Interest-First Friendships

This piece from More to That resonates.

Indeed, old friendships fray because of new interests developed over time. Video games were one of my earliest obsessions shaping the friends I had around me. Now, I’m not into video games like I was before and many of my old friendships have diverged as a result.

However, just because there are no common interests doesn’t mean you should cut ties. Old friends have shared history and More to That writes:

Shared history is important because you cannot decouple the past from the present. The person you are today is the result of all the relationships and friendships you’ve had up to this point. A big part of accepting who you are today is to acknowledge the bonds that have helped to cultivate your sense of self from then until now.

While I have drifted from old friends because of new interests, I still talk to many of my old friends too. Even though our conversations may not be as meaningful as they before, being around them exudes affection, warmth, and gives me energy nonetheless.

More to That then describes making friends based off of curiosity and current interests:

The internet has massively widened the scope of career opportunities, but it has also done so for interest-first friendships. These are friendships that take shape because you published or created something that signifies your curiosities, which then act as a beacon for people to find and connect with you.

For most of human history, geography acted as the bottleneck for friendships. But now, it’s curiosity. It doesn’t matter where in the world you’re located — if your ideas are compelling enough, it’s inevitable that relationships will take shape and orbit around your shared curiosities. This leads to discussions that dismantle the on-ramp of small talk, and shuttle you right onto the highway of meaningful dialogue.

One of my new interests recently is writing and many of my friends now I’ve met because of this interest in writing.

This is also one of my motivations for writing every day. My blog is a signal of what’s important to me and what I’m interested in. And I’ve met many through my blog as a result.

January 6, 2022


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