How Friendship Lamps Can Help You Communicate Across the Miles - Friendship Lamps

How Friendship Lamps Can Help You Communicate Across the Miles

With the pandemic still not letting up in most parts of the world and travel still being restricted to a great degree, couples in long-distance relationships are bearing the brunt of the prolonged physical separation and all the anxiety and uncertainty it brings. In these trying times, one singular product seems to be making a lot of difference. And it’s not just for LDR couples; hundreds of families, friends, and many others in close relationships with someone far away have benefited from this amazing piece of technology. If you’ve never heard of a friendship lamp, read on.


What is a Friendship Lamp?


The friendship lamp from FriendLamps is known by many names: relationship lamp, wi-fi touch lamp, long-distance lamp, and so on. It allows you to communicate between one lamp and another or several others using the Internet. All you need to do is hook up these lamps, plug them into the wall, set up the connection on your smartphone or tablet, and start using them right away.


The essence of how it works is very simple, so without getting all technical, let’s show you how it works. Since these lamps work in pairs or groups, let’s see how they are designed to communicate with each other.


  1. The first lamp (let’s call this FriendLamp A) is plugged into a wall socket using any charging block that you use for your mobile devices. The lamp itself comes with a power cable, which plugs into the USB port of the charging brick.
  2. The lamp is powered up and then connected to the local Wi-Fi signal using your smartphone or tablet. Once the connection is established, you will need to choose a color for this lamp and enter a Group ID on your phone. That’s the basic setup for FriendLamp A.
  3. Next, take FriendLamps B, C, and however many you have in different locations, and follow the same process for each of them. In other words, plug them into the wall socket, take your phone or tablet, and hook them up to the Internet. The only difference here is that the Group ID you use has to match the one that FriendLamp A is using.

That’s all there is to it!


Once you’ve set up a pair or group of lamps in this manner, you can start communicating with each other.


How Do FriendLamps Communicate with Each Other?


Since all the lamps are now on and connected to the Internet, all you need to do is touch one lamp on the sensor plate on top. When you tap it, a signal is instantly sent to all the other lamps in that Group ID. Remember you chose a particular color for each FriendLamp in your network? Now every other lamp in that network will light up in that color at exactly the same time.


So, let’s say you are the parents of a set of three children, each of whom lives with their families in different parts of the country. You’ll need a total of four lamps: one for you and one for each of them. Let’s say you’ve set it up this way:


FriendLamp A - Parents - the color chosen is red

FriendLamp B - First Child - the color chosen is blue

FriendLamp C - Second Child - the color chosen is purple

FriendLamp D - Third Child - the color chosen is green


When FriendLamp A is tapped on the sensor plate at the top, FriendLamps B, C, and D will light up in red. When FriendLamp B is tapped, FriendLamps A, C, and D will light up in blue. And so on. The reason it works this way is to help you identify who tapped the lamp - the color instantly tells you who it is. If there are several lamps in the network, it might be a good idea to print out and stick a cheatsheet near the lamp so you know who’s tapped it.


Why is the Lighting Up of the FriendLamp Such a Big Deal?


Even though we have so many options to communicate instantly with someone who lives across the world, it seems like a Herculean effort to stay connected with others, even the people we treasure the most in our lives.


For instance, you can text but you don’t know if they’re in a meeting and you’re causing a distraction. You wait and wait for the text and your imagination runs wild when you don’t get a response for a long time. You might even get irritated or angry when someone doesn’t respond instantly, not realizing that they have lives of their own and you’re not their number one priority.


You can, of course, call them on their cell phones, but what if they’re busy and it goes to voicemail? Are you ready with a message in mind or do you stutter and mumble with a shabby “call me back” because you just didn’t know what to say? Or did you just hang up? The problem with calling is that unless the call is scheduled, they could be doing anything at that point in time. You’d have to check beforehand if they’re free, and even if they pick up, you don’t know if they’re in a hurry or have the time for a leisurely chat.


The FriendLamp solution makes all these problems go away. It’s a great way to tell someone you’re thinking of them and not really expecting a response of any kind. If they do respond right away and your lamp changes color, that’s a huge bonus!


As for why it’s such a big deal, just hear what some of our customers have shared with us:


“My daughter and I live in different states and it’s so hard not being seeing each other as often as we would like. Waking up to my room lit up and seeing it change colors puts a different type of love in my heart. These are a wonderful creation and really do hit the spot to connect you to a loved one from a far. It lights up my whole day every time ❤️”


“I love that I can let my young niece know that I am thinking about her 3,000+ miles away. Setup way super easy, so many colors to choose from 10/10 would recommend.”


“I purchased lamps for myself and 5 family households across the US. One household is dealing with Stage 4 cancer, so this is a great way to support them.”


“I love it.. it helps me keep in touch with my boyfriend even when he sometimes doesn’t want to answer his phone“


“I can’t tell you how much we enjoy seeing them light when the other person is thinking about us. It’s a lovely additional way to keep in “touch,” especially when there’s not much to share so a text or call isn’t needed.”


“the colors are gorgeous, much more vibrant than i expected! i can’t wait to send the other to my friend, it’s sure to be chaotic.”


That’s why it’s such a HUGE deal for us. We’ve been able to touch lives across the world by helping them stay connected with their near and dear ones. Over the years, we’ve received hundreds of formal reviews and our customer service representatives have heard hundreds of compliments over the phone. For some people, this product is a life-changer because it offers a novel and unobtrusive way to say “Hey” to someone whenever you feel like it.


One of the great things is that there’s none of the expectations or obligations that go with an email, a text, or even a phone call. None of that baggage comes with a friendship lamp. Just tap and forget - they’ll get the message when they’re available.


What’s the Psychology behind the Effect of FriendLamps?


So there’s little doubt that FriendLamps can have a tremendously positive effect on relationships. We’ve seen that through the years and across the thousands of customers we’ve been privileged to serve. But what’s the secret to this innovative way to literally ‘stay in touch?’


To answer that, we need to understand a little about human behavior. From the moment we’re born, we seek attention. At first, it’s in the form of touch and sound. Then it’s sight, smell, and taste. Our senses need to be constantly stimulated during those early years. As we grow older and mature into adulthood, we still retain many of those urges. It shows up in different forms, of course, but the root of it is still the need to satisfy our cravings and urges. Most of all, it feeds our five senses, and this is how it works:


Sight - Why do we take photographs or shoot videos? It’s so that we can preserve memories in a pristine condition without having to only rely on our memories. Memories can fade or be modified with time, and we need something that can maintain the integrity of that memory; hence, photos and videos. That visual cue is so powerful because it stimulates our vision, which is arguably the most acute and sensitive of our five senses.


Sound - Music can bring back some powerful memories, especially if it’s a song you haven’t heard since childhood or since you were in college. It often opens a floodgate to all the other memories associated with it. For that reason, music is a powerful memory tool. It stimulates another very sensitive sense - our ability to hear.


Touch - The power of touch can’t be underestimated, especially during our early years of development. Even inside the fetus, the warmth of the surrounding fluid and the vibrations of the mother’s voice are received as tactile stimulants.


Smell - Have you ever smelled a particular scent that took you back several years to the past in a single instant? We may not know it, but every smell we ever experienced from the time we were born is recorded in our subconscious mind. When we get a whiff of something familiar after a long time, we invoke forgotten memories.


Taste - Taste isn’t given the importance it should, but it, too, is a very powerful tool to stimulate our brain to recall old memories we didn’t even realize we still had. That’s why many food companies harp on the fact that their food tastes like home cooking. You can’t ever forget the foods you ate when you were a child - the favorites your mother or father served up or a beloved relative or friend got you as a treat.


FriendLamps trigger the most powerful sense of them all - sight. When you see your lamp light up in a color that your grandchild three thousand miles away chose, it’s not just your eyes that light up. Your mood improves, precious memories are invoked, your body starts producing beneficial chemicals, and your whole disposition is improved for the remainder of the day. When your best friend across the country sees their lamp light up in your color, it makes their day and puts them in a good mood despite the fact that they were down in the dumps just seconds ago.


In truth, even we don’t know the full extent to which our FriendLamps help alleviate moments of stress, bring a smile to someone’s worried face, or bring a positive emotion flooding in to wash away a negative one. What we do know is that it is making a difference in people’s lives, one lamp at a time.


Behavioral Benefits and Other Considerations


From a behavioral point of view, there are a lot of other benefits of receiving a positive stimulus like the one provided when your FriendLamp lights up. We haven’t conducted any research on that but there’s plenty of scientific evidence to support the fact that a positive stimulus can make a significant difference to our overall mood and well-being.


Let’s take the example of receiving a compliment. It’s a loose analogy but it serves our purpose here when you look at it as a positive and unexpected stimulus. The lighting up of a FriendLamp telling you that a relative or friend is thinking of you is similar in many respects. Are there any differences? Yes, several. However, the shared aspect of both types of stimuli is that there’s more to them than meets the eye - or ear, and it’s the ‘more’ part that has the lasting effect in either case.


To elaborate, let’s say someone at work told you that she loved the color of your dress. The immediate reaction is one of surprise and pleasure. You say “thank you” and move on, but the lasting effect of that compliment stays with you through the day. It can live with you in the form of gratitude, self-confidence, and even a higher level of energy. Isn’t that amazing? One simple compliment can practically make your day.


That’s how a FriendLamp works on your mind as well. Your grandkid or sister touching their lamp lights up yours. Your immediate reaction is pleasure, but the lasting effect is a continuous string of positive emotions and feelings, possibly throughout the day.


And the impact of that goes far beyond what the receiver gets out of it. When your mood is improved, you treat others with more compassion, your attention to your work improves, you’re likely to make someone else feel good about themselves, and so on and so forth. The chain of events that the lighting of a lamp or a simple compliment propagates is like the butterfly effect. It amplifies rather than diminishes as it progresses. One such event might make 10 people happy that day. That’s the power of FriendshipLamps. And compliments, of course.


Another behavioral aspect of using FriendLamps is that, over time, your expectations remain at an elevated level because the lamp could light up at any time. When you know that the other person is just getting home, your senses are heightened in anticipation. Several studies have been done on how anticipating an event or an incident can help you be happier as a person. Aren’t we all excited when there’s a long weekend coming up and we’ve made plans to go away for a few days? You can barely stand to count the days until it happens. During that time, your level of excitement is much higher than normal.


In reality, anticipating something that’s yet to happen is even more powerful than the memory of something good that’s already happened. Two American researchers found in 2007 that a future event usually caused more excitement in an individual than a fond memory from the past. Here’s the basic theory:


“We tend to experience more intense emotions about future events than those in the past. This is because, on the whole, we have an expectation that future events will make us feel more emotional than ones that have passed.”


That’s the power of anticipating that your loved one will think of you and touch their lamp. Of course, the disappointment that comes with the lamp not lighting up can be quite harsh as well. Therefore, temper your expectations if you see that it has reached an unusually high level. If you’re communicating regularly with the lamp, this shouldn’t be a problem. Nevertheless, it’s something to be aware of.


In Closing


The pandemic has brought something vitally important to the foreground, and it is the fact that we crave human contact in some form or other as a means of staying sane and emotionally healthy. When travel restrictions were first put in place, most people didn’t give it a second thought because they assumed it was going to be short-lived. But after discovering the extent of the pandemic, some lost all hope of seeing their loved ones in the near future. In many cases, FriendLamps was able to step in and save the day because it kept people connected and allowed them to communicate in a unique way from across hundreds or thousands of miles.


The future is still fuzzy as far as normalcy is concerned, and travel for casual purposes is still not advised. But as long as you have FriendLamps to fall back on, you never have to feel the pinch of loneliness ever again. So many of our customers, especially parents and grandparents separated from their family, have told us that it completely transformed the way they communicated with each other. Some had even coded messages into their communication so if the lamp lit up at a particular time, say 11 am, it meant one thing, and if it lit up before or after, it meant something else. They turned it into a fun way to stay in touch, and we’re grateful for the ideas they shared with our other customers.


If you haven’t seen or tried friendship lamps, this is the perfect opportunity for you. We’re currently offering them at a discounted rate with fast shipping (free in the U.S.) so you can get them ahead April 4. In two words, Easter Sunday! Go ahead and get yours before the one holiday in the year that represents new life and a new beginning. Let 2021 be better than the last one; one that’s more positive, filled with new hope, and a renewed sense that the future holds untold promises that will unfold as we go through the year. God bless.
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