sanctuary

how to be a good friend

Cecily Brown, The Picnic, 2006

There’s a certain kind of serendipity that happens in New York. You can feel bone-deep loneliness one minute and unexpected connectedness the next. Last April, I was feeling mildly depressed and socially disengaged. I had signed up for a 20-mile “hygge hike” from Williamsburg to Long Island City with complete strangers. When the day arrived, it felt like a Herculean commitment. Just go for an hour or two, I reasoned to myself.

I ended up staying for the whole thing and came home at 11 p.m. with a big, silly grin on my face, more energized than if I had downed five shots of espresso.

The way that day unfolded was nothing short of magical. Racing against the forecasted rain, we took shelter in an art gallery on LIC where we somehow slipped into front-row seats at a jazz concert and caught a few acts of stand-up comedy. Then, we dashed across the street and devoured pizza and garlic knots while making plans to hang out again. What I didn’t know I needed—and what I found that day—was a connection fueled by mutual curiosity and likemindedness, the kind that comes from spending hours with people you’ve just met but somehow feel like you’ve known your whole life.

Friendship has been the accidental theme of this year, and I’ve been reflecting on what it means to be a good friend. I came up with five qualities:

1. Honoring commitments

As someone who struggles to juggle social engagements with much-needed alone time, I find that it can be tempting to cancel simply because I need to recharge. I think that’s fine—you need to do what’s right for you—but I’m trying to be more careful about what I commit to so that I can actually follow through. This means taking care of my needs first (e.g. getting enough R&R) so that I can show up fully for my friends. Related note: I feel very strongly that we should honor commitments to friends as much as we honor plans with a partner/spouse/date.

2. Reciprocal effort

It doesn’t have to be equal effort, but it does take two to keep a friendship going. If none of the people I met that day had tried to stay in touch, we wouldn’t have become friends no matter how much we clicked. Simone de Beauvoir famously holds the view that friendship can be asymmetrical. I don’t think you need to feel the exact same way about each other, but there must be effort on both sides. If someone is consistently taking a week to respond to your texts, they’re not being a good friend. It doesn’t mean they’re a bad person. They’re just not prioritizing your friendship over whatever else is keeping them busy. 

3. A certain degree of non-judgement 

It’s so easy to find fault with people. He monopolizes a conversation. She’s hyper-logical and argumentative. I think it’s really important not to judge our friends too harshly. Family members are harsh critics, and your harshest critic is probably yourself. Everyone has quirks and flaws. Friendship is the one sanctuary where it should feel O.K. to let your weird flag fly. 

4. Willingness to work through conflict together

Everyone is bound to screw up at some point: make an insensitive comment, accidentally hurt someone they love. A good friend tries to clear up any misunderstanding and work with you to get to a better place. Even if they’re mad as hell, they give you the opportunity to explain yourself. They don’t make quick assumptions. Conflict can only strengthen a friendship if it’s well-handled.

5. The ability to keep your confidence

When someone shares something personal with me, I feel honored by their trust and want to protect it. The friends I value most are the ones I know I can confide in. Again: friendship as sanctuary.

Making this list, it became apparent that the qualities I value in a friend are not so different from the ones I look for in a romantic partner. Friendship and romantic love aren’t so distinct in my mind. I could see myself dating some of my friends if we had met under different circumstances. A romantic partner gets that label because they have all the qualities of a good friend, plus our relationship developed through the conventions of dating.

I didn’t think it was possible to find entirely new, close friends after 30, and it happened so serendipitously, I feel truly blessed. The focus on friendship this year has been profoundly transformative. Instead of locking myself away to write, instead of obsessively ruminating over a guy or depressively swiping on an app, I turned to friendship first as an antidote to loneliness, then as a vital, sustaining source of joy and comfort.

Next year, I still want to meet new people, but more importantly, I want to deepen the relationships I’ve already formed. I want to be a better friend. It sounds so simple. It sounds like something you shouldn’t have to try to do, unlike exercising more or reading more books. But what if we made it an intentional practice?

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