Episode Transcript
You're listening to The Love Vox with psychotherapist Amynah Dharani.
Amynah Dharani:
Hello everyone. I'm your host, Amynah Dharani. This is the podcast where people who are passionate about the human condition by people who are equally passionate voices in their field. If you're a new listener to our podcast, welcome to the show, friends. The pandemic seems like another time to me. Yet its aftereffects, I believe, are still being felt. I'm specifically referring to the isolation that we all experienced. The need to belong and connect is an essential human need. It's a driving force. We humans are social beings. This is not just a saying, it's backed by research. The need for social connection drives many of our actions and choices. Belonging is a cornerstone of mental health as well.
Social connections contribute significantly to our psychological well-being. When people feel connected, they are not only happier but also more resilient against stress and anxiety. When we feel connected, our emotional resilience strengthens. This connection fosters a sense of safety and acceptance that is vital in coping with life's challenges. On the flip side, isolation can lead to anxiety and depression. People who lack supportive relationships often struggle more with their mental well-being. They may find it hard to relieve stressors without a network to lean on. Belonging also cultivates self-esteem. Being part of a group validates our experiences and feelings. It reassures us that we're not alone in our struggles or triumphs. Healthy connections enhance motivation too, pushing individuals toward personal growth and fulfillment. The warmth of companionship offers encouragement when pursuing goals, making even daunting tasks seem achievable alongside others who share similar journeys.
The quest for belonging is a fundamental aspect of human nature as it also influences and shapes our identities. With the rise of social media, finding your tribe has never been easier or more complicated.
While some seek out healthy communities that uplift and inspire, others may stumble upon chaotic or destructive groups that can lead to harmful consequences.
As we navigate this complex landscape of online interactions, understanding why we gravitate towards certain groups becomes crucial. What draws us into these connections? Is it a genuine search for identity creation or simply an echo chamber fueling our beliefs?
In our episode today, we explore with our guest the need for belonging and how these dynamics impact individual identity and mental health. Let's go meet him
Friends, I have here with me Ian McRae. He is a psychologist, an award winning author, and an independent researcher specializing in the psychology of work, digital communications and emerging technologies.
He is the author of several books that have been translated into a dozen languages including High Potential Web of Value and Dark social. Ian also serves on uh, the British Psychological Society Division of Occupational Psychology Committee and Research board. Welcome Ian.
[00:03:41] Ian MacRae: Yeah, thanks very much for having me. I'm looking forward to chatting with you today.
[00:03:44] Amynah Dharani: Ian, you are a psychologist and an independent researcher. What are your interests in terms of understanding the psychology of humans?
[00:03:52] Ian MacRae: Yeah, they vary a bit and kind of intersect because I've both been interested in individual differences in personality, um, especially in the context of leadership, organizational workplace psychology. So what are those individual factors that make people successful or not vulnerable or not, um, effective or not at work. But then I also do a lot of research into networks, both kind of social in person networks and um, kind of workplace networks as well as digital networks. So I'm kind of go back and forth between the two, but I'm also really interested in the intersection of them. So what happens when you get these individual psychological traits, interacting with wider networks of more people, of lots of interesting complex social dynamics.
[00:04:34] Amynah Dharani: Do you mean groups?
[00:04:36] Ian MacRae: Yeah, groups and um, kind of the wider connections of groups as well. So you know how your workplace network overacts, interacts with your friendship network, with family networks, community networks, do they over intersect or do they not?
[00:04:50] Amynah Dharani: In my mental health language, we call it systems, Systems psychology. Ian, what is shaping a person's identity in our fast-moving technological world?
[00:05:01] Ian MacRae: One of the biggest things is the other people around you. So your direct social networks, your direct groups. So we all have our own sense of our identity and who we are, but it is shaped by the people around us and especially the immediate people around us. Right. The most important, influential, interesting people in our lives. But who that is really varies between different people and different groups. Right. For some people it's very much local community groups, it's family, it might be a tight-knit friendship network. Whereas for some people their immediate social network is mostly online or on the Internet. They might not be in the same city, the same country, they might not necessarily have the same kind of in-person groups. Um, but it's the people you're interacting with really regularly. Um, maybe day to day, hour to hour or um, those kind of role models. You have the people who you like talking to, the people who you learn things from. Interestingly, I think more and more people's identities are being shaped by people they don't necessarily know or don't know directly.
[00:05:58] Amynah Dharani: Uh, that's so interesting.
[00:06:00] Ian MacRae: Yeah. So those kind of parasocial relationships that people have, right, with celebrities they follow, who might be producing a lot of online content. So they're seeing this content all the time, every Day in a lot of their different channels. And so their immediate comparison group is not necessarily their siblings or their immediate friends. They might be seeing more of these other people who they haven't necessarily met. But if you're seeing them all the time, it's coloring your sense of both who you are and how you relate to people around you or who you're familiar with.
[00:06:33] Amynah Dharani: That is really fascinating. And that kind of takes me to my next question, which is how is a person's identity, how is that being constructed today? We are now about 20 years out. Right. Um, from uh, social media, which was probably at its infancy 20 years ago. And that's a massive influence now.
[00:06:53] Ian MacRae: Yeah, absolutely. And 20 years is an interesting time period for me personally too, because I was using some of those digital networks 20 years ago, but the early versions of them. Right. So um, my kind of friendship networks were fairly online, but most people's weren't. So it's kind of shifted now over 20 years to be, I think 70 odd percent of people are on some sort of social media platform, but most people are using it two or three hours a day. So it shifted from being a very niche experience for certain subsets of the population to being widespread. And that changes because in those online environments you're encountering all sorts of different people and uh, not necessarily your immediate friendship group.
[00:07:32] Amynah Dharani: And I think what comes up for me, Ian, is that these are anonymous people potentially.
[00:07:39] Ian MacRae: Yeah. And even if they're not anonymous, they might be very curated profiles by people who are creating a brand image, which is fine, right. Like that exists. People are, you know, marketing brands. People are famous actors or actresses or musicians who are a product as much as a person behind them. But they are, can be very carefully curated and selected. And it's not the same sense of someone you'd get from knowing them online as well as in person and going to the pub with them or seeing them in church or wherever.
[00:08:08] Amynah Dharani: Such a, such a good point, Ian. The need to belong is a strong human need. You know, has technology helped or hindered that, uh, in terms of the social processes of connection, that's a tough one.
[00:08:21] Ian MacRae: Because I'd say both. And it depends on both the people and how they use it and the groups. Because, you know, there's one argument that says now you can find anyone with similar interests wherever you are in the world. Right. It doesn't matter if they're a thousand miles away on the opposite side of the world. You can find someone who has had a similar experience to you or thinks a similar way to you. And I think there's a, uh, positive and a negative side of that. Like, it's great that you can connect with people and find people with similar experiences, similar interests. You can talk to people in ways you might not be able to talk to people immediately around you, but that can also be disconnecting. Right? Because that can really take you out of understanding the situation of people around you in the kind of immediate, immediate social groups if you've got a very different perspective that is based on a different dispersed network. So I think that's a challenge. But you have to understand how people are using the technology too, because there's a huge difference between people who are using, let's just say, like chat. So peer to peer networks, people are just having discussions with their friends versus people who are passively consuming a lot of content. Right. So very different between messaging your friends and family and scrolling endlessly through social media. Because one of those is passive process. It's not really a social process. It's kind of consuming advertising as content. Whereas someone else may be using whatever platform M5 hours a day, but they're chatting with their friends, they're having discussions, they're talking about their social situation, they're solving issues. It really depends. I mean, what do you think about that in your practice? How are people using these networks in different ways?
[00:09:54] Amynah Dharani: In terms of how I see human beings needing connection, I think we are learning how to communicate and socialize at a very young age.
If we are kind of creating these silos, we are not sitting in spaces with other people that have different views. We're only in our own echo chambers. And I think that's the part that I, you know, I kind of question. I'm from a different generation. You know, there was no social media, there was no Internet. And so it was the good old fashioned way of making friends and communities. I also really welcome being able to find other people. For example, if I take an interest in creative writing in a particular genre, I will find that community.
That won't be my only connection. And I think when we split off and find ourselves in our silos is where we enter the kind of, what I consider the really dangerous space. Perhaps dangerous is very dramatic. We're not communicating with this, with the community at large in wanting to belong with something, an idea or a group of people. There are specific types of personalities that may be more vulnerable to groups, and I mean groups in general, not necessarily toxic groups. What are these personality types from your research? Real perspective?
[00:11:22] Ian MacRae: Yeah, there definitely are. There's some personality types where people just have more of a need to belong, to feel part of a group whether or not it's good for them or whether or not it's harmful or constructive to them. They have a really strong need to either do something productive as part of a group or feel, uh, as a part of that community where there's some personality traits that are completely the opposite. They're suspicious, avoidant, worried about belonging to groups and any sort of authority. I don't use the clinical definitions of personality disorders, but I think there's subclinical versions of those that look at some of the patterns and behavior. So one of the things, a common example that people know about is perfectionism, sometimes clinically, is obsessive compulsive personality disorder, but it's that really strong need to feel productive, to have long term goals, and to produce something that is of value to yourself, to your group, to society. Um, so someone like that might have a lot more susceptibility to falling vulnerable to groups that misuse, um, that intention. If you want to, if you need to feel like you're contributing something, there's all sorts of healthy, productive, effective groups that will channel that really effectively and really well into work, into community, into doing good things.
But there's also a vulnerability there in that, uh, if you feel like you're doing something that can be manipulated or taken advantage of by a group or a leader who wants to do something destructive.
[00:12:45] Amynah Dharani: Absolutely. And a number of things come to mind. The loneliness epidemic. Right. Um, we are lonely. Uh, if we are hungry for connection, we may take anything that's on offer as well. Right? Versus, uh, being emotionally intelligent about our choices is probably what I would.
[00:13:06] Ian MacRae: And there's a substantial amount of research that demonstrates that like, the feeling of belonging is far more important than the group ideology. So in a sense, if you're very isolated, very lonely, needing that connection, then you're open to joining any group, especially one that gives you a sense of connection, of belonging, of being valued as part of a social group.
[00:13:27] Amynah Dharani: Such a good point. So how does one identify a healthy group versus an unhealthy group? You and I have studied in our respective psychological domains, but for the average person, when we are lonely or we are looking for connection, how do I know this particular group that I'm seeing online is good for me or not?
[00:13:49] Ian MacRae: Yeah, I mean, I would say personally, one of the things, um, to focus on is whether you can also function independently of the group and if the group takes that away from you. So there's a lot of things you can do to immerse yourself in a group that are fine. But then if you can't function healthily, independently, productively without that group, then they're taking something away. And it may be a case that people join groups because they struggle to do that beforehand. But there's a few key factors, and some of this comes from the personality disorder research as well. But things like kind of your own identity, having an identity that's separate from the group, and that if you lose the group, you still have a sense of that identity. It's fine to have an identity that's really connected to a group, that can be great. But if just the thought of losing the group makes you think, I don't know who I would be without that one, that might be a risk factor. Not necessarily because people get embedded in groups for all sorts of other reasons. The other one is self direction. If you don't have any goals outside of the group or the capacity to make goals and plans outside of what either the group or the leader of the group tells you to do, that's another risk factor. It's very healthy to channel your personal, your career goals into a workplace, your goals for community and connection into a community or religious group. That's all, uh, great. But if you don't have anything outside of it, again, that's another risk factor. It's good to have, you know, as you mentioned, silos. It's good to not just be in one silo, to have interlinking groups that all have complementary kind of goals and objectives, not just one in isolation. Um, the other one is empathy. So this is really common of toxic groups. If you only have empathy for people within that group, then there's something gone really wrong. If everyone outside of that group is not worthy of compassion, of empathy. If you can't understand the emotional factors that might be going on for people outside of your immediate group, that's a risk factor that you've been isolated from, appreciating the humanity of everyone instead of just people you're familiar with or close to.
[00:15:46] Amynah Dharani: Such a good point.
[00:15:47] Ian MacRae: Yeah. And I think that's a kind of fundamental one and it's a hard one to see when you're in it because there's all sorts of reasons why you say, oh, these people have done these things, so we don't, they don't deserve this type of capacity. They need some sort of different treatment. Um, but if once you see that thinking in yourself for other people, that's a warning sign. Um, yeah. And then the last one is intimacy. So can you form mutually satisfying relationships outside of the group? If that is entirely dependent on group membership, that's another sign for concern. Right. Like if you can only identify with people who have the exact same beliefs, values, follow the same leader, but you can't understand what someone else might want from a relationship outside of that group. It's another sign of kind of isolation within a particular group.
[00:16:32] Amynah Dharani: Which psychological tactics and influences do these unhealthy groups, what do they employ, what do they do?
[00:16:41] Ian MacRae: Yeah, um, there's a few tactics and I think sometimes they're more implicit. They're not necessarily constructed. People fall into these groups as leaders as well as followers. And I think sometimes you see this with kind of self help development groups that turn a bit cultish and start taking way too much of people's money and time and focus and attention. But they often have a destructive leader. So it usually takes some sort of direction, like these groups can form organically. But usually there's someone who takes the lead and takes most of the time, um, attention, money, sometimes of the people involved. And usually that requires some sort of charisma, leadership ability and someone who enjoys being in that position of power. Because most of the people in the group then are actually not looking for that position of power. They're looking for some of their needs to be fulfilled that are probably emotional, psychological needs, which is belonging. So if you have a charismatic leader in combination with a whole bunch of people who need to feel that belonging and will sacrifice other things to feel that, then that's quite common. But then that's a good example of how you can look at within the group versus outside of the group. So if people are exclusively looking to that group or that leader to fulfill all of their psychological needs and ah, unable to do it outside of it, or in many cases are punished for going outside of the group to fulfill those needs.
[00:18:01] Amynah Dharani: Um, that's a really good point. So there would be some kind of group pressure or the pressure coming from the leader.
[00:18:08] Ian MacRae: Exactly. Or sometimes coming from the group members as well. Because once you develop these little subcultures or communities that have their own little rules, people who violate those rules get punished quite severely.
[00:18:19] Amynah Dharani: Right now there would be specific types of personalities that would be vulnerable to these chaotic groups or these unhealthy groups. And I know we touched on, we've touched on this already, but that person who is vulnerable to a more rigid group or a more coercive group, if I can use that word, what is that person?
[00:18:41] Ian MacRae: Yeah. Who is that person I mentioned? Unfulfilled needs. But often those people who are very compassionate and caring and loving.
[00:18:47] Amynah Dharani: That's so fascinating. I just want to impress that upon, uh, the audience. I mean, if you have a more giving nature, I think is what I'm hearing you say. Right.
[00:18:55] Ian MacRae: And sometimes people who think that they can help and they can fix some of the problems and they want to see other people happy, feeling good, feeling a sense of belonging. And sometimes those people are really effective enforcers of the group norms because they want that kind of group cohesion, and they want to see people getting along. And it's interesting to see sometimes the sacrifices people will make personally or for the group to try and create that sense or feeling or image of kind of cohesion and compassion. But sometimes the tactics get toxic in that sense when it's misapplied and we.
[00:19:29] Amynah Dharani: Can be manipulated in doing certain things. So yes, we may want to join a group because it helps, just as an example, a marginalized community or some kind of, uh, social, uh, need in the community. And then that group leader or it's community members can transform the group into, uh, another directive, if I can say.
[00:19:50] Ian MacRae: And it's interesting to see too, because I think normally destructive leaders get a lot of credit, which they deserve. But sometimes I think they may be riding the wave more. And you see this sometimes in digital groups where you've got someone who's quite both charismatic but also very perceptive. And instead of directing the group in a way, they're explaining and describing and leading the group in a way that makes it sound cohesive. So they're creating a narrative around what's already happening, if that makes sense. And sometimes you get extreme groups getting more extreme and slightly more radicalized because you've got a leader who's not necessarily driving the movement entirely, but figuring out how to explain it to people in a way that keeps the group cohesive. So there's a shared responsibility there.
[00:20:30] Amynah Dharani: Right. So whatever is in the zeitgeist, uh, whatever is in the media, for example, if elections are, if, I don't know, some other social, a need in the community is being shared or discussed, they may take those actual events and manipulate them.
[00:20:46] Ian MacRae: Yeah. Be very aware of both what's going on externally and what's going on internally. So if there's discussions or conflict within the group or there's a narrative emerging within a group, then they're the ones who kind of explain that and take credit for it, even if it's not necessarily entirely their own kind of responsibility. Sorry, responsibility is the wrong word. But their kind of, the idea they've.
[00:21:06] Amynah Dharani: Generated, it's all one thing about one person, a person being vulnerable to joining these groups. I'm also thinking about the person who is driven to manipulate. And I'm not necessarily sure that these individuals think of themselves as manipulators. Right. There is a certain personality that is driven to drive discord, I think is probably the right way online on these various subreddit groups or whatever that may be. They are driven to create that discord. And that's another personality type.
[00:21:43] Ian MacRae: Yeah, there's definitely more social component. And those are the people who tend to be more likely to be leaders of the group or kind of driving some of the discourse or ideology or the way things develop. And they like that chaos because it's useful for them. Right. Because if they have a sense of where the divisions are and where the chaos is, they can take it and play both sides off against each other. They can kind of push people's buttons and stoke up conflict among the group without necessarily being the pe. The person who's obviously responsible for it. So they can be very good at manipulating, um, and pushing around those social dynamics to. For their own benefit.
[00:22:19] Amynah Dharani: I see that personality as having a personality disorder. Once a person has joined this group online or, uh, in person, and they're in this vortex of these chaotic groups. And I really like that you've used the word chaotic groups because there's no judgment or value that you're impressing on this. But these are chaotic groups. How can family members or trusted colleagues and friends, how can they help these members?
[00:22:49] Ian MacRae: Yeah, that's near and dear. Really tough challenges. Because sometimes once people are in these chaotic groups, it's a bit too late. Right. There's not always a lot you can do, especially if a group has taken over a big chunk of someone's identity or in the way they make sense of the world and understand things around them. Because if they're only looking internally for the group for information, something is going to have to really break within the group before they are going to see that external perspective. I think one of the things is more preventative is that having more dynamic, kind of diverse social networks is really important. Having trusted friends, family members or people in different parts of your life that you have a relationship with, where they'll tell you the honest truth and that you can trust them to do that. And that's mutual. And that's not calling out, that's not aggressive, that shouting at someone. You don't know that they're doing the wrong thing isn't going to make a big change. But it's those more kind of quiet, respected, um, trustworthy conversations that you have with people that can slow people down from going off on these dark paths. And that's one of the things that, um, I think was really interesting in the last couple of years of, um, environments of isolation and lockdown and stuff, and people having what I would say is fewer social guardrails, right? Like, less connection to community, less connection to people at work. Just saying, what are you doing? Why are you doing that? This is like, you know, don't spend all of your time doing that. And it's not necessarily something that happens. Like it's one conversation that fixes everything. But it's those little interactions that we have every day with different people that give us a better sense of broader, uh, social reality of how different people perceive things and what, what the dangers are about going down really destructive paths or following these chaotic groups.
[00:24:28] Amynah Dharani: And of course, the pandemic was such the unknown. It's all very well in hindsight. We can go back and say, well, we didn't need to do this. Why the heck did we have toilet paper shortage? Or this was so stupid and all the rest of it. Right? But yeah, uh, what the heck did we know? And this was really whatever steps were being taken, uh, were to mitigate people's lives. And we can understand that. Yes, we're having our own emotional process. We're, you know, if we've lost a job because of that, or if there's a loss of income, we're going to be really emotionally charged. If we've lost loved ones, um, due to the virus, we're going to have another different response. And we may want somebody to blame. And therefore we are now vulnerable to join one group, uh, that has a specific view and that is really taking all those emotions and telling you where to.
[00:25:24] Ian MacRae: Yeah, exactly. That's a good point too, about the uncertainty initially about what are the right things to do. Because there's lots of different strategies, lots of different prevention strategies for both the virus and people's jobs. People trying to sort out so many different things in so many different areas of their lives. And that uncertainty makes people really hungry for a certain clear, specific solution, even if there isn't one. Especially in the time, um, when everything is a bit chaotic, it's hard to know which direction. So that's why, um, I think those kind of diverse social connections are the best guardrail, because then you can get different perspectives and slow down. Hopefully have some time to think about it both individually and with other people. And then, um, yeah. Not fall down those rabbit holes too quickly.
[00:26:07] Amynah Dharani: I happen to be a fan of Michael Smarkanish and his recommendation to his audience is have a wide media diet. You are then getting information from various different channels and you can then step back and understand what's really taking place versus what are a bunch of opinions. Right. Um, what can individuals do for themselves to keep a balance of perspectives and rational discourse? I went into the kind of the highly charged emotions that came out of the pandemic and of course the isolation that you speak of. Right. I mean we um, we were not able to connect with loved ones, you know, and somebody was controlling that. That is the government. Right. Um, and then of course that created a different discourse. Well, what can individuals do so that they don't get sucked into these conversations, these extreme conversations and these chaotic groups in the first.
[00:27:06] Ian MacRae: As much as you can to be a bit more curious about other people's perspectives and points of view.
[00:27:11] Amynah Dharani: So curiosity. I just, I just want to impress on that you're recommending people to be curious.
[00:27:16] Ian MacRae: I just did a piece of research with the BBC about people, their own and others intentions during controversial, even political conversation. And the research was really clearly showing that almost everyone underestimates how much other people want to learn and overestimates how much people want to persuade.
Um, yeah, yeah, yeah, say that again.
[00:27:40] Amynah Dharani: Say that again. So yeah, I really want you to impress. This is um, really interesting.
[00:27:44] Ian MacRae: Overestimated how much other people wanted to persuade them of information and underestimated how much other people wanted to learn.
So we all thought, or if I were using myself as an example, I would say, okay, I'm really interested in learning about other people's views. Most other people don't want to learn quite as much as I do. And um, I'm not that interested in persuading people, but most other people are focused on persuading me of something during a controversial conversation. So there was a bit of a gap in essentially underestimating the kind of pro social goals of other people. We did the same with antisocial goals too. So we asked people, how much do you like to start an argument? And how much do other people like to start an argument? And almost everyone said, absolutely not, I never like to start an argument. But everyone overestimated other people's desire to start an argument. It wasn't really high. But I think finding the middle ground there is important and you can't do it all the time, like at a casual conversation, at a bus stop or in a grocery store or whatever. You're not going to get deeply into understanding the motivation of someone else and their political beliefs. Americans weren't any different than our international population. I think people imagine that America is highly polarized and people are fundamentally different there politically than other people. Which with this research, based on how people are perceiving themselves and others, absolutely no different for an international population, which I think is interesting. It could also be partly a nature of the sample. Right. So these were BBC readers. So international BBC readers were maybe a different audience than the general population. So that's. But it's consistent with previous research that used general populations. But I think we need to understand that bias is naturally there both in ourself and other people. So when we have the opportunity and we have the kind of mental emotional space to have those conversations and learn a bit more, that's when we should try and do them. Um, and recognize in ourselves too when we're not ready to have those conversations and also when other people are not in a kind of open minded space to have those conversations. Like it's much better to do it with a group of friends or old friends after you've maybe had some time together, had a glass of wine, whatever, is kind of loosening things up socially so you're more open and accepting of what other people might say and taking those opportunities to understand at least a bit of it and also knowing you don't necessarily need to agree with them.
[00:29:58] Amynah Dharani: Absolutely. Most people are not our enemies, right?
[00:30:01] Ian MacRae: Uh, yes, exactly.
[00:30:03] Amynah Dharani: We're not each other's enemies. Ian, in wrapping up, what are you working on?
[00:30:08] Ian MacRae: I've just finished another book recently about blockchain networks and the kind of intersection of technology, society and business there. Because I think there's some interesting things happening with just how online digital networks are being constructed and created and some of the kind of weird artifacts of what happens from that and weird kind of financial mechanisms and incentives that kind of can skew human behavior. And if you put people in the wrong environment, you get all sorts of weird reactions. That's true of in a physical space. It's also true of digital spaces.
[00:30:38] Amynah Dharani: So exciting. I hope that you will visit the show again.
[00:30:42] Ian MacRae: Absolutely.
[00:30:42] Amynah Dharani: Share some of your ongoing research.
[00:30:44] Ian MacRae: Cool. Thanks very much.
[00:30:46] Amynah Dharani: Thank you. Ian.
Welcome back. So what are your thoughts after listening to Our guest?
Ian McRae's perspective is unique given his research interests at Mary Psychology and Technology.
For me, I understand the digital age as having transformed how we seek identity and belonging Social media platforms offer a vast landscape for individuals to explore who they are.
Every post, like or comment can shape our self perception. Many people turn online to find communities that resonate with their interests and values. These spaces provide a sense of connection that might be lacking in real life. The appeal of virtual connections is strong and sometimes even addictive.
However, this search isn't always straightforward. Anonymity can lead to both freedom and chaos.
People may adopt personas that feel more accepted but aren't truly reflective of themselves. This can create a complex web where group identity can overshadow individual identity. It's essential to navigate these waters carefully as the quest for belonging can sometimes lead us astray into less healthy territories.
So what can an individual do? I believe it's vital to maintain a diverse social network. Engaging with different perspectives can dissolve the boundaries of echo chambers and some practical steps can include the following 1 seek conversations outside your usual circles 2 limit time spent in emotionally charged online environments and 3 reflect on group dynamics and their effects on personal beliefs. Additionally, individuals should actively work towards acknowledging the pull of anxiety-inducing groups. This awareness can empower them to resist unhealthy affiliations. While social connections offer substantial benefits, it is crucial to recognize the potential dangers of destructive groups. These groups can cloud rational decision-making and lead to reckless behavior. Engaging with diverse perspectives and promoting healthy interactions are vital steps in combating emotional chaos. Making a conscious effort to step outside of one's comfort zone may reveal alternative paths toward personal growth and emotional well being.
If you'd like to learn about my private practice, you can go to thelifeinterupted.com in the meantime, please connect with The Love Vox on Facebook, Instagram, and X. And if you'd like to contribute to the show, please visit the show's website, thelovevox.com where you can leave voicemails that can be featured on the show and you can also contribute to stories we're looking to feature. Until next time, stay passionate. Stay curious.
