Lesson Overview

The first book about the NetWeaving concept was entitled Power NetWeaving, and it was co-authored by Bob Littell and Donna Fisher. The book covered the skill sets of NetWeaving and featured persons in the financial services industry who had essentially built their careers and practices around NetWeaving – just without calling it that.

What became apparent as Bob spoke about NetWeaving around our country and abroad, was that in addition to the personal and business advantages of becoming more proficient at the skill sets, there was an additional factor at work – the Heart of NetWeaving.

Bob began to notice that people whom he had known for years began relating to him differently. He finally realized that he had become an ambassador and a vocal advocate for a philosophy and concept that represented universally admired principles. NetWeaving is really all about the Golden Rule and putting other persons’ Needs, Problems, and Opportunities on an equal or higher level from their own.  Without realizing it, he was enhancing and elevating his image in other peoples’ eyes.

Bob’s friendship with Catherine Ryan Hyde, author of book on which the movie classic was based, culminated in him becoming the first elected president of her Pay It Forward Foundation.  Catherine also gave him permission to refer to NetWeaving as the ‘business version’ of Pay It Forward.  That added further credibility since millions of people saw the movie or read the book or both.

But there was something else which others noticed, but which Bob said he had not initially recognized until people started pointing it out.  After serving in this spokesperson/ambassador role for several years, having both improved his own NetWeaving skill sets, as well as having become a more articulate advocate, he also noticed that his passion for the concept had grown.   And, along with this increased passion, came a new source of energy.  And the more he spoke about the concept, the more energized he became.

Then, other people who had now become fans of the concept and who had been practicing it and speaking about it for some extended period, started noting similar effects on their lives and businesses.

This is not really surprising since science has shown that there is something which has simply been called a Helper’s High. It’s been proven that when you help someone, the brain emits ‘endorphins’ (i.e. chemicals emitted) that cause an energized feeling of happiness and euphoria.  You may have heard it said that when you’re feeling down, one of the best ways to get out of the dumps, is to go help someone, and that’s due to this endorphin effect.

So the heart of NetWeaving involves going beyond just practicing the skill sets on a more regular basis, but learning that when you become an ambassador and vocal advocate for the concept, it elevates your image in other peoples’ eyes, and it energizes you and makes you better at everything else you do.  And if you genuinely like helping people, the more you do, the more you want to do.

Those who question whether they have the time to wait for the favors they do and the help they give others to come back around, either are not recognizing, or maybe are not of the current mindset to accept these two immediate benefits of becoming a vocal NetWeaving advocate and ambassador of the concept.

It was discovering this Heart of NetWeaving which inspired Bob to create teaching and training programs so that eventually we could have an army of persons out there spreading the good word about NetWeaving – both around the country and now even around the world.

It has been interesting to note that as the NetWeaving international community has grown substantially over the past 20+ years, a number of other countries and cultures seem to naturally gravitate to this concept.  This may well be that other cultures are more comfortable with the concept of creating meaningful relationships FIRST – before doing any business – and therefore NetWeaving is a much more traditional form of networking for them.

Also, the concept of karma ties in very closely with the belief that, ‘what goes around, does come back around’.