Building Community & Friendships

A friend once remarked to me that - "You're like a sailor with friends in every port!" 

I am incredibly thankful to have friends spread out throughout the world, and am often asked "How do you do it?" 

I'm always happy to share a few things that have worked for me in terms of cultivating and maintain friendships (without being great at remembering birthdates or being a gift-giver). 

- Social Media:

I definitely give credit to social media, even though it can have positive or negative repercussions, for me, it has been overwhelmingly positive.

By posting, following, commenting and otherwise interacting... this counts!

- Meetup:

For building friendships, I've had great success with the Meetup platform/app which helps connect like-minded people platonically, meaning it is not a dating platform. I have attended and hosted various meetups in the different places I've lived and found a great return on any time invested! If nothing else, you'll meet people who enjoy doing the things you like to do - ex. hiking, or exploring a new city.

- Bumble BFF:

I've also had positive results from Bumble BFF which is the friend side of the dating app Bumble.  

- Friends of Friends:

On a few different occasions, I've been introduced to friends of friends and have become friends with them too. This has happened either via social media or in-person introductions. I LOVE doing this with my community!

- Texting

I do send random messages when I haven't spoken to someone in awhile, or a picture of something that reminds me of them or a memory we shared.

Friends often say - "I feel bad that you're always the first one to reach out.", and I reply with - "What is important to me is that you reply."  

How many friends is enough?

"Evolutionary psychologist Robin Dunbar proposed that humans can cognitively handle around 150 meaningful social relationships, which is known as 'Dunbar's number'." Wikipedia

Hope this was inspirational in some way!