🎉 Using Internet Serendipity To Spark In-Person Connection
This Summer, I was feeling a little bit stuck.
On paper, things were going pretty well. But on the inside, I wanted to feel more expansive with my work, projects, and socially.
So, I decided to run a social experiment to see if that could help me!
I wanted to have a phone call with a new person everyday in July.
After posting about this on LinkedIn, over 80 people had expressed interest in chatting with me. It then became clear that people I did not know were seeking more social connection and serendipity too.
During this experiment in July, I started to feel differently. I felt more alive, more social momentum, and a new sense of possibility through these conversations.
Because of this, I decided to have a “curiosity conversation” with prior podcast guest and 2x author
. For years, he has generously made himself available for no agenda calls with people.
On that call with Paul at like 10:30 PM EST, he said something like, “you gotta meet
because you both are really passionate about hosting in-person events with like-minded people.”To take Paul’s generosity one step further, Paul went ahead and introduced us. (Thank you Paul!)
A few weeks later, Will and I got together for a coffee chat on a Sunday. I didn’t know what to expect going into this coffee chat.
Finding A Conversational Thread
Towards the end of the chat though, we found a conversational thread that we were able to discuss deeper and build upon together.
Will was curious about me producing 40+ in-person events, remotely, in 2024.
Right before we got together, Will hosted meetups around the world connected to his new company Act Two cc
, and he wanted to do another bigger tour in 2025.I was pumped about this bigger World Tour idea.
So, to try to make things more real and concrete, we decided to pilot an event in Brooklyn in August together.
And this event was electric….
At least two new podcasts were sparked because of this event!
Will and I should probably keep this magic going, right?
Good news…. we are!
Learn about the Internet Serendipity World Tour!
We are pumped to collaborate with like-minded community builders and Circle to produce 10+ events for community builders and creators starting in Taipei on November 8th and ending in Columbus on December 16th!
You can learn more here!
After Taipei, the next event is in London on Tuesday November 11th!
My Initial Learnings From This Project (So Far)
When you are in motion, good things happen. I probably wouldn’t have reached out to Paul if I was not doing my unplanned phone call experiment. And without Paul’s introduction to Will, I probably wouldn’t be writing this post…
When you are thinking about working with someone new, try to start small if you can. I think the August Brooklyn pilot event was a good experiment for both of us to see what we could do together and if we work well together.
When like-minded people with personal and creative projects gather, magic happens!
A new podcast episode with Will about all of this will be released this Thursday!
Before then, you can listen to the power of in-person events here:
If you are a community builder or a creator, you can learn more about the Internet Serendipity World Tour here!
🎧 Two New Podcast Episodes
#1: If you want to learn about community building, listen to this new podcast episode with Morgan Brady:
#2: If you want to learn about texting friends when you think of them, selling a company, and /or building an agency via word of mouth, listen to this podcast episode with Al Simon:
To more serendipity,
PS: my NYC gatherings calendar for other events is updated as well!
PPS: feel free to write back and a share serendipity story of yours!
Serendipity and synchronicity! Congrats!
Just RSVP’d to yalls next Internet Serendipity event, looking forward to it :)