This document discusses the advantages and disadvantages of technology and how it affects our connections with others. While technology allows for easier and faster connections with more people, it can also be a distraction from real-time relationships. The document recommends prioritizing face-to-face interactions for close personal connections, as the social brain functions best when reading nonverbal cues in real time. Communicating electronically lacks these important social cues, so reflecting on intentions before responding can help avoid miscommunications.

1. By Col Mukteshwar Prasad(Retd)
Based on blog of Daniel Goleman
Focus on How You Connect

2. Focus on How You Connect
 Technology can not be eliminated from our lives anytime soon. Nor should
we.
 Advantages
 Smart phones and social media expand our universe.
 We can connect with others or collect information easier and faster
than ever.
 Hyper-connected world – even with people we rarely see or speak with
regularly – can offer very valuable sources of information.
 Expand what you can know:
 you may find out about a job opening etc
 Disadvantages
 But they also expand our spectrum of attention.
 Too much of a good thing can become
 A distraction,
 Even a false reality –
 Sometimes at the detriment of our relationships.

3. Focus on How You Connect
 Shouldn’t confuse all of our social media connections with
the rich personal world of real-time relationships.
 But getting lost in a world of too many digital connections can be very
unfulfilling and isolating.
 That’s why for close personal connections, try to prioritize your
communication methods.
 When possible, make the interaction face to face – especially if you
need to discuss something important.
 The social brain is in its natural habitat when we're talking with someone
face-to-face in real time.
 It’s picking up information that it wants in the moment.
 It's reading prosody in voice, emotions, and nonverbal cues.
 And it's doing it invisibly, doing it constantly, out of our awareness –
and then telling us what to do next to keep things smooth and on track.

4. Focus on How You Connect
 The problem with communicating too much via email or text is that they
have no channels for the social brain to attend to.
 You have nothing for the orbital frontal cortex, which is
dying to get this information to latch onto, to inhibit
impulse and tell you, “no don't do that, do this.”
 We’re essentially flying blind.
 But if you have to communicate electronically, try to create more presence in
your interactions.
 Take a few seconds to reflect on your intention and message.
 Is it clear?
 Will the tone be misinterpreted?
 That brief pause can save you a lot of back pedaling and hassle for
an intentionally (or unintentionally) snarky comment.
 For more about the importance of attention in our day-to-day lives, watch
Daniel Goleman’s interview with Mindful editor, Barry Boyce.