“The concept of Six Degrees of Separation suggests that all people (yes…worldwide) are separated by six or fewer social connections from each other.  As a result, a chain of “a friend of a friend statements can be made to connect any two people in a maximum of six steps” (Wikipedia).  If you couple this idea with the fact that each person knows between 600-2000 people, suddenly, the world seems much smaller, and our individual spheres of influence become greater than we realized.

Unfortunately, Big Tech has tampered with this process.  In today’s social media climate, the strength of these human connections in an electronic world is determined by algorithms that analyze an individual’s social media post for views and relevancy. So, no longer is it just knowing your audience and publishing your posts which are inserted chronologically into the stack with everyone else’s.  That is why in every post on each platform, people plead with their audience to like/share their posts so that they can be seen or heard…seems like a kind of worldwide middle child syndrome.

In my oil painting entitled, “Five Fishing Buddies”, we see human connection distilled to its most pure form.  In this case camaraderie and a common love of fishing.  Foot to foot and shoulder to shoulder they stand physically connected with the pole showing off the catch of the day.  Spending time on the lake together, telling stories, encouraging each other, trying to catch the biggest fish.  Later they will lift a mug of beer and share their “fish stories”.  They’ll think of their buddies as they enjoy their catch for dinner with their families.  They’ll stay in touch and plan their next outing on the water.  Were these times of less stress and more joy?  What do you think?