Photo by Aftab
What is Relevance?According to the Wikipedia:
Relevance is a term used to describe how pertinent, connected, or applicable something is to a given matter.
In the context of this article, Relevance is used to describe how we connect to the world around us.
We are a busy generation and our lives are filled with chores and massive information overload. Frequently, our responsibilities invade every waking moment of our lives and make it difficult to stay relevant to the world around us. It is the reality of today.
However, in those times that we are interacting with others, it is important to stay relevant, informed, and to be able to keep up the conversation. It is also satisfying to get positive conversational feedback and to be perceived as a well-rounded person in the eyes others.
Here are a few simple tips to significantly improve your “relevance factor” with minimal time invested.
1. Stay in the Know – brush up on the brave new world around you. When you get “behind times”, stay “well-rounded” and get instant updates from these sources:
- News Headlines on Google News, Yahoo News. For strong opinions, and excellent editorial, turn to New York Times. Their “Most Popular” section helps to narrow down the content and separate important from trivial.
- Best Socially Rated Content – News, Articles, Videos, Images. Some of the more popular sources are Digg, and Del-icio-us. The former helps narrow down the pulsating content of the moment, while the latter shows the most popular sites bookmarked by the users.
- For more emerging “up to the” minute news and opinions, search through Blog News aggregators, such as: TechMeme, BlogPulse, Google Blog Search. (The search results generated via blog searches are different than the results returned via Google or other search engines and frequently more narrowed and specific to the topic to the search results.)
- Art – Check out Art Exhibits in your area. Even if you do not have a chance to go to the exhibit, it helps to know featured artists and exhibitions. For in depth info, read credible reviews from a credible source. For example, turn to New Yorker “Arts” section when planning to go to New York. The editorial is top notch and covers the latest and greatest from the art world.
- Film – Use Rotten Tomatoes to freshen up on your film awareness. (Left Hand Sidebar displays films that are currently playing at box office & their reviews. The higher the fresh factor(the # of red tomatoes) the better the film is rated).
- Celebrity – While this topic is a little less academic and is frequently bordering gossip, there is a reason Celebrity Magazines are so popular, not to mention is a great conversation filler at times and is bound to pique human curiosity.
Some good sites are: Pop Sugar, ICYDK, Allie is Wired, Celebrity Moms
2. Hone Up Your Inner Analytic - different situations require a different approach. By being alert, listening, observing, and trying to size up what is most useful in a situation or to a person you interacting with in a specific situation, you can make yourself invaluable.
For example, an amazing story or a ground breaking news about fashion or celebrity, regardless of how captivating it may be, would be irrelevant to people who just experienced earthquake and lost their homes.
This is an extreme example, but it captures the essence of making yourself relevant (or in this case, irrelevant) to another person or situation.
3. Reach Beneath the Surface - situations, conversations & most importantly people have many layers. The most basic level of interaction is on the surface. However, if you try to think about a topic, or a situation deeper – more real, captivating, and interesting conversations and experiences are bound to emerge.
For example, someone who comes from from a family with divorced parents may have a very different outlook on family and marriage than someone who’s parents have been married for a lifetime. Knowing a person’s background and being aware of it during the conversation, would allow a person to ask more meaningful questions, which in turn can result in significantly more sincere and deeper conversation.
4. Present a Well Rounded Point of View – opinions are a dime a dozen, but your point is perceived so much more relevant and powerful, when it is thought out. In taking a strong stance, first, familiarize yourself with the opposing point of view and acknowledge it. Then explain why the point that you are making makes more sense.
For example: “I think organic food is definitely healthier than non-organic options, even though there are data points that indicate that organic food is not fully regulated either. Still, I feel eating organic decreases the likelihood of consuming pesticides and antibiotics that are present in non-organic food.”
This sounds a lot more relevant, well-rounded, and credible then: “I like organic, because it is organic.”
5. Do New Things - to stay updated, learn new things, and entertain your inner explorer, try to incorporate new things into your life and daily routines. Note the positives and the negatives. Evaluate how these things fit into your overall knowledge framework. Then you have something real to discuss and useful points to make. Here are a few suggestions to get your imagination going.
6. Push Boundaries – stretch your comfort zone. It sometimes takes effort to understand new concepts, but it provides new data points and improves your overall understanding of the world around you.
When I took my first programming class in college, it seemed like a foreign concept and took enormous effort to grasp, because I couldn’t relate the concept to anything similar that I’ve done before. Later, when I took another programming language class that was considered more difficult, it was actually easier, because I could relate the concept to something I already knew and build on the existing foundation. I call this “Learning Economy of Scale”.
The more you know, the easier it becomes to grasp new things, because they are building on a piece of knowledge that you already have. The key is to have multiple pieces of knowledge, which in turn makes you a multi-dimensional person.
7. Become an expert – dwell deeper into an area of interest and relate what you know to other things that are happening right now. Not only will you be referred to within you group of peers as the knowledge expert, but you will be able to draw patterns from your area of expertise to other things that are happening around you. Here is a great resource to start with: How Stuff Works.
In summary: Being relevant is an acquired skill, not genetic or inherent trait. It does require interconnecting with people and events around us.
It takes some time and effort, but ultimately leads to deeper conversations, more fulfilling interactions, and thorough understanding of the world we live in.
How do you stay relevant? Share your tips in the comment section.
View Feed XML
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
I read your article with great pleasure. Thank you.
Really enjoyed this! Well done!