, in the care of our elderly parents.

Midlife is also a time of personal reassessment and changing relationships. Partners retire or separate, children leave home, parents become dependent or die. Instead of becoming more free, we often find ourselves more burdened. The loss of health, marriage and employment can exacerbate the issue and isolation can be a problem.

Being lonely is brought on by a lack of social network, and is a condition that can strike even married people because they are not emotionally connected or close to their partners. It may also be there is dependency on the partner to create social contacts, or just being shy makes it hard to connect.

Emotional loneliness is the absence of a close emotional relationship and it takes time to develop friendships you are willing to trust. All close relationships require self-disclosure and that may frighten many people because of the potential rejection factor.

Everyone needs someone to hang out with, to share the trials and triumphs of the every day with, and to feel connected to another human being. Frequently, this is not the case.

Nearly every woman I’ve spoken with in the last year has indicated that there are strong issues with isolation. Many believe they are alone in their midlife transitions and there is no one to really talk to about it. This is the fallacy. We are too strong in number for this to be true, and yet, this is how we “feel”.

Learning how to share this ‘feeling’ is critical to our well-being.

We are all in the same boat. We need human relationships to survive. In fact, they have done research to show that one in four people do not have a best friend, and one in eight is likely to develop dementia if they do not have a strong social network to back them up. These are scary statistics. I can tell you which side of the fence I want to be on.

So much of our social isolation is caused by fear of rejection, of not having anything to contribute, or distrust of strangers. These fears are usually not well-founded and generally, when confronted, will disappear. I know this from experience.

Building a social network with like-minded people can have the opposite effect. It brings you of yourself, gives you a common ground to share things, and to get the encouragement and support you are looking for. That’s why there are so many social networking sites out there. So many people just want to connect, to feel that someone is listening, and they can be heard.

I have spent my life traveling the globe. I left my home in Scotland at the age of 16 for London, where I knew no one. Twelve years later, I did it again, when I left London to go to San Francisco, where I knew one person. At 33 I went to Los Angeles, knowing only two people, and at age 46 I went to Paris where I knew no one, except my immediate family. The journey continued to Amsterdam and then to New York. All along the way, my social network was limited. But through the classes I took, the religious affiliation I had, and the groups I started or connected to, I was able to construct a powerful network of friends who live all over the world. No one said it would be easy, but you can do it.

The first step is the hardest, but once you get going, the rest is easy.

1. Get out and start connecting. How you do that is up to you, but I strongly recommend the face-to-face kind. It is the human connection that keeps us alive. The virtual ones keep us locked into our rooms, behind the computer, being faceless (even if your photo is up there).

2. Phone calls are better than sitting staring at the computer Instant Messaging with someone. We crave human contact. In this technological, automated world, the more we connect, the more we’re losing ‘touch’.

3. If you are religious join the groups in your church or synagogue, if you have an interest in something, then connect through that. If you would like to find like-minded women, go where they go. This is number one. I like to write, so I joined writers groups. I like to sing, so I joined a choir.

4. Join a health club, or find something that interests you and go to the meetings.

5. Make dates for the movies, to go to a restaurant, a museum or a play.

6. Be really bold, and take yourself on a foreign vacation with a special interest group.

7. Go to places regularly and very soon people will start to recognize you and want to know who you are.

Many of us have the same insecurities, and the only way to find it if it’s real is to take the chance. See where you fit, find like-minded women to support you. Friends are important, being seen and heard is important, and knowing there is a safe place you can share is critical.

I created my company Fearless Fifties as a community for women who want to end the isolation; to connect women to each other for support, encouragement and inspiration and to allow them to take control of their own life so they can start creating the life they always dreamed about.

It’s your first step towards building the social network you always wanted.