How many friends is the right number?

[ECHETLAEUS]

What do you prefer?
500 euros (one papercoin) or 8000 cents?
Look how Tristan has Andrew and Andrew has Tristan.
This kind of relationship if you have in your life either of friendship or brotherhood youre the most blessed man in the world.

 

[SELCOUTH]

• ~5 Close friends(1 lover for physical intimacy, 1 mentor to learn a great deal from. It's worth considering mentoring someone else too).
• 20-150 Fairweather friends(Colleagues, people skilled in trades etc). The goal here is to be able to pay for people to do jobs(not about discounted, but a good job from a trustable person). They can also be a good source of "stuff" and some you can learn from. The idea here is similar to diversification in investments. Diversify in their skills, their interests and there beliefs and values and you can't go wrong. Also diversify in their ages. It may be worthwhile doing some notekeeping if you're an autist or terrible with names and faces, just to keep on top of it all?

As for what to avoid? Generally, avoid people who are high maintenance(breakdowns all the time). I'll also add, that it's harder nowadays to make excellent friends, and it's VERY hard to convince anyone to change anything in their ways(not impossible, but if you consider how hard it is to change yourself...). I would also suggest being careful about associating a lot with people who are very mentally ill and unstable as that can spill over onto you and make you worse.

Same here. I feel like 5 close friends is a perfect number

 

[Null043]

• ~5 Close friends(1 lover for physical intimacy, 1 mentor to learn a great deal from. It's worth considering mentoring someone else too).
• 20-150 Fairweather friends(Colleagues, people skilled in trades etc). The goal here is to be able to pay for people to do jobs(not about discounted, but a good job from a trustable person). They can also be a good source of "stuff" and some you can learn from. The idea here is similar to diversification in investments. Diversify in their skills, their interests and there beliefs and values and you can't go wrong. Also diversify in their ages. It may be worthwhile doing some notekeeping if you're an autist or terrible with names and faces, just to keep on top of it all?

As for what to avoid? Generally, avoid people who are high maintenance(breakdowns all the time). I'll also add, that it's harder nowadays to make excellent friends, and it's VERY hard to convince anyone to change anything in their ways(not impossible, but if you consider how hard it is to change yourself...). I would also suggest being careful about associating a lot with people who are very mentally ill and unstable as that can spill over onto you and make you worse.

Really good advice, high maintanance people either drain your battery or fuck everything up when you least expect it, makes it harder to care for other friends or people in your life (family, gf, etc.)

 

[HellManMayo]

How many friends should a person have? 1-3 super close ones? Or maybe having 20 friends whom arent that close, but you can reliably call on favors if needed?

I'm very curious about other people's thoughts, I myself think 2-4 is a good number because I value the loyalty more than the networking capacity.

Depends a lot on how introverted/extrovered and how old you are.

When you're in college or school you spend all your time with kids your age + you have waaay less responsibilities. When you're in the workforce you have a ton more familial/personal obligations and a lot less energy/time to devote to socializing.

If you just want to call on favors, you're better off improving bonds with your neighbors or family, because they're a lot more capable and likely to help you in a pinch.

 

[ECHETLAEUS]

Theres no number of friends right or wrong. Make sure you are friend with yourself and then youll be able to chose whos good and wrong for u.

 

[RisingThumb]

Theres no number of friends right or wrong. Make sure you are friend with yourself and then youll be able to chose whos good and wrong for u.

What if I'm enemies with myself?

 

[ECHETLAEUS]

What if I'm enemies with myself?

We all have both good and dark side inside us. Most of the people are just an emotional rollercoaster and they never discover their inner world. Beyond self-destructive actions, what defines someone as being hostile to themselves? The deppression, or the anger? Many times the light comes out of the darkness. So these things we see as bad may not be having a bad result. If you have low self esteem youll attract toxic and abusive people. If you have a positive and quality attitude youll take no shit from others and youll survive even in your darkest days. So first objective: Be friends with you and dont ignore your dark side.

 

[RisingThumb]

We all have both good and dark side inside us. Most of the people are just an emotional rollercoaster and they never discover their inner world. Beyond self-destructive actions, what defines someone as being hostile to themselves? The deppression, or the anger? Many times the light comes out of the darkness. So these things we see as bad may not be having a bad result. If you have low self esteem youll attract toxic and abusive people. If you have a positive and quality attitude youll take no shit from others and youll survive even in your darkest days. So first objective: Be friends with you and dont ignore your dark side.

This echoes a lot of the Jungian sentiment about integrating the Shadow into the self. As for what defines someone as being hostile to themselves, I'd argue it's when they have a lot of elements of their shadow they haven't successfully integrated, and as a result of it, they are left at the whims of those unconscious things they bury within themselves that takes them on these emotional rollercoasters.

 

[ECHETLAEUS]

This echoes a lot of the Jungian sentiment about integrating the Shadow into the self. As for what defines someone as being hostile to themselves, I'd argue it's when they have a lot of elements of their shadow they haven't successfully integrated, and as a result of it, they are left at the whims of those unconscious things they bury within themselves that takes them on these emotional rollercoasters.

I haven't read Jung yet. Its in the future plans to read his work. But i agree if you cant manage your dark side then it annihilates you. Your dark side is bad only if you dont control it.

 

[Ardea]

A small number of close friends is preferable to a large number of acquaintances. This is my personal opinion; I find extended social interaction draining. It is better to have a small group of friends who understand that my sporadic communication is a personal quirk and not some sort of attack against them.

 

[PizzaW0lf]

When it comes to friendship nowadays, I simply like to just use the Keanu Reeves method of treating every interaction as if it were the last one. Here's what I mean,


View: https://youtu.be/wHHwE8Y-pqk

 

[gathermore]

A small number of close friends is preferable to a large number of acquaintances. This is my personal opinion; I find extended social interaction draining. It is better to have a small group of friends who understand that my sporadic communication is a personal quirk and not some sort of attack against them.

but give me a quantitative answer please, for data collection purposes.

it can be a range idc