“Years ago,” AS said, “when we were in Myrtle Beach, I asked you how many real friends you had in Florida. You asked me to define friend. I said, ‘Someone you could ask to pick you up at the airport.’”
I asked AS if sending a car service would count.
“No,” he said. And then he told me a funny story about being stranded at an airport in Cleveland after the ride he’d counted on didn’t show up.
Friendship: Who… What… Why… and How?
“A rich life includes at least two sorts of friendships – friends that are there for you in sickness and those that are there with you in health. Some friends play both roles but many just one.” – Michael Masterson
I’m a big fan of Seneca. But when it comes to friendship, I find his definition overly strict. In a letter to Lucilius, titled “On Philosophy and Friendship,” he says that relationships based on one party’s hope to benefit from the other should not be considered true friendships.
For Seneca, a true friend is someone that is loyal, trustworthy, and worthy. His standards for loyalty and trustworthiness are high. A loyal friend will follow you into damnation. A trustworthy friend will take a bullet for you. In that letter, he doesn’t say what he means by “worthy.” I suppose he means someone of good moral character, someone you admire.
Although I think I understand his reasoning, Seneca’s Draconian requirements for friendship seem unrealistic and contradictory. They are the epitome of selfish benefit.
Aristotle had a more nuanced view. He allowed for three kinds of friendships: those based on usefulness, those based on pleasure, and those based on a mutual appreciation of values.
The first two, Aristotle calls “accidental” friendships – those that aren’t necessarily chosen by you. Your teachers, for example. Your students and your colleagues. Aristotle points out, quite correctly in my experience, that such accidental friendships are often limited in depth and ephemeral. They are only as deep as they need to be. And they last only as long as they are mutually useful.
But Aristotle claims that there is another kind of friendship: friendships based on virtue. And by virtue, he usually means good character and behavior consistent with good character. I believe this is similar to what Seneca means by worthy.
Aristotle says that these sorts of friendships are more valuable than accidental friendships because they are deeper and more durable. And the relationship tends to improve both parties equally.
My own view of friendship is close to Aristotle’s.
For me, friendships of utility would include the myriad casual friendships we have with random people that are “useful” in our lives. I mentioned teachers and students and colleagues above, but they also include your barber, your fitness instructor, your doorman, and the kid that mows your lawn. Most commonly today, however, friendships of utility are business-related.
Friendships of pleasure would include anybody and everybody that lights you up when you are with them. On first reflection, these may seem the shallowest and least worthy. But if you could add up all the moments of pleasure they give you, you might feel, as I do, that “fun” friends are very valuable indeed.
As for purposeful (non-accidental) friendships, these are, for most people, few and far between. They are those rare relationships you have with people whose intelligence advances your thinking, whose wit charms your emotions, whose behavior stimulates your admiration, and whose love and appreciation for life inspires you to be better than you are.
That’s a big order.
As for loyalty, that is an important virtue that can improve any friendship. But it’s not limited to purposeful friendships. Friends that are fun and useful can also be loyal to you, as you can be to them. Loyalty is especially important in business and in mentorship relationships because it is essential to the bargain: I am useful to you when you have little or nothing. You give back to me when you can.
Loyalty also enhances friendships based on pleasure. The person with the cheerful word at the lodge or at a family reunion is also, often, the person that will think to stop by and say hello when you are down and out.
As to trustworthiness – that’s tricky. I do think that trust is an essential component of any good relationship, but I also think that too many people don’t understand how it works.
When a friend disappoints you because they won’t pick you up at the airport, they may be breaking a trust. Or not.
Trust makes sense only when it is based on the person’s proven character and behavior. When you tell an alcoholic that he broke your trust by drinking – even if he promised not to drink – you are damaging the relationship by expecting from him that which cannot be reasonably expected.
When your friendship is contingent on the other person being something other than what he already is when you form the friendship, you are imposing on the relationship an unrealistic expectation that will end up hurting you both.
This, to me, is the biggest secret of having and keeping friends: Always trust that, despite time and circumstances, they will remain pretty much just as they were when you met them.
I don’t know when I figured this out, but I can say that it has made me happy in just about all of my friendships. I have many fun friends, for instance, that wouldn’t pick me up at the airport if I begged them to. That doesn’t bother me at all. And I have friends that will come to my aid any time I am in trouble, but as for fun – well, that’s not what we do.
I have friends I see once a week and friends I see once a decade. I don’t feel that any of my friendships are more or less worthy than the rest. By expecting nothing but what each one brought initially and naturally to the relationship, I am satisfied nearly 100% of the time.
So if you were to ask me whether one friend or another is a better friend to me, I wouldn’t know how to respond. Except to say that they are all perfect just the way they are.
For practical advice on how to make and keep friends, I couldn’t do better than the rules set down by Dale Carnegie in his book How to Win Friends and Influence People:
- Become genuinely interested in other people.
“You can make more friends in two months by being interested in them, than in two years by making them interested in you.”
- Smile.
Happiness does not depend on outside circumstances, but rather on inward attitudes. Smiles are free to give and have an amazing ability to make others feel good.
- Remember that a person’s name is, to that person, the sweetest and most important sound in any language.
People love their names so much that they will often donate large amounts of money just to have a building named after themselves. We make people feel extremely valued and important just by remembering their names.
- Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves.
The easiest way to become a good conversationalist is to become a good listener. To be a good listener, we must actually care about what people have to say.
- Talk in terms of the other person’s interests.
The royal road to a person’s heart is to talk about the things he or she treasures most. When we talk to people about what they are interested in, they feel valued and value us in return.
- Make the other person feel important – and do it sincerely.
The golden rule is to treat other people the way we would like to be treated. We love to feel important and so does everyone else. People will talk to us for hours if we allow them to talk about themselves. If we can make people feel important in a sincere and appreciative way, we will win all the friends we could ever dream of.
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