Between men and women there is no friendship possible. There is passion, enmity, worship, love, but no friendship.
- Oscar Wilde -
Oscar Wilde, you cynical bastard...I disagree with you. Ok, so if I'm honest I sort of agree and sort of disagree with the quote as I've seen many cases in which Oscar's words fit perfectly; however I have seen many relationships between men and women in which friendship is the foundation. I'm actually in some of those relationships where it's simply friendship and nothing more or less.
You're probably wondering why I chose this quote today...well, I was thinking about the connections we make on Hive and how we, or others in the community see them - not that the latter really matters at all. There's people from all over the world, different cultures, socio-economic realities, religions (or lack of religion in my case), ages, intelligence and so on...and then there's the differences in thought and attitude, ideology and a million other things besides. Of course, we're all men and women too...and last time I looked, there's a difference between the genders. No folks, I'm not saying there's an inequality, just that men and women are different.
Anyway, how the fuck do all those differences combine into two people matching up and building a relationship; how do people connect and interact despite the myriad of differences? I don't know the answer.
I like to think I'm a reasonable man, have a sense of humour, an ethics and code of honour, integrity and a brain in my head, small and shaped like a peanut though it may be. I am a strong character, have values and associated opinions, and am passionate about most of what I do and my life in general. I'm generous, kind, courteous and giving and yet can be brutally honest, decisive and efficient in my prosecution of those who deserve such. I've done things others may look at and be reviled by, and I've done things that people would hail as saintly...Basically, I'm just your typical, average-as-fuck man; I refer to myself here in respect of on Hive and off.
But here's the thing...There's always a thing.
The thing
I know I'm not everyone's cup of tea, meaning not everyone will respond to me well and some just fucken outright hate me. That's ok too, I'm totally fine with it because I understand that people don't always get along. I don't hate them for it, I just move on, pay them no mind, and get on with my life. Doing so leaves more time and capacity to invest into the relationships I want, I mean here on Hive and in real life, and I gain more value from them because of the investment.
But here's another thing...There's always another thing.
The other thing
Here on Hive I have a lot of relationships with a lot of people, all different types of personalities, cultures and so on...and I have female relationships here also and I think of them the same as the male ones, although I may swear a lot more to the fellows in comments. Essentially though, each are the same, a relationship with a person.
So, relationships with male and female users...and all despite me being a knucklehead, nutbag and whatever else I call myself, and that people perceive me to be.
The thing is, (I told you there's another thing), that people tend to match up according to how they feel about a person and here on Hive it's the writing, images, presentation and content of the posts, frequency and quality of the commenting, knowledge, how they treat other people, their sense of fun and humour and so on that people respond to. I mean, what else is there? I don't believe that people connect with me just because I'm male and I certainly don't look for a particular gender when building relationships here.
How we present ourselves will dictate who and why people decide to engage with us, not our genders. I don't know about you here, I speak for myself.
Unfortunately we don't generally have the ability to get face-to-face with each other on Hive but the principles are the same. Manners, courtesy, showing genuine interest, being understanding, actively participating in the relationship, being attentive, interesting, listening...if I was to meet a person in the real-world, say at a bar or function, these are the things I'd be doing, and I do the same on Hive - it's how relationships form.
It's difficult to fully understand who each of us actually is from just a post and some commenting; it's impossible really.
In the same way, it's impossible to judge the status of a relationship between two Hive users simply by observing a few comments from the outside of it as it's often a complex thing built over time and specific to those users. There's husband and wife users here, boyfriend and girlfriend accounts also, and those are easier to read but generally a few comments made between two people who met on the blockchain could be construed in any way at all, but perception isn't always reality. (It's actually mostly not the reality.)
Connections
The great thing is that connections can potentially happen between every user here and it's that which I want to ask you about in this post. Do you have a strategy on how you find and connect with others and how do you develop those into relationships?
Do you let-it-flow organically, or do you work at relationships, seek people out? I'm not one to connect only with people who like what I like, that's boring, but what about you? Do you find value in engaging with people who know or do things that you do not or do you only surround yourself with people who have the same interests, mushrooms or photos for instance? How do you nurture the relationships you create? Here's one for the brave souls...Have you ever felt close to someone you've met here on Hive? Have you felt connected in some way that goes deeper than a few posts and comments?
I believe a person could never know another, me included, by just a few posts and comments here on Hive - People are complicated and, of course, don't always reveal everything, or anything, here on the interwebs. What do you think? Feel free to comment below and let me know. You don't have to tag user names though, it's probably best you don't.
Design and create your ideal life, don't live it by default - Tomorrow isn't promised so be humble and kind
I toook the image in this post with my Olympus camera with a macro lens.