By Penny Power – Business Author & Human-Centred Speaker
Over the past few weeks, I have been pondering a great deal about relationships. How they begin, how they grow, why some become deeply significant to us and why others remain warm, enjoyable, and light-touch.
Last week I wrote about the importance of being proactive in our relationships. This week I want to take that thought a little further and explore what actually happens when two people begin to connect.
As I have been writing my book, Significance: How to Create and Maintain Significant Relationships, I have found myself trying to understand something we all do instinctively, but perhaps rarely stop to examine.
How does a stranger become someone who matters to us?
It has led me to something I call the 7 Cs of Connection.
The first is perhaps the most obvious, but increasingly it can also be the hardest.
Conversation.
Every relationship has to start somewhere. Someone has to say hello. Someone has to ask the first question. Someone has to take the small emotional risk of beginning.
I think we sometimes underestimate the courage involved in this. Walking into a room where you know nobody, approaching someone at an event, joining a new community, or even speaking to the person sitting beside you can feel surprisingly uncomfortable.
Yet almost every significant relationship in our lives once began with a conversation.
The second C is Curiosity.
Once the conversation has begun, are we genuinely interested in discovering the person in front of us?
Not simply asking, “What do you do?” while waiting for our turn to speak, but wondering who they are. What matters to them? What excites them? What are they experiencing in their life?
Curiosity says, “I want to know you.”
From curiosity can come the third C, Compassion.
When someone shares something of themselves with us, we have a choice. We can simply hear the words, or we can try to understand their world.
Perhaps they are excited about something. Perhaps they are struggling. Perhaps they are lonely, overwhelmed, or uncertain. Compassion doesn’t mean we have to fix anything. Sometimes the most compassionate thing we can do is simply listen and allow someone to feel heard.
And that naturally takes us towards Contribution.
I have always believed that relationships deepen through contribution, but contribution doesn’t have to be grand. It might be an idea, an introduction, a piece of encouragement, or sharing something we have learned.
Sometimes contribution is simply giving someone our full attention.
When we contribute to another person’s life, however lightly, we are saying, “I want your life to be a little better because we met.”
Then comes Commitment.
This doesn’t mean we suddenly have to become best friends. Commitment can be tiny. “Let’s have another coffee.” “I’ll send you that article.” “I’ll introduce you to someone.” “Let’s speak again next month.”
It is simply a decision that this relationship is worth another moment of our time.
Some relationships will stop there, and that is absolutely fine. Not every person we meet needs to become deeply significant. Some relationships are meant to remain light touch, congenial and independent. We enjoy one another, perhaps occasionally help one another, but neither person carries a great emotional expectation of the other.
Other relationships begin to deepen.
And as they do, we discover the importance of Compromise.
Relationships cannot be competitions.
They cannot always happen on our terms, at our preferred time, in our preferred way. Two people bring different personalities, capacities, needs, communication styles, and expectations into every relationship.
Sometimes I have to move towards you. Sometimes you move towards me. Sometimes one person has greater capacity than the other.
Compromise says, “This relationship matters enough for me to make room for you.”
And finally comes the seventh C, Consistency.
For me, this may be the one that transforms connection into significance.
Consistency is remembering.
It is the unexpected WhatsApp message. Remembering the important meeting. Asking about the hospital appointment. Checking how someone’s child got on. Following up on something they told you weeks ago.
It is being proactive rather than waiting for the other person to keep the relationship alive.
Consistency says, “You continue to exist in my mind even when you are not standing in front of me.”
And perhaps that is one of the most beautiful ways we make another human being feel significant.
What I love about these seven stages is that there is no requirement for every relationship to travel all the way through them.
A lovely conversation with a stranger can simply remain a lovely conversation.
A colleague may become someone we are curious about and enjoy working alongside without becoming a close friend.
A client or supplier may develop into someone we deeply value and remain connected to for decades.
And occasionally, someone enters our life and, through conversation, curiosity, compassion, contribution, commitment, compromise, and consistency, becomes one of those precious people we simply cannot imagine life without.
Perhaps that is the point.
We don’t need more relationships.
Most of us already know more people than we have the emotional capacity to hold closely.
What we need is to become more intentional about the relationships we already have, and more aware of which ones we want to deepen.
So perhaps this week, think about someone who matters to you.
Where are you in the 7 Cs?
Have you remained curious about them?
Do they feel your compassion?
Are you contributing to their life?
Have you demonstrated commitment?
Is there somewhere you need to compromise?
And, perhaps most importantly, are you consistent enough for them to know that they remain in your thoughts?
Significant relationships rarely arrive fully formed.
They are built, one interaction at a time.
And sometimes all it takes to begin is a conversation.
With love,
Penny x
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