Rachel Friedmann

Red Door Salon with Erika

After an exhausting couple of days, I was happy to accept an invitation to a Red Door Salon event hosted by DC Magazine. It was any woman’s dream come true. From a quick trim to microdermabrasion, we were pampered, fed, and given cupcakes. For those of us indecisive about our makeup, which includes me, we were given make up refreshes. Mine looked so good I had to purchase the eye makeup they used!

Besides loving the evening, I appreciated more my friends. I have heard horror stories from friends who live in LA and New York on how people will treat you based on what they perceive you can do for them. In this competitive world, that can be cutthroat at times, I am happy that I have friends professionally and personally that help each other out with no expectations. The reason I went to that fabulous spa evening was because of one such friend.

So how does this relate to communication and connections in today’s digital world? Just remember that genuine people are still out there, you just may have to look a little harder to find them.

Keep an eye out in DC Magazine for a photo of my microdermabrasion treatment in process!

I recently retweeted Zen Habits tweet “If you dislike or are angry at a person, you don’t understand him.”

So why I am writing this post? I keep wondering why there is so much conflict between people who interact and communicate on a regular basis – friends, coworkers, family, etc. More than a few of my friends have been dealing with angry or controlling bosses and are at a loss as to what to do. One of these friends visited from out of town this past weekend. Maybe if we all try to put ourselves in each others shoes literally, we may find that there our issues outside our control that are at play and need to be considered. Unfortunately, this is much easier said than done.

As I keep pondering this idea, here is an additional thought from Mario Batali, who was featured on The Daily Show last week.

“Generally cooks that yell at other cooks, or chefs that yell at their cooks, are expressing their own self-loathing for not having prepared their staff to do the job they knew was coming at them.”

Or maybe the yelling is just self-loathing…

I can’t count how many texts I sent/received today and am afraid to know the number. Between meet-ups with friends and a meeting time change I felt like my day was spent entirely on my blackberry.

I worry as I often do about how society is changing the rules of how we interact. Are these dissected conversations we regularly have with those closest to us bringing us closer together or diluting relationships? We take for granted that our friends and families will respond immediately to a text or call and are quickly annoyed if they don’t.

The question still remains swirling around my mind – are we better off with the way we communicate now than we were 10 years ago?