This September 30th will mark my third anniversary on Twitter. It has certainly been quite a journey. I'm an introvert by nature. When I created my account, I used a rather cryptic name that included a combination of my first name and numbers: marty0518. I was leery of putting myself out there, in public, on the Internet. For the first year, I only dipped my virtual toe in the Twitter waters, posting occasionally and rarely reaching out. I was fearful of what other people would think. Fear limited my interactions...until one person reached out to me.

In January 2009, Bill Mitchell (@askbillmitchell) replied to one of my tweets. I don't remember the particular post or reply, but that's not what's important. Bill took a chance on me and reached out. What started with a simple reply led to a phone call and many conversations. I credit Bill with helping me break through the wall of fear and begin to explore the potential of Twitter in forging REAL relationships. 

In the past three years, I've been fortunate to meet and become friends with several incredible people. For an introvert like me, this has been a wonderful gift and has made me realize that there are great people out there. You just need to break through the fear and reach out. If you seek positive relationships and look for the good in people, you will find it. I value honesty, transparency and real people and I've been blessed to find those qualities in most people I've met on Twitter.

This got me thinking and over the past several weeks I have contemplated changing my Twitter name to my full, REAL name. If I believe in honesty and transparency, I should put my thoughts and values into action. So, this past Saturday, I made the switch. I changed my long time Twitter name from @marty0518 to @MartyMcPadden. This is just another way for me to step farther outside my comfort zone in putting myself out there in a more public and transparent way. So far, it's been an incredibly rewarding and positive experience.

The number one benefit I've gained from participating in social media has been the ability to cast a wide net regarding meeting people. Instead of limiting myself to my immediate surroundings here in Connecticut, Twitter and other social networks have allowed me to meet incredible people from all over the world I would never have had the opportunity to become friends with, let alone be aware of their existence. 

My next goal in stepping outside of my comfort zone is to get out and meet as many of my Twitter friends in person as possible. I'm looking forward to attending some upcoming conferences and meet-ups and I'm currently making plans to do so. My dream is to put together a meet-up tour, so to speak, to meet and forge in-person relationships with as many of my virtual friends as possible. Isn't that what life's all about?

I'm Marty McPadden from Connecticut. It's great to meet you.

Posted via email from Marty McPadden