Two weeks ago I wrote about the value of independence. The article was a bit longer than my normal writing, but I felt the topic deserved the extra length. A number of readers here must have agreed with me, because it was one of the most commented on articles in the last few months.
In the article, I argued that independence was necessary for both a happy life and a moral one. I claimed that financial independence was important, but it was only one step. Social and intellectual independence had even bigger ramifications, even though they were harder to recognize. The issue of social independence raised a lot of questions in the comments, so I’d like to address that idea today.
What is Social Independence?
Independence means that the amount of value you take from other people is equal to or less than the amount of value you put back. It doesn’t mean you don’t need other people. And it doesn’t mean you avoid other people’s help. Although those are associations to the word independence, I’m not referring to those aspects. Being a lone wolf or hermit isn’t the goal of independence.
Think of someone who is financially independent. Unless they grow their own crops, sew their own clothes and build their own computers from silicon in the ground, they still need other people. I doubt Bill Gates would survive with a homemade spear on a desert island. So financial independence doesn’t mean you don’t need other people.
What Bill Gates does have is (at least in theory) is an equal balance of trade. The amount of money he earns is greater than or equal to the money he spends. He doesn’t need the government, family or friends to write him a check. In fact, he gives away some of his wealth to philanthropic organizations, making his case the opposite of financial dependence.
Social independence is exactly the same idea, except there isn’t any money involved. Money is a medium for exchanging material wealth. Relationships don’t have a physical currency, but value is still exchanged between people. Being part of groups can give love, security, friendship and support. In many ways, social currency has a much higher value than dollars and cents.
Social Independence Doesn’t Mean Solitude
Socially independent people still need friends. However, someone who is socially independent contributes at least as much social value as they take in from other people. More importantly, they recognize their contribution and don’t allow other people to swindle them on social transactions.
A financially independent person would immediately exit any relationship where one person was cheating her. If she were being swindled on her grocery bill, she would shop at a different store. She wouldn’t be compelled to stay in a relationship that robs her in one way by making her dependent in another.
Similarly a socially independent person wouldn’t stay in a relationship where friendship and trust were violated. He would recognize his value and leave any destructive relationships, confident that he could make healthier ones. He wouldn’t be dependent on the opinions of other people to make decisions important to him. If he wanted to start a business, he wouldn’t allow peer pressure to push him into a job he didn’t like.
Levels of Independence
Independence isn’t an all-or-nothing quality. You can have different levels of social, financial or intellectual independence. You may be in complete and hopeless debt to someone, or you may simply have a small deficit.
This is, once again, easier to see with financial independence. In a scale from complete dependency to complete independence, you would probably these people along the spectrum:
- The Beggar. This person is completely dependent on other people to survive. If he didn’t receive regular income from other people, he would probably die.
- The Mooch. This person contributes some value back to society, but takes a lot more. He accepts debts he won’t pay back and relies on friends and governments to maintain his lifestyle.
- The Replaceable Employee. This person may have some debts, but otherwise contributes as much as she earns. However, her boss could replace her at any time, and she doesn’t have many other means to support herself.
- The Independent Entrepreneur. This person contributes at least as much value as she takes. She also has many different income sources so no one person holds power over her. Also at this level of the spectrum would be freelancers with different clients or employees with skills that allow them to easily find work.
- The Philanthropist. This person doesn’t just use his abundance to cover his debts. He uses it to encourage the independence of other people. He wouldn’t support initiatives that chain people to him, but actively seeks ways to encourage other people to become more independent.
Similarly, social independence has a spectrum from complete dependence to total independence.
- The Loner. This person is completely reliant on the few friends he does have for social support. If they left, he would be completely alone, which is unthinkable to him. As a result, he would do almost anything to keep their favor.
- The Wimp. This person contributes value back to her group, but she makes too many concessions to support her relationships. She makes radical changes to her life to accommodate the whims and opinions of friends and family, when they would not do the same for her.
- The Generic Friend. This person contributes value back to his group, but is dependent on one group for all social support. He also lacks the skills or confidence to make new friends, should this group leave him.
- The Independent Socializer. This person has many friends and is confident of her ability to navigate her social life. Any relationships that drain her are abandoned for equal transactions. She has close friends and relationships, but is confident that she could form new ones if these people were disloyal to her.
- The Social Enabler. This person takes social independence to the final level. Not only does he have complete social independence, but he uses that independence to break other people of their dependencies.
Financial independence, as it is easier to measure, is a lot more common than social independence. I would argue that most people are not socially independent and many are far into the range of moderate and complete dependency. I have met a few people who could be described as socially independent, and almost none who fully complete the spectrum.
Why is Social Independence So Difficult?
It’s easy to know if someone is swindling you. You can check the prices. Money is regulated. There are many laws preventing people from cheating you out of money. Our societal structure encourages economic independence. Independence is necessary for economic health, so society usually pushes people to become more independent.
Social independence doesn’t run on the same fuel. As a result, there is less pressure to move people up the ladder of social independence. So most of the people who do have a degree of independence, developed it unconsciously. In many cases, being popular and staying loyal to untrustworthy friends is actually promoted.
Social independence is also more difficult because social currency is more valuable than money. Beyond a minimum poverty threshold, money just buys luxuries. But, many people are currently in a social poverty, where they don’t feel that the basic needs of friendship, love and security are being met. As a result, many people are willing to chain themselves to social dependence just to meet those basic needs. If you were starving to death, you probably wouldn’t have as many scruples about stealing enough bread to survive.
Valuing the Independence You Don’t Possess
I’m not at the level of complete independence in any category. I consider independence to be extremely important, but I recognize my own shortcomings and dependencies. But just because I haven’t reached the highest pinnacles of this value, doesn’t mean I can’t climb towards it.
Once you recognize the importance of something, you have the power to work towards it. If you don’t consider your health to be important, chances are you’re going to end up weak and overweight. By seeing your shortcomings towards something that is important, you can put effort into changing it. I’ve made a lot of progress towards independence in all areas, once I recognized how important it was to me.
Independence Is Power Over Yourself
Independence is a form of power. Except, instead of power over other people, it means power over yourself. Power over other people is opposite to total independence, since it is pushing others towards dependency. Without independence, you’re enslaved to whatever provides for you. With independence, you’re free.
I'm a speed-reading, vegetarian, holistic learning, productivity hacking university student.
What’s your view on popularity and how it fits into your idea of social independence?
On one hand it seems like a popular person would have an easy time achieving social independence by having the tools to make new friends easily.
But you also said “In many cases, being popular and staying loyal to untrustworthy friends is actually promoted.”, implying popularity should be avoided.
Do you think see it as bad? Or bad if it’s a certain type of popularity (i.e., where you’re dependent on the one group who looks up to you, or feeling you have to be looked up and that you need to climb social circles in general)?
My awareness has now expanded, thank you Scott.
I also am disturbed as I realize I’m a moocher!
Chris,
Popularity is great, it’s nice to have people like you. The question is what you do to achieve that popularity. If it involves becoming inauthentic in order to be better liked, you’ve traded popularity for social independence. A bad trade, in my opinion.
My comment in the article could have used some refinement.
Gary,
We’re all moochers and beggars at some point. I think what is important is having the desire to improve.
-Scott
Scott,
You also touched on something that runs as a kind of invisible thread through your post; the inverse (reverse?) of independence is slavery, and the ugly truth is that when we lack independence, we practice a kind of slavery that works on the master no less than the slave.
Now I have to go back and see where or if you talked about habits of thinking because I am pretty sure it is my thinking that gets stuck in patterns that reinforce my dependence.
Really cool post, never thought of a hierarchy of social styles like this. I may be decieving myself, but I think I’m an independant socializer having gone through all the previous stages. I don’t really understand how to be a social enabler. Is that like giving people the confidence to be independant? Can you be specific about what an enabler does?
Thanks,
Rich,
Being a social enabler would help give people confidence, and also push them to take more control over their social lives. I think often it is an indirect role, something that happens when you are completely independent yourself.
[...] exploring the idea of how to become more social, expanding on the ideas as I’ve written about them before. You might want to bookmark this post if you don’t have time to read it all [...]
Hi Scott,
Do you know you’ve got an advert above your comments and below the post that says “Popular Prick”? Maybe you do, just incase i thought id let you know.
i think its one of those rotating google ads, i reloaded twice, it was there twice and the 3rd time it changed?
richard,
Yes… it’s a Google AdSense ad, there must have been a recent spike in the keywords.
I’m trying to phase out advertisements on the website as a revenue source, but I haven’t done it completely. My advice is that if you don’t like an ad, don’t click on it. They go away if people don’t click on them. If you REALLY don’t like an ad, send me an email and I can look at banning it directly. As for the “popular prick” ad, I’m not a fan of the title, but it is relevant to the topic at least, so I’m not going to ban it yet.
Thanks for the feedback,
-Scott
May I respectfully suggest that a better title for The Social Enabler might be The Social Facilitator or something of that nature, because the word: ‘Enablement’ has taken on a somewhat foul connotation, as in the enabler of a liar, drunk or bully.
As for Popular Prick, he has had his say and now I will have mine. Know more at: http://www.FooolQuest.com/alien.htm#fit
Aaron, I hadn’t thought of that connotation. To me, enable is a rough synonym for empower, although I can see where you might get the wrong impression.
[...] exploring the idea of how to become more social, expanding on the ideas as I’ve written about them before. You might want to bookmark this post if you don’t have time to read it all [...]
[...] exploring the idea of how to become more social, expanding on the ideas as I’ve written about them before. You might want to bookmark this post if you don’t have time to read it all [...]
SO how do you go about improving from being beggars to being socially independant? Right now, I think I have fallen in a bottom-less pit of depression, just because I realised that for my ‘friends’ I am completely replaceable. I am in a situation where I have been meeting the same group of people for the 3rd year running, and there remain 2 more years to go, as I need to finish this 5-year course.
The problem, I think, is communication. I am plain boring – there I said it. How do you make youself less boring? All the others seem to find it easy to talk about meaningless things; I find it extremely difficult. Any tips please?
Also: How do you prevent yourself from letting your feelings hinder you from doing things? I seem to waste a lot of time when I am depressed because no one took any notice of me.
When the friends I used to hang out with seem to disappear – they all seemed to have found other friends, but it seemed I haven’t clicked with anyone yet – how do I get myself to talk to other people when I know/ think that they will think that I am doing that only because I have no one else to talk to? I have feelings of guilt that make me think that the others think I am using them – I have passed from experiences where others used me, and I don’t want anyone to pass from that too.
Just some words of advice or encouragement are welcome: and if it is possible to link to some articles which might help me strike a good conversation, that would be awsome!!! Sorry for the long post, but thanks for the good read – it has provided some enlightment wrt my situation.
Despite the slightly awkward and tin-eared sound, “empowerer,” then, would be most correct. And though spellchecker rejects the that conjugation, nevertheless with Google I do find the term in use.
Aaron,
The point of my writing is to convey an idea. Usually this means staying within the established conventions of grammar and spelling, but creating my own language conventions is sometimes necessary to easily communicate a point. Content can’t be at the mercy of delivery.
Ain’t Gone Yet,
There are plenty of articles about socializing, but honestly, all the reading in the world won’t help if you don’t make a plan of action. Something simple like scheduling more time to go to places where you can meet people, or making a deliberate effort to be friendly can help.
Best of luck with your situation, I hope you can find the solutions to your problems!
-Scott
[...] Social independence [...]
Ain’t Gone Yet,
You should look into a social coach if you’re looking for more guidance. Not sure where you’re at, but there’s one in San Francisco: http://www.wisersocializer.com.
Good luck.
he scott,
thanks for this great blog, i’ve been walking around with this idea of social independence and searching around if other people also think like that, now im actually sad that i’m not the special only one who thinks this way haha. anyway it means i’ve got to work on my social independence. thanks
[...] Social independence [...]
Great post!
“Value” is such a vague term here, I’m thinking “Christian values”… yeah, that doesn’t tell me anything. “Value” could be exploiting others, for all I know. There are plenty of “financially independent” people who don’t create much I would consider valuable to anyone.
That said… I am not a very *productive* person… I don’t believe in half the things I produce… and that’s possibly a huge understatement.
Hey Scott!
Great post! What I took from your blog is that we have to first of all value ourselves for all the right reasons and not take ourselves so seriously. But I do have a question for you. What if we do something nice for a close relative and yet they don’t appreciate it. Isn’t the blame on their side because I am doing this act of kindness not for them but for myself so if they don’t appreciate it I don’t lose anything but they do. How would you look at this situation.
Thanks again.
[...] Social independence [...]
Really interesting post, and a unique perspective on things.
For me, having Asperger’s Syndrome I have been trying to build a social life from about the age of 20. I’m now 28, and have number of friends from different places. I go to events run by a local social networking group I discovered online, and that has enabled me to meet many new people and types that I wouldn’t otherwise ever have bumped into which is great. I’m always working to develop friendships and I thus analyse the social dynamics of situations, and thinking about social independence or dependence adds another perspective to the issue.
You’ve given me some inspiration for my future posts on my blog, which is at http://socialdynamicsas.blogspot.com and gives my thoughts and analysis of social situations.