Introduction
There is a particular kind of hesitation that arrives when someone you haven't spoken to in a while crosses your mind. You remember their laugh, a conversation, perhaps something kind they did for you. For a moment, reaching out seems obvious. Then another thought intervenes: It has been too long.
Maybe they are busy. Maybe they have forgotten you. Maybe a message after so much silence would feel awkward. So you put your phone down, promise yourself you will do it another day, and carry on. The connection is still there, but the silence grows a little longer.
What if the brave part of maintaining a relationship is not the first hello, but the next one, especially when nobody is expecting it?
Why This Post Matters
We are surrounded by ways to connect and remarkably skilled at letting connections fade. A name sits in our contacts. A former colleague appears in a feed. Someone we once cared about becomes a person we mean to call. None of this necessarily signals indifference. Often it signals a life so full that relationships get whatever attention remains.
The trouble is that a relationship cannot be maintained by good intentions alone. It needs some evidence that we remember, that we care, that we are willing to make the first move without knowing whether the gesture will be returned.
That is the idea at the centre of Janice Porter's approach to connection. The host of Relationships Rule podcast teaches people to build relationships through curiosity, follow-through and thoughtful attention. But the most striking part of our conversation was not a networking tactic. It was a deceptively simple question she keeps near her computer: Who needs to hear from me today?
The Silence That Nobody Intended
A relationship rarely ends with an official announcement. Sometimes two people simply stop calling. The weeks become months. The longer the gap, the more difficult it feels to interrupt it. We begin to imagine explanations for the silence, even when nothing has actually happened between us.
During our conversation, I shared a personal rule: when someone I have not spoken with in a long time comes to mind, I try to pick up the phone. Not because every call leads to some remarkable revelation, but because the timing has sometimes mattered in ways I could not have predicted.
Janice offered a similar perspective. A fellow podcaster she knew through online conversations had been on her mind. When she finally emailed, an immediate reply from the woman's husband brought painful news: the woman had died a couple of weeks earlier. Janice was saddened, and the experience made the reality of a relationship formed through a screen feel unmistakable.
It is an uncomfortable reminder that we do not always know what is happening in someone else's life. Nor can we know how many opportunities for a small act of care are still available. That is not a reason to reach out in fear. It is a reason to stop treating the impulse to connect as unimportant.
The Note That Arrived at the Right Time
For Janice Porter, nurturing a relationship can be as tangible as sending a card. She told me a story that helped shape her own practice. It concerned a mentor who thought of the organist at his church, a woman who had played the hymns week after week. He sent her a simple thank-you card, with no special occasion attached.
Later, the organist explained that she had been ready to quit. The complaints had accumulated: why this hymn, why not that one, why had she made a different choice? She was exhausted by the criticism. On the day she was about to call the church, something prompted her to check the mailbox. The card was waiting.
A brief acknowledgment did not solve every problem in her life. But it changed that moment. She felt seen for something that had become thankless. The note arrived without its sender knowing how badly it was needed.
“But send the unexpected note or card. Send a card to someone when they least expect it, because the the the weird thing about that is it always comes at the right time. I mean, I've got stories about things where it can give you shivers where you've sent a card and someone has sent a message back saying, You're not gonna believe this, but that card just arrived at the right time. And you you had no idea.”
— Janice Porter
Host of Relationships Rule
That is what makes an unexpected gesture so powerful. It does not demand a response. It does not ask the other person to buy something, recommend us or make time for a meeting. It simply says: I thought of you, and I wanted you to know.
Follow-Up Is a Form of Care
It is easy to mistake a collection of contacts for a network of relationships. The difference is what happens after the introduction. At a conference, a party or an online meeting, we say we will call next week. We mean it in the moment. Then the next week arrives and the promise disappears beneath everything else.
Janice Porter was clear about this in our conversation: when we say we will follow up, we have to mean it. She described coming home from networking events, tired after hours of conversation, and still sitting down to send personal emails. She would follow with cards that arrived the next week. It was work, and that was precisely the point. Relationships require participation.
The principle is not limited to professional networking. Remembering an old friend, acknowledging a mentor, checking on a neighbour or thanking someone who quietly shows up all express the same idea. Care becomes real when it moves from thought to action.
Janice also spoke about being curious, doing what you say you will do, adding value and showing appreciation. These are not grand gestures. They are ordinary habits that make people feel they matter. The courage lies in practising them when there is no immediate reward.
Reaching Out Without an Agenda
One of the risks of treating relationships as opportunities is that every message starts to sound like a transaction. A familiar name appears in our inbox, and we brace for the pitch. Janice Porter shared a funny example of offering to be of service to a new LinkedIn connection, only to be told that the person was not looking for services. Janice had intended an invitation to connect, not a sales approach. The misunderstanding revealed how accustomed we have become to expecting an agenda.
There is a useful lesson in that awkward exchange. The purpose of reaching out should be clear in our own minds before we send the message. Are we genuinely curious about the person? Do we want to thank them? Are we checking in because they crossed our mind? If so, we can say that plainly. We do not need to dress a human gesture in the language of business development.
And we cannot control the reply. The other person may be delighted, distracted or uninterested. A meaningful gesture is still meaningful even when it does not produce the outcome we imagined. Connection is an invitation, not an obligation.
Lessons for Living Life Audaciously
We often associate audacity with big declarations, difficult decisions and bold public moves. But sometimes audacity looks much quieter. It is the willingness to interrupt a long silence. It is sending the note without waiting for the perfect words. It is calling someone when the voice in your head says you have probably left it too late.
There may be a person you have been thinking about for weeks. Perhaps you owe them a thank-you. Perhaps you miss them. Perhaps you simply wonder how they are doing. You do not have to explain the entire gap in communication before you are allowed to reconnect. A sincere hello is a beginning, not a courtroom defence.
The next time someone comes to mind, notice the impulse before you talk yourself out of it. You may never know what your message means on the other end. You also may never know what would have happened if you had stayed silent. That uncertainty is exactly why reaching out first can be an audacious act.
Hear the full conversation on The Audacious Living Podcast.
