The Big Power of Tiny Connections: How Small Interactions Spark Awesome Outcomes

Why this book is a must-read for people who want a bigger life …

The people you know have the power to change your life and you have the power to change theirs. But what if meeting people isn’t your strong suit? Or you’ve become complacent about making new connections? Or you simply do not know how you can live the powerful, fulfilled life you envision for yourself?

This life-changing book will underscore how powerfully connection supports your happiness, health and well-being, while also sharing practical ways you can find and make connections on a daily basis, almost anywhere.

In this zippy read, Jen Nash explains how the opportunity to connect is everywhere and how we can get more than we ever dreamed of out of life if we just make the effort to lean in and say hello.

Using amazing true-life stories and scientific research on how we listen, talk, and crave connection, this book demonstrates that making time to connect is the most productive thing we can do to thrive at home or at work.

Whether you want to go to more parties, get a better job, make more money, or get laid more—reading this book will give you practical strategies for doing it all. A happier, more successful, and more fulfilling life is within your reach. The Big Power of Tiny Connections will show you the way.

Contents

Prologue

PART ONE: Hoping for Connection

Chapter 1 Tiny Connections … Made to Be, Not Meant to Be

Chapter 2 I Don’t Need More Friends and Other Lies We Tell Ourselves

Chapter 3 Tiny Connections Will … Make You Interesting at Parties

PART two: tiny connections will ...

Chapter 4 Tiny Connections Will … Get You a Better Job

Chapter 5 Tiny Connections Will … Get You Laid

Chapter 6 Tiny Connections Will … Make You a Better Person

Chapter 7 Tiny Connections … Can Earn You More Money

Chapter 8 Tiny Connections Will … Make Your Life More Exciting

Chapter 9 Tiny Connections Will … Turn You into a Super-Connector

PART three: let’s get practical

Chapter 10 Tiny Connections 101

Chapter 11 How to Work The Room When You Don’t Know A Soul

Chapter 12 How to Be a Great Listener

Chapter 13 What to Do When You Don’t ‘Click’ Right Away

Chapter 14 How to Exit Conversations Gracefully

Chapter 15 Staying Connected

Chapter 16 How to Connect Without Leaving the House

Chapter 17 How to Create a Connected Workplace

Chapter 18 Conclusion

Looking To Work With Jen?

References

Jen Acknowledges

About the Author

Prologue

My mother talked to strangers a lot. And while I didn’t love it as a kid, I got used to it. I accepted the fact that she would strike up a conversation with pretty much anyone, anywhere. Mom would chat with the person next to us on the sidewalk while we were all waiting for the crosswalk light to change. She’d swap stories or recipe tips with the person in front of her in line at the butcher. She’d express interest in the server’s childhood in Mumbai, India, or in a passerby’s hand-quilted jacket from Little Rock, Arkansas, or in the intricate cane a gentleman in the art gallery was using. She’d share her historical, informational, medical, nutritional, or even spiritual advice with almost anyone, anywhere at any time.

Maybe this doesn’t sound that odd, but she’d do it even if she didn’t speak their language.

A Vassar graduate who focused her studies on languages, my mother spoke English, French, Spanish and German, picked up a smattering of Asian languages when we lived in Malaysia, Hong Kong, and Japan. If you didn’t know her, watching her talk to random strangers would make you think she was the bravest, least inhibited person you had ever met. In truth, Mom was rather shy, but she buried that shyness under a mantle of bluster and personality.

As an adult, I would often be embarrassed when she would attempt to endear herself to the Asian shopkeepers in my New York City neighborhood. She’d walk into my local bodega and speak to the owners in Cantonese, since they looked Asian, and we’d spent many years living in Hong Kong. It might have worked, however most of the local shopkeepers in my area are Korean—not Chinese. These patient, kind-hearted shopkeepers didn’t seem fazed by this elderly woman nattering to them in bits and pieces of some foreign language, as to them she was just another eccentric tourist, but I was mortified.

No matter my protests, Mom would carry on. She was certain she’d eventually not only get it right—but also make someone’s day. And sure enough, once in a while she did. The look of surprise and astonishment on their faces would then be priceless. One minute here is the dotty older woman speaking nonsense and the next she’s thanking them properly in their mother tongue. I asked my mom what the point of all the back and forth was, after all she could just politely thank them in English. She would just shake her head and point out the fact that by struggling, then making that unexpected connection across languages, she was sprinkling joy everywhere she went. Having seen the smiles some of them beamed at her as she walked away, I think she was onto something! Looking back, I don’t know why I felt so impatient when Mom had these exchanges, because it was precisely these small moments that would lead me to understand how powerfully connective, motivating and supporting our interactions with the world can be— it was these moments that lead me to spend my time talking and coaching about the power of connection all over the world.

Over the years, the way my mother engaged with anyone and everyone, rubbed off on me. I started collecting thank yous in foreign languages: Arigato, Obrigado, Mootsomesk, Kitness—and those became my gateway drug to fast and easy connection. I have an uncanny ability to figure out where people are from, just by paying close attention to their accents. Many people think South Africans are Australian, or Brazilians are Argentinian—and they often don’t know that people in Jordan speak Arabic. As I developed this skill, I realized that when I whip out the old Chokran (thank you) and Masalema (goodbye) in Arabic when I’m walking out of my local deli, the Jordanian deli owner Wadha always breaks into a killer smile. It never fails to put surprise and delight on his face!

Everything we have in our lives largely depends on the people we know and the people they know. So, the larger and more diverse your network is—the more unique, empowered, and amazing life you can lead. (By a diverse network I mean demographic diversity, paradigm diversity as well as skill and experience diversity.) Mom connected to make people’s day. And while I enjoyed the flashes of connection that accompany my thank-you flexing, I realized there was so much more opportunity within those tiny sparks.

What’s the Point?

Connection is extremely powerful. Transformative even. More than anything it’s a tool we can use—or a muscle we can flex—to create the lives we want to live.

1

Tiny Connections … Made to Be, Not Meant to Be

Liza, a particularly attractive friend of mine, was in a yoga studio waiting for the class to start. After fifteen minutes, it seemed the teacher was a no-show, so all the students started mulling about and chatting to each other. A young man in his mid to late twenties who had been sitting next to Liza, struck up a conversation with her for a few minutes and then casually asked if she had a Tinder handle. Since they were face to face, chatting away, Liza was curious why he wanted her online dating handle and asked him as much directly. He responded, Well, I’d like to ask you out.

Let’s think about this for a moment. Here we have a handsome ‘yogi boi’ standing next to Liza, and yet, he’s become so reliant on apps to manage his social life he doesn’t know how to ask a pretty girl out on a date without the intermediary assistance of technology. Liza was bemused and saddened, so she switched the topic of conversation and avoided giving him her number. Nonetheless, the exchange shocked her enough that when she got home, she posted about the experience on Facebook—which is how I heard about it.

I remember being amazed and sad reading this story. How had dating evolved to such a place? As I thought more about it, I realized that a twenty-something-year-old has always lived in a world where there are dating intermediaries (websites, apps, etc.). He had never seen a personal ad in a newspaper or had to call someone (not text) to ask them out. It probably never even occurred to Yogi Boi to just ask Liza out on the spot. So, it got me wondering, how is a society that’s hell bent on retreating into technology going to support creative human connections—the one thing we must have to live amazing, productive, lucrative, healthy, fulfilled lives? From where I’m standing, it seems like we’re not only losing the ability to connect in person (sorry, Yogi Boi!) but we’re losing the interest to connect at all, and that’s really scary.

I Don’t Just Talk the Talk: I Live and Breathe Connections

As a human connectivity expert, I travel the world, shifting people’s perspective around the critical importance of human connections within their personal and professional lives. Through corporate and one-on-one executive coaching sessions, I focus on connection as the power base for excellence in leadership, inclusion and retention in a corporate world that’s struggling with mass splintering.

Whether we’re working onsite or remotely, the office culture of the past is just that … in the past. Now more than ever we must rethink how we connect with friends, family and coworkers as our days are jammed with video meetings and calls. I believe that you can’t reap the social and financial benefits of connecting with others without the right kind of awareness, insights, and solid diligent effort. I know because I don’t just talk about the power of connections, I live it.

I’ve been a creative director and marketing strategist for some of the most well-regarded companies in the world, which means I was paid very well to develop marketing campaigns that built relationships between people and brands. It also means I got very good at understanding human nature, because when you want people to take certain actions you must understand their motivations and make it very easy for them to take the steps you’re hoping they’ll take. While I was in this role, I was also simultaneously building a multi-million-dollar real estate portfolio. I knew nothing about real estate when I started in my early thirties, but I was extremely driven and focused on owning passive income properties—so I forced myself to meet a lot of people and asked a lot of questions so I could build a network of other real estate experts around me.

Over the years, I’ve transformed my career, grown my income well past six figures, befriended influential people and gained access to things I would never have seen or known about otherwise—all because I took concrete steps to connect with a wide range of people around me. I live the principles I’m espousing in this book, and as story after story will show you, nothing beats having awesome, life-changing experiences thanks to the connections you’ve made.

LET ME TELL YOU A STORY:

For my birthday, I historically have loved to go for high tea at a fancy hotel with someone who enjoys that sort of thing. I’m a fan of the petit fours, the tiny sandwiches, the scones, clotted cream and, of course, the excellent champagne. About a decade ago, my mother and I were having high tea at the Pierre Hotel, a classic New York landmark hotel, where I was planning to kick off my birthday week of silliness. We were sitting there enjoying the last sandwiches with our tea, when an older gentleman sitting nearby interrupted our conversation as he’d overhead us talking about living in Japan.

After asking us some questions about our experiences abroad, he politely begged our forgiveness for interrupting and went back to his drink. My mom and I however didn’t want to let him off the hook so easily. He seemed smart, interesting, and fun! So instead of staying in our own lanes and minding our business, we invited him to join us.

It turned out he was not only the former mayor of a nearby large city but also the former governor of that state as well. He was very high energy and fun, and after twenty minutes or so, he invited us to join him for lunch two hours away at his home that was in a different state. Normally I don’t drive two hours for lunch, but we were planning to head in that direction, as I lived part-time in New York and part-time in his state as well … so we accepted his invitation and met him the next day.

Over the following years, we’ve developed a friendship that has enabled me to meet and spend time at dinner with celebrities such as like Norah Jones, Tony Bennett and his gorgeous wife Susan Crow, as well other notables like the NBA commissioner Adam Silver and financial journalist Maria Bartiromo. I even got to meet Presidential Candidate Mike Bloomberg. It’s amazing that one minute you’re having tea and chatting and then less than a year later you’re hanging out with celebs you normally only read about.

Connections Don’t Just Happen

What do I mean by that? Well, for starters you can’t just show up at some random bar and expect to be included with all the fun, attractive people. You can’t sit back and wait for people to come to you. You must actively look for opportunities to connect and that’s what I’m here to show you in this book. Step-by-step, I’m going to make it clear how you can create positive connections and outcomes in your life. I will help you see opportunities to connect where you currently see none. I’ll inspire you to pay more attention to the world around you. To recognize the opportunities that cross your path every day, and to take action to turn those opportunities into amazing outcomes.

Making Tiny Connections Will

Get you a better job

How you interact at work can get you considered for promotions, unique opportunities, or juicy roles you wouldn’t have thought possible.

Get you laid

People are more likely to be receptive to advances of any kind from people their peers have vetted. When you’re introduced to someone through friends, you’re instantly not a stranger and you’ve got instant street cred because of that lineage. That can make the leap from stranger to partner a much