Those links that you shared are definitely interesting! What would you say your Vital Friend role is? I’ll hazard a guess and say that you are very often a Mind Opener.

Some questions you can ask yourself to determine if someone is your Vital Friend:

Direct quotes:

“If this person were no longer around, would your overall satisfaction with life decrease?”

“If this person were no longer a part of your life, would your achievement or engagement at work decrease?”

“If you answered yes to either or both these questions, then you have found a vital friend.”

Here’s an article about health and friendship: http://www.dukemednews.org/news/article.php?id=11

I feel that I am healthier because I don’t hold anger, resentment and hatred in my body. I have worked through a lot of my issues (and I am sure there are more) and I believe that this is why I seldom get sick and when I do, I generally recover quickly. Yes I do eat healthy foods and exercise. I have noticed that depressed, sickly and negative people seem to eat fatty and sugary foods.

I don’t think the amount of friends makes me happy. It’s not like the more friends I have the happier I’ll get. I do think I am blessed with good friends - friends that I would miss if they were gone from my life. I also think that the ability to build friendships is healthy and friends provide a healthy mirror. A friend will affirm you when you may not even be affirming to yourself.

Vital Friends has a website and here’s a link to the roles that the play: https://www.vitalfriends.com/roles.aspx

Well I think that I’m about as guarded as I want to be. I don’t particularly want to be more open (not to give the wrong impression because I am open with certain people). I think that I’m very comfortable being closed to most people and open to a select number.

So are you happier and healthier because of the number of friends that you have? I wonder how they are able to classify “good” friends. How would you classify them?

I was going to ask if YOU had more friends of one sex than the other!

Without actually counting up my friends I think I probably have slightly more male friends than female friends. When I was younger I had more male friends and it made me wonder if somehow I was competing with women and didn’t get close to them because of that.

Most of my friends are in the same socio-economic scale. Most are clustered around my age but I have some in their late 50s to mid-60s.

I do get along well with men and have been a sounding board for relationship issues. I’m told that I don’t react like the typical woman, which makes it easier for a man to ask for feedback or advice.

With respect to being guarded is this the way you want to be? Or do you wish you were more open? I have a friend who is VERY private. I wish he were more open so that he would have more friends. I’m his only friend. I forget the exact statistic, but in the book, “Vital Friends” people who have 3 or more good friends are generally healthier or happier. Something like that. Happier and healthier do go hand in hand.

I’d say that I can make friends fairly easily, but at the same time I think that I don’t have that many close ones. I feel that it’s a fairly short jump from acquaintance to friend for me but a rather larger one from friend to good friend. I think that I, personally, like to stay fairly guarded. I’d say that based on circumstances and prior experience I probably have an easier time talking and getting to know girls. I think that it’s very easy for guys to lose my respect because I know exactly where they’re coming from. So if they mess up, I can understand what happened more and somehow that makes it easier for me to be disappointed in them. Still, I definitely have friends of both sexes. Would you say that you have more friends of one of the sexes? Has it always been that way for you?

Right now, as I type, I see an empty line. After I post, it’ll all be mushed. I don’t think it’s WordPress but something with the threaded comments plugin. Maybe. I once had threaded comments but it didn’t play nice with my theme and I unplugged it.

(just hit enter key twice): Based on what you’ve written and what you think about, you sound like someone very easy to speak with and you also seem to have the eye of the observer. Acceptance for me is a work-in-progress. As you’ve probably guessed, I’ve read many books on spirituality, relationships and personal development and acceptance and unconditional love are key to all three. You start with acceptance and unconditional love for self so that you are able to give it to others. Based on what I have observed within you, you will probably move in this direction over time. When I was younger, I was much more annoyed and irritated by people. Now…not so much. I find being annoyed very draining and stressful. I am still growing and I want to keep growing. I figure I’ll look back at who I am now and say, “I can’t believe that I used to get upset over…that!”

(just hit enter key twice): I seem to be able to easily connect to people so yes, I make friends easily. There are different levels of friendship of course. I agree, the first step in creating a friendship is an exchange of “self” - personal details. Not all my friends remain in my life. Some have faded away. Some I communicate with once a year but they are still there if you know what I mean. Sometimes I have wanted to create a stronger friendship and the other person doesn’t. Those are hard but you can’t force relationships.

(just hit enter key twice): Would you say you make friends easily and do you have many friends? Do you have very close friends? Do you have friends of both sexes?

If you give me some more details of how you were trying to format your comment and what happened, maybe I can try and investigate it further. I do know that Wordpress in general cuts out a fair amount of the whitespace if you try to add extra line breaks. Well that’s been my experience anyways. But if you do let me know more about what you’re talking about, I’ll try to see if there’s something that I messed up in the CSS.

Anyways, I think that you’re right about some people going too far too fast. I have known some people like that, and they too have made me uncomfortable because their questions are too much. But I think that it’s great that you are interested in people. I have found that it’s actually pretty easy to talk to people as long as you talk about the thing that everyone is interested: themselves.

I’m probably not as accepting or non-judgmental as you are, but I do enjoy getting to hear other people talk.

I do think that trivial talk has its place. And sometimes it’s great. But at the same time, I think that we (as well as many others out there) just don’t like it as often as it actually happens.

So do you think that you can make friends very easily? It sounds like you have an aptitude for talking to people and getting them to open up to you. And that seems to me to be the first step to having a friendship.

Well said! [side note: I try to format my comments a bit, at least with different paragraphs but this theme mashes CRs or white spaces or something]

Your thoughts on “getting past the small talk” - I think I know what you mean. Some people seem to have, well, not exactly nothing to say but you get the sense that they don’t think much beyond the surface. I don’t want to say they are “shallow” but rather, they are unaware. Which makes me seem conceited!

When it comes to getting past small talk, it works both ways. In my case, I probably ask people questions that others might find uncomfortable. I may make statements or observations that other might leave unsaid. You’ve read my blog enough to probably get the idea that I don’t have too much tiny talk with people. I find people incredibly interesting. Everyone has a story. People surprise me over and over again. I think that people might not get past the small talk because they may feel uncomfortable with expressing their more creative or unusual thoughts and ideas - they may feel that they will be unaccepted. Does this make sense? They censor themselves.

In my case, I try to be very accepting and receptive and non-judgmental to who others are. I think that this allows others to get past sticking to small talk. I also have to be accepting of myself (more difficult!) so that I feel free to express myself beyond the trivial. Not that trivial is bad. Sometimes very silly “girl talk” is fun. Not that I can talk about shoes all that well. Unless they are running shoes.

Your comment definitely has truth to it. Friends are the ones who are just there. It doesn’t matter whether it’s good or bad or bland. They’re there not because of circumstances but really because of you.

You can count yourself lucky to have such a group of friends.

I like your comment about a so-called boring life really not being all that bad. That’s actually how I feel right now. It is hard to tell people when they ask me how I’ve been doing because really things are quite the same. And at the same time, that’s fine with me. I think that people have a hard time getting past the small talk and transcending the talk of the current state of affairs. It’s the rare person who can that will make a good friend, don’t you think?

I’ve known many of my friend for 10 years or more and we’ve gone the gamut - bad, good, and really quite boring. I have always considered them real friends. I could see loaning any of them money (if I had it) because I know they would only ask IF THEY HAD TO and heck, I could see having them stay with me (it’d be crowded) if they needed it, too. I’m not sure how common it is but I really feel like I am blessed with fantastic friends - more than handful!

Do friendships take some effort? Yes they do. Calls, cards, emails, getting together every so often, yep, friendships require some nurturing. It also takes some understanding that you don’t have to have just one “best friend” or that friendships have to be equal. You can have the best friend you can go skiing with, the good buddy that is great for just hanging with. Sometimes one friend makes more of an effort than the other but that’s fine too if both understand. For example, I enjoy writing emails and sending cards but one friend of mine only likes calling. I know we’re friends and that he’s not that into email but he enjoys receiving my emails and I’m fine with that. Someone else might think, “Hey, I do all the work.”

It IS great to have people who want to hang around you during times of contentment. I wonder at people who complain that “my life is so boring.”

Why is boring so bad? If you’re happy and everyone thinks you have a boring life, so what! I would think that anything could become boring if you had it every day.