Saturday, January 18, 2014

The finer points of friendship: Quality beats quantity

I feel like I'm wandering alongside spreads of food in one those enormous buffet restaurants. There's so much food of so many types and my stomach is growling but I don't know where to start. How will I ever choose? So I just hug my plate to my chest in anxiety because I know my time and appetite are limited.

But the buffet isn't food, it's people.

There are phenomenal people all around me in the here in Redding, California, in the ministry school program my husband and I are in. These people are fascinating, compassionate, influential people and I've had coffee dates with a bunch of them.

But I'm lonely.

Yes, I admit it, I'm lonely for community, for friends who truly know me.

We've only been here for 18 months. And I'm realizing that relationships take time. And I'm also realizing that perhaps I made a crucial strategic error: I tried to be friends with too many people.

Choose your people. Commit. Go deep. 
I know other people who picked their friends in the first few months of school last year and have reserved their coffee times and weekend social slots for these people. And I see that 18 months later, they have deep community.

I, on the other hand, was fickle. I wanted to get to know a lot of people. And now I find myself running from party to coffee date to group meeting to lunch date, still getting to know amazing people, but not feeling like I belong with anyone.

If I have one pearl of wisdom to offer from this experience: don't try to be friends with everyone. Choose your people. Commit. Go deep. Because having a few good friends beats having lots of friends. Community beats popularity. I know that firsthand now.




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