In French, the word for wine is vin. If you want to order a glass of red wine, you say: “Je voudrais un verre de vin rouge, s’il vous plait.” In this post, I’m going to use VIN as an acronym to discuss the importance of finding connections with people according to Values, Interests, and Needs. I like VIN as an acronym and vin as a drink because they represent the flavors of connections as well as wine – deep and flavorful or thin and tart depending on many factors. Apologies, in advance, to my non-drinking friends for using wine as a metaphor.
Over 30 years ago, Barry Cohen and I wrote a book on Connectedness. In the book, we suggested that connections had many possibilities: Being connected to self, being connected to others, and being connected to a higher purpose. We proposed that the first step in building deeper connections was to be able to accurately identify how you were feeling and what was most important to you at a given moment, i.e. being connected to yourself. We found that, without a high level of self-awareness, it’s impossible to connect fully with someone else or with an over-arching purpose. It seems to me that, over the past 30 years, the need for connection has not only increased in importance, but the challenges of connecting have also grown much greater with the intrusion of social media in our lives.
Just as it is the case with fine wine, there are many different ways to describe the flavor and texture of deep connections. Relationships can be fruity, acidic, smoky, spicy, dry, sweet, full of honey or vinegar, rich, full-bodied, heavy, light, thin or delicate. The taste of red wine can vary depending on the type of grape or region where it was grown, and connections vary by types of people and by the differences in their roots and the regions in which they were born and raised.
Deep connections, like fine wines, can feel like a symphony in which the values, interests, and needs of both parties come together in perfect harmony – creating a complex, but satisfying experience. A meaningful connection is like a piece of art that reveals its subtleties over time. For example, a first date may unleash a burst of fruity flavors, but subsequent encounters may reveal new aromas. Intimate connections are complementary and complex, but are grounded in the belief that both parties are there for each other when needed.
In today’s world, it is more important than ever to find connections with others who share our values, interests and needs. We are constantly bombarded with information and disinformation that can increase feelings of isolation and loneliness. When we find people who share our core beliefs and passions, the experience can open and deepen our hearts much like wine opens and deepens after a bottle is first uncorked. And there is nothing like a glass of wine (or soda) to find bridges over potential divides.
Finding connections with people who share our values solidifies our sense of purpose and gives us a greater sense of feeling supported and accepted. Some of the most important values for me are respect, integrity, freedom, trust, and helping. When I’m making decisions or entering into relationships, I not only try to act in ways that are aligned with those values but also look for evidence of those values in the people with whom I’m interacting. Forming deep connections with people who share our values can help us learn, grow, expand our perspectives, and challenge our beliefs. When we work together with people who share our values, we are usually able to make better decisions and we are more effective in making a positive difference. While forming deep connections should not be conditional on shared values, they do tend to increase the speed and strength of the connection.
Finding connections with people who share our interests makes it easier to develop more intimate and personal relationships. We can discuss potentially toxic topics more freely and find ways to support each other in our passion and pursuits. Some of my main interests include reading, writing, exercising, music, and meditation. When I come across people who have read some of the same books I have read over the years, for example, the level of conversation feels more elevated, substantive, and rewarding.
Finally, finding connections with people who share our needs, as well as our values and interests, can be the most rewarding AND challenging. Sometimes, our needs can be excessive or a bit neurotic. Personally, I plead guilty to being too needy at times. My needs for affirmation, affection, intimacy, travel, intellectual stimulation and emotional connection can be completely unrealistic. I have to remain awake and alert to when my needs are crossing the line or going too far. Still, when we experience moments in which our needs are being fully met, life opens to new possibilities.
Needs change over time. Maslow suggested that satisfying basic survival needs like food, housing, shelter and safety are prerequisites to pursuing higher order needs like belonging, love, self-esteem and self-actualization. As I get older, I find that satisfying intellectual, emotional and spiritual needs are more important than satisfying physical needs.
For me, the keys to developing deeper connections are acceptance, forgiveness and gratitude. I need to accept the fact that my VINs (or preference for a particular vin) may be different from other people in my life. I need to forgive people who are not in sync with all of my VINs. And, I need to be grateful for all the VIN connections I have in my heart and mind as well as the vin in my wine cabinet.
The depth of these connections vary among family, friends and foes and, in my experience, there is never complete alignment on all three. That’s why acceptance, forgiveness and gratitude are so important. Assuming we have a clear understanding of the nature or our VINs and we are able to generously accept, forgive, and be grateful, then we need to compassionately compute whether or not all of our VIN connections outweigh our VIN disconnects. That assessment will help us to determine how much more we want to invest in any given relationship . . . . or not. And how much vin we may need to get through a day.
Deepening connections is an important part of living a fulfilling life. When we are connected to others and to a higher purpose, we feel supported, loved, accepted, and inspired. Some important conditions for developing deeper connections are to be authentic, empathic, respectful, open-minded, curious, concrete, reliable, inquiring, positive, and supportive. If it any wonder that forming and sustaining deep connections requires a lot of work?
While I have focused on values, interests and needs in this post, I would be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge some of the other factors that lead to connections or disconnects. Clearly, our religious and political beliefs play a role in the connections we have with people and purpose. Also, our interpersonal style, decision-making preferences, and conflict management tendencies also affect the level of connections we develop. I will spare you more extensive riffs on all of those factors, but suffice it to say that they all play important roles in family relationships, team building, and organizational effectiveness.
In closing, let me return to my wine metaphor for a moment. Fine wines come from rich soil, strong vines, and quality grapes. In fact, some say that 50 year-old vines produce the best wines even though they require more care as they get more fragile. Having been married for over 50 years, I can say unequivocally that relationships can get better as they age – if they are able to endure the VIN disconnects that surely will occur over that period of time. Having common values is like the soil that produces healthy vines; having common interests is like the vines that endure changing weather conditions; having common needs is like appreciating grapes that produce cabernets, chardonnays, or pinot noirs. Some people like fruity blends and others prefer full blends. You get the idea.
I’m hoping we will all experience fine wines (or non-alcoholic drinks) and deep connections in our lives. I wish that more of our connections and fine wines felt more like harmonious symphonies than cacophonous discordances. I’m hoping we will grow not only in our appreciation of common VINs but also of different blends. And I’m hoping we will all become more grateful for our points of connection as well as more accepting and forgiving of our points of contention. May it be so.
FULL DISCLOSURE: In writing this post, I employed the services of my personal assistant, Bard – Google’s version of an AI ChatGPT. First, I asked Bard to write a 500 word essay on the importance finding connections on values, interests, and needs. In 3 seconds, I had an answer. Then, I asked Bard to tell me all the different ways fine wines could be described. It immediately produced a long list of descriptors. I had an outline in my mind before I started to write, and I knew I wanted to build the essay based on the metaphor with wine. While I used very little of what Bard wrote in its lightning quick responses to my questions, I think using the tool increased the efficiency of the writing process and the power of the message. You can be the judge of that.
Also published on Medium.
