One of the biggest questions anyone receives on a creative pursuit: "what is the ______ about?" (painting, movie, podcast, song, poem, etc.)
I struggled with an answer to this question. I always heard that you need to find your niche before you start anything creative. Still, I could never bring myself to one certain topic. Yes - I have my passions and interests, yet committing to building something about just one of them made me nervous. I knew I could possibly take on one of these passions and build something fast, yet I also knew that my interest would wane and I wouldn't be able to build something to last.
I decided that I didn't know precisely what I was going to talk to people about on the podcast, I just knew that I really wanted to talk to people. And, I think all of us really need to talk to people. A lack of connection leads to isolation and humans were never meant to live in isolation - we were meant for connection.
I'll be writing a lot more about this phenomena, and also many other reasons we should be talking to people around us, but that will come later on
That being said, the topic of this podcast isn't something that I just recently started proselytizing. I'll share a story to illustrate. Earlier this week, I decided that I should make a Twitter for the podcast (@talkchrismiller). I reasoned that even if I'm not the most active Tweeter, at least I can fill the virtual space and provide another way to connect with people.
When I downloaded Twitter on my phone, I remembered that I had made an account in high school. Initially, I was a bit nervous when I saw this. Like the rest of us, my prefrontal cortex and judgment was not the most developed in high school (still getting there), but I still published my thoughts on the world wide web. So, I began to scroll and scroll with the intent of damage control.
Surprisingly there weren't too many offenses, but mainly tweets like these below:
The truth is, I have always had an interest in people. Why I've always had this interest is hard for me to dissect. I'm sure some contributing factors are: my innate wiring, the way I was raised, the values and faith I've picked up, and the unpredictable nature of human interaction. It excites me to know that, just like I have an interest in talking to people, everyone else has their own thing.
And, all of us get to pull back the curtain to learn what that thing is by striking up a conversation.
See you next time, folks.
Chris
