I have blogged before about not needing things in common to maintain a friendship, and I stand by it. If enough emotional intimacy is present, then usually you don’t have to enjoy the same things to enjoy a friendship. I have plenty of friends with whom I have very little in common in terms of interests and hobbies, yet we love chatting the hours away frequently. Though technically these friendships are unbalanced I suppose, being that we usually don’t do activities together, but just visit each other at home and talk! But it has never mattered to me because I have never wanted to expand them past that particularly.
Maybe that is because I know we don’t enjoy the same things, or maybe it is because I know we are just going to chat the whole time anyway that it is just as easy and inexpensive not to bother. I’m not too sure. However, after we were forcibly locked down recently, I started yearning for my activity friends in ways that were understandable yet somehow unexpected.
My activity friends are ones I enjoy, but talk to less. I like them fine, but for whatever reason, long conversation sometimes feels awkward, stunted or forced. These are the friends I will see movies or shows with, do escape room challenges, bowling or mini golf. We usually steer away from things like dinners because conversation needs to meander and with these particular friends that just feels strained. Sometimes it is because we have different values or opinions on things, or sometimes the person doesn’t open up and share, preferring to stick to more surface level topics that I struggle to engage with, or sometimes it is because the thing one of us really wants to talk about is off limits with that particular friend. It doesn’t really matter why we don’t talk as much, because being fun activity friends works for us both.
Obviously, during lock down it was these friends that I missed, because they weren’t the ones to keep in touch. There were no new gigs or movies or venues to check out. And I realised it wasn’t the activities I missed as much as the friends I enjoy them with. These friends bring joy and laughter. They keep things light and fun and although we might be less emotionally intimate, they still add huge value to my life. Laughter is the best medicine and these were the friends I needed to lift my mood! And they needed me equally.
So this made me ponder if I should be more mindful of trying to find friends with whom I can talk, share and deeply connect, as well as hang out and share activities. If I should take notes on the ways in which they like to spend their time to see if we would be more rounded in our connection. If they are the kinds of people who seem to get a rush from never slowing down, or the ones who love nothing more than slowing down. If they are more indoorsy or outdoorsy?
In pondering these things it made me think more closely about the kinds of things I like doing too, and how different we all are in our interests and hobbies. Not to mention values, and even circumstances. And all of these can play a role in how socially available and compatible 2 people will be for one another. A bird may love a fish….
I have always been happy kind of categorising my friends, as I find it helps me manage my expectations of them. It never occurred to me that perhaps I should be looking for friends that I cannot categorise because we like many of the same things and share many values and speak similar languages. Or maybe that is the ultimate dream, but we are each so unique in these aspects that we need more varied friends to match with us in certain areas and challenge us in others?
Certainly I can say it has been working for me so far, but moving forwards I think I will be more mindful of how my friends spend time when they are not with me as a way to assess compatibility so that I am not left longing for more than they can offer. My friends who are most socially successful perhaps are the ones who know themselves the best and surround themselves with more like-minded people.
I’m not going to say you have to have things in common to be friends, because you don’t. But I am going to say it might help, and knowing yourself and what you like, will definitely help you be attracted to people you might be better suited to. Because sometimes, liking someone, just isn’t enough. After all, we are all likable to someone but not to everyone. If being likable was enough, we’d all be friends with everyone, and we aren’t, are we?
In answer to my question, I don’t think we have to know what we like to know who we like, but I definitely think it helps!
❤ Love,
Your Best Friend ForNever
xx
