Why do people bother spending time with you?
While reading a blog post about passive income streams, I was presented with the following question: Why do people bother spending time with you? I had to stop and think about this for a little bit. The point of the question is to identify the value that you already bring people. I realize that I don’t really know why people spend time with me. If I think about it, not too many people actually do spend time with me. More accurately, I don’t spend much time with other people.
However, I do know a lot of people. There are a ton of people that I maintain some level of contact with. As an exercise, I am going to create a spreadsheet full of the names of everyone in my contact list. I am going to list the following:
- Last time we did something together
- What we usually do
- What value they have for me
- What value I think I bring to them
Hopefully, I will find a trend. I am not necessarily concerned about finding any possible business opportunities. I am only passively interested in passive income streams. (Sorry couldn’t help myself) If doing this enlightened me on one of them I wouldn’t be upset. This does seem like a good way to evaluate my perception of the relationships that I have with other people. I think this will end up becoming a “How big of an asshole am I?” test. I fully expect to realize that I am a big one.
It would be very helpful if some of you would help me with the value part. Other than the fact that I am just so pleasant to be around, what do you get out of knowing me? The more selfish your reason the more I want to know. If you want I’ll assume that the main reason is simply friendship but I am interested in hearing any of the secondary reasons. I’ll make you a deal, if you send me an answer I will reply honestly with the value I expect to receive from you. I’ll only do that if you request it. You may not want to know 🙂
If you feel more comfortable, send your reply via email at erik@craddock.org