Issue #42: “Far more people out there want closer ties than they actually have”
An interview with author and friendship expert Rhaina Cohen, plus prompts for the Friendship Training Program: Part 2
This week, we chatted to
, author of The Other Significant Others — a just-released book about people who have put friendship at the center of their lives. (She’s also a producer and editor for NPR who’s worked on incredible shows like Hidden Brain, Invisibilia, Morning Edition, All Things Considered, Life Kit, Planet Money, and more.) called The Other Significant Others a “radical and deeply persuasive argument for prioritizing the best friendships that ground us,” while researcher and writer Marisa Franco (and one of the inspirations for Platonic Love!) described it as an “absorbing overhaul of everything you thought you knew about friendship.”
We’re excited to share what we learned about friendship from Rhaina — including the strategy she uses to cement new connections, what people who prioritize friendship have in common, and how to use Insecure to deepen relationships.
But first, here are some of our favorite reader comments from Part One of the Program:
“You just have to bite the bullet and ask… you can frame it as, ‘Well, we both really like coming to this playground, let me get your number and we can plan to meet up sometime.’ I’ve never had anyone act weird or put off when I asked.” -
“I have loved using Marco Polo to stay in touch with my three study abroad friends. We've used it for years and it makes me feel close to them. I highly recommend it for friends who live in different cities.” - Margie
“While I don't know anyone locally who's into pickleball, my boyfriend and I committed to taking a beginner's class together and joining a league. Seems like a nice, not-too-demanding way to be active instead of watching TV after dinner, and to interact with a bunch of new people regularly!” -
“I am currently writing in from Thailand where I am on a group travel trip with a company called Flash Pack, which feels like it fits the prompt of an unlikely place I would have made friends. The company is for solo travelers in their 30s and 40s and their mission is all about building lifelong friendships through travel. Again, it is testing the limits of my comfort zone and is pushing me to grow in interesting ways I am grateful for.” - Jill
Aja: What led you to write The Other Significant Others?
Rhaina: In my mid-twenties, I ended up in a friendship that felt like it surpassed even a best friend. I met M. at a mutual friend's birthday. We discovered we lived a five-minute walk from each other, and because of that proximity, started seeing each other all the time. And I felt for her not so different from when I was falling in love with my now husband.
Aja: Wow, tell us more.
Rhaina: I wanted to be in her presence. I wanted her influence. And I wanted to know as much as I could about her. It's a kind of friendship I now know people experience because of the book I would go on to report — but at the time was kind of revelatory. It opened up a whole bunch of questions for me, like: Why do we assume a friendship cannot be as life-defining as a romantic relationship?
Aja: I know that you've talked to a lot of people who are in “platonic life partnerships.” I'm curious what you found those people have in common.
Rhaina: Well, they have a real affinity for the other person that makes them want to keep going back. Several people used this term “magical.” And a lot of the people I wrote about are very intentional about the friendship — like discussing how they talk to potential romantic partners about each other and the role they play in each other’s lives. One pair of friends I wrote about decided that they were going to only date people who were okay with non-monogamy — not because they wanted multiple romantic partners, but because they had found women who wanted monogamy felt the friendship was too competitive.
There’s open discussion and negotiation about what they're willing to give up to preserve the friendship along with recognition the friendship needs tending to. When you have a relationship that close, letting things go unsaid — which I think is the MO for so many people in friendship — doesn't work.
Aja: Aliza has written about this — our default is avoiding hard conversations or conflict. There's an expectation things should be easy that we’d never bring to a romantic relationship.
Aliza: When you want to get to know a friend better, what's a way to say, Hey, I like you; let's hang out more?
Rhaina: I've literally told people that I have a friend crush on them.
Aliza: Brave!
Rhaina: Being willing to make a bit of an unusual overture — and potentially get rejected — can be helpful too. I met someone who was about to travel for a couple of weeks, and instead of saying Let's catch up when you get back, I was like, I have this crazy idea. Why don't we just exchange voice memos every day? She was totally game. We ended up learning a lot about each other in this concentrated time rather than, you know, letting it stretch out.
Aja: Aliza and I love voice memos as this fun, intimate, fairly low-effort way to stay in touch with people.
Rhaina: I have a thing for the intimacy of people's voices. And my friends are often recording them as they're moving through their lives, so maybe my friend is walking on the street and runs into somebody, or I can hear them trying to beat the light and run across the street. I just feel a little bit implanted in their world.
We ended up learning a lot about each other in this concentrated time rather than, you know, letting it stretch out.
Aja: What’s your take on boundaries in friendship? For example, someone saying, I can’t have this tough conversation with you, I’m at capacity, or I’m sorry, I have to focus on myself first.
Rhaina: My general feeling is that it’s good to think in trade-offs, and the things that bring us the most joy are also going to involve some downsides. That might mean you need to be there for somebody when you are not necessarily in the best mood. I guess I would want people to distinguish between when you are really at capacity versus would just rather not. And how would you treat this person if they weren’t a friend? Would you say, Hi, romantic partner? I know your cat just died, but I just don't have bandwidth?
Aja: That’s really helpful framing. What tips do you have for finding new friends, or turning acquaintances or friends of friends into true friends?
Rhaina: Far more people out there want closer ties than they actually have. Try to gently quiet the part of your brain that is afraid of getting rejected. There's plenty of research to indicate we expect people to like us less than they do. And one technique I use is remembering if the person is not interested, that just maintains the status quo.
You can also use existing cultural depictions of friendship — like The Golden Girls and Broad City and Insecure — to open up conversations about friendship before directly getting into, Who are we to each other? What do we want to be?
Aja: Aliza is re-watching Sex in the City, while I’m watching it for the first time, and that's sparked some informal conversations about what a good friendship looks like and how you can or cannot show up for someone.
Would you say, Hi, romantic partner? I know your cat just died, but I just don't have bandwidth?
Rhaina: Somebody that I interviewed for the book, who has a friendship close enough to be a partnership, said the friendship has inspired him to examine the other friendships in his life and ask himself, What is the fullest version of this friendship? That does not mean every single person has to be at the level of a partnership. It’s being proactive about what you want the friendship to look like. Maybe you want to become closer — he ended up joining a co-working space with a few friends so he could see them two to three times a week — or find clarity on the way that the friendship fulfills you. Maybe it's your pickleball friendship. It's okay to have friendships that fit into different quarters of your life.
This is an abridged version of our conversation. Luckily, if you’d like to hear more from Rhaina, you have options. Listen to her recent interview with Ezra Klein, or catch Rhaina on her upcoming book tour.1 And check out the song about friendship her friends made in honor of the book.
Week Two: Strengthening Friendships
The first phase of our training program centered on new or future friendships. You can go back and revisit those prompts — plus the 150+ (!!) reader comments on our discussion thread — here.
This week, paid subscribers will have access to the second part of the program, including prompts and discussion board, which focuses on our current or present friendships. (And yes, you can do it with a friend too!) These prompts will help you nurture the bond you have with your friends, get more out of your relationships — and, we hope, release the fear or anxiety of, “Am I doing this right?”
Step one: Pick one or two reflection questions to respond to on the discussion board.