Connections are the pillar of health we too often forget

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Concerns about work’s impact on health tend to focus on the mental and physical repercussions. But Kasley Killam, a Vancouver native and health consultant now based in California, says that misses an important part of the picture: Social health.
“Even if you have a strong body and mind, you can’t be fully healthy without meaningful connection,” she writes in The Art and Science of Connection.
Giving some attention to connection can help us live longer, healthier and happier. But we underestimate the importance of relationships on our health, studies have shown. As well, today’s trends at work run counter to the need for social connection. Everything is rushed and we are operating in a hybrid era, seeing co-workers face-to-face less frequently. Also, artificial intelligence is offering us a machine rather than a human as a colleague on tasks.
She calls it the paradox of being plugged in. “Ask yourself: Am I using the tools available to connect meaningfully? Or are they substituting for quality time in person with the people I care about?” she writes.
She urges you to take stock of your social health. Start by identifying who fuels it. There will probably be an inner circle of one to five relationships – family members, close friends, a romantic partner and perhaps a work colleague.
Then reflect on the strength of each of those connections. Who would you feel comfortable turning to in an emergency? Who feels like a spark for your soul? Also: Who among the connections should be excluded because they are hurting your health?
Now move on to how to better optimize your connections. Be selective, because relationships take time and energy. She warns that extroverts who say yes to every invitation may benefit from being more selective.
She offers these five guiding principles:
After evaluating your situation, you can choose to stretch, increasing the number of relationships or communities you connect with. Or you might decide it’s best to rest – keeping things as they are or even reducing the number of key contacts. You can decide to deepen your connections with some individuals. For others, you might choose to just sustain the existing relationship.
Also, consider your style. Based on two factors – your preferred or typical amount of interaction on a spectrum from infrequent to frequent and your preferred or typical type of connection from casual to deep – she came up with these four styles:
Looking at the list, you may see yourself as one specific style or a mix. And the styles can evolve over time. She stresses that one approach is not better than the other. But each is the route, for you, to social health.
Harvey Schachter is a Kingston-based writer specializing in management issues. He, along with Sheelagh Whittaker, former CEO of both EDS Canada and Cancom, are the authors of When Harvey Didn’t Meet Sheelagh: Emails on Leadership.