We're stuck in a mental model centered around those wanting to see everything from everybody we follow, which results in all those connections. I think we need to explore other ways of using relays. I want the option to select one relay for my Bitcoin stuff, one for my human rights group, and "visit" each one. One connection to one relay... it's fine if I miss posts to other relays. I have no interest in crochet, so I don't need to make a connection and download posts from nostr.crochet just because one person I'm following posted there one time.
Discussion
have you tried browsing relays on yakihonne? that experience you're describing already exists, but I think it has a lot of room to improve