3 Simple Reasons Why Friends’ Circles Shrink Over Time
There’s a need to curate a reliable inner circle still out of the larger pool.
Published in
5 min readJan 24, 2022
When you are younger you can have a wide circle of “friends”. Almost anyone can join because the criteria are loose and we are also led to believe that the wider our circles the better. It showed we were popular, connected, and well-liked.
Although apart from the desires for popularity and connection, research shows that the width of our circles could also depend on other factors like our personality types, our individual circumstances, or socioeconomic conditions.
Why do our circles shrink?
As we progress in life the circles naturally get smaller. It happens mainly because:
- as we evolve as individuals some of those friends will no longer fit in with us because they too have grown in a different direction;
- there are some who, unfortunately, do not grow; and
- as we get older we will also get wiser. Wise enough to cut off those extremely tasking, low-value, high maintenance, one-sided friendships. After weeding these friendships out of the friends’ pool there will naturally, be fewer left.
