.5b - [between the posts] - On friendship

Hi all,

Given the incredible response I've had to my previous blog post, and some things I have recently experienced, I wanted to write a follow-up to my previous post. Going forward, I might do this from time to time.

Thank you for reading, and reacting to, my post

Thanks.

Thanks,to each of you who took time out of your busy days to read my previous post, and especially to those of you who reached out to me in person about it.

None of my previous posts seemed to have affected people as much as my previous posts did. I have had numerous people reach out to me about the post, ask to connect with me to discuss the post and our friendships, or guess which bucket they fall into (close friend or acquaintance).

I hope that this shows that people are interested in getting to know each other on a deeper level. All you need to do is take a step to make this happen.

So if there is somebody who you want to get to know on a deeper level, or if you just want to turn some 'acquaintances' into 'friends', please take the step and reach out to them. A great way to do this (as suggested by a friend who actually did this) is to use my previous blog post as an excuse and to start the conversation with Question 11 in The 36 Questions That Lead to Love:

"Take four minutes and tell your partner your life story in as much detail as possible"

Let me know how it goes!

Further reading

For those of you interested in reading about the uniquely American approach to small talk and relationships, a great article (recommended by a friend) is "My Struggle with American Small Talk" from the New Yorker.

My favourite line from the article, which somewhat epitomises the American model to friendship, is:

"In the East, I’ve heard it said, there’s intimacy without friendship; in the West, there’s friendship without intimacy."

In the real world: Peter Buffett

Tonight, I had the privilege to attend "Life Is What You Make It: A Concert & Conversation with Peter Buffett". Peter Buffett (son of Warren Buffett, investor extraordinaire) gave an interactive multimedia conversation that featured pictures from Buffett's childhood, videos he shot during his philanthropic work, some of the most emotionally evocative music I have ever heard and regular open question sessions. One thing that really stood out for me was when he talked about tribes and connectedness.

For most of the time that homo sapiens have existed on Planet Earth, people have lived in tribes of close, connected families and friends. However, this has changed in modern history.

Buffett asked people to consider how they could move away from the transactional human relationships that make up most of our lives and try and become more connected with the people around us. Part of that comes from acknowledging the truth of who you are and what you want, rather than some arbitrary external metric (Buffett showed us his father's report card from school, which showed Warren Buffett received a B- and 2 C's in maths). Part of it also comes from actively seeking out connections with other people and nature.

I found this especially pertinent to the idea of friendships. Think about why you are trying to become friends with people and really ask yourself if you are simply being transactional or whether you are trying to make a genuine connection.

(Bonus - Most of Peter Buffet's family came to the event. This meant that I got to see the Oracle of Omaha walk past me (although security guards stopped me from rushing up to meet him). I have never been as starstruck as I was then.)