How to Lose Friends and Prioritize Yourself

Do you really need friendships, and moreover, should you?

Photo by Hannah Busing on Unsplash

I have always been surprisingly adept at making friends. So over my long life of 23, I have made just about every type of friend there is. It is the keeping part I am quite bad at.

From the ‘we are friends for LIFE until we stop going to the same school’ to the ‘we bonded over a shared love of obscure 90s movies and have been inseparable ever since,’ my friend spectrum has always been surprisingly colourful.

But even so, and this might make me sound just wonderful, but I have yet to have a friendship that can outlive its setting.

Maybe it’s this, maybe it’s my own sense of skepticism and self-reliance but I’ve always sought friendships but never ached for one.

I think that there has to be a stark difference between wanting friends, wanting relationships and needing them. If the great year that was 2020 has taught us anything, it’s that being happy in your own company can be a literal life-saving trait.

Friendships are very important, yes. But not all friendships are made the same.

Some friendships feel like warm, soft grass under your foot — they are comforting, nourishing and make you smile. But some friendships are dry, barb-like and jagged. Because most friendships all but lack the central link.

The central link to friendships is trust. A trust to make yourself vulnerable, and to rely not just on your own strength but on someone else’s too. And that can be dangerous.

The title of this essay may nudge you into thinking that this is nothing but a shallow negative version of Dale Carnegie’s iconic ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’ and you may be partly right.

The point of this essay is to provide a balance.

The Dichotomy of Disposable

As philosopher Aristotle once remarked, “Friendship is a single soul dwelling in two bodies”. But as we have already covered, not all friendships are equal.

It takes a lot of energy and effort to sustain any relationship. And I think it’s logical to assume that not all friendships deserve such an investment. Most friendships fall in this weird little boat where they are both disposable and not so. Both important and absolutely not.

And so friendships may offer varying degrees of support, joy, and fulfillment, but they may also come with their challenges and limitations.

And thus, I pose the question: When, if ever, is it acceptable to kill a friendship?

Because ‘I don’t think I wanna be his friend anymore’ — is never not met with gasps and pitchforks.

The prevalent discourse about friendships fading away due to neglect has instilled in us a tendency to cling to every relationship. However, some friendships are just too draining, too noxious, too encumbering, and too fruitless to continue.

There is a definite element of looking after someone else when fostering friendships, but there should also be an element of selfishness, an element of looking after yourself.

Should there not?

TL-DW: Relationships take work to sustain. Some relationships are not worth that work.

Think of yourself like a gardener, and think of your social circle, however small, as the garden. For the gardener, nurturing their garden isn’t just a duty, but a source of deep satisfaction and fulfillment.

And to maintain their garden and hence their very own happiness, occasional pruning is inevitable. From shrubs that take too much and give nothing to plants that become twisted and foul — it’s important to remove the not-so-good so the good can flourish.

A One-Way Mirror

It really sucks when it seems like you are the only person who gives a crap about your friendship. When you are always the one calling first, texting first, making plans first.

In those friendships that actually matter, that actually have some meaning — this disparity in giving a shit can feel glaring and painful.

Remember how I talked about friendships having a certain weight? Yeah, this is that weight I was referring to. It’s like carrying the weight of the friendship on your shoulders while the other person’s contribution feels light and fleeting.

This asymmetry in effort not only destroys any and all foundation our friendships stand on but also actively hurts — they make us feel unimportant and irrelevant

And here’s the harsh truth that like everyone knows and ignores is this: one-way friendships are unsustainable.

They erode trust, breed resentment, and ultimately lead to feelings of loneliness and disillusionment. Despite our best efforts to hold onto the friendship, it’s destined to wither away if the reciprocity isn’t there.

Both parties bear responsibility for nurturing and sustaining the relationship. If one person consistently fails to reciprocate effort and investment, it’s a sign of deeper issues within the friendship that need to be addressed.

So, while it’s natural to want to cling to friendships, even when they’re one-sided, it’s essential to recognize when it’s time to let go. Holding onto toxic or unfulfilling relationships only prolongs the pain and prevents you from investing in connections that are truly reciprocal and nourishing.

TL-DW: A friendship simply cannot be a one-way street.

From “People-Pleaser” to Self-Advocate

So to prepare for this essay, I skimmed through a copy of the original ‘How To Win Friends and Influence People’. It’s been close to forever since I read it last. What I read both surprised me and delighted me.

Here is a (very) SparkNotes version:

Six Ways to Make People Like You

1. Become genuinely interested in other people.
2. Smile.
3. Remember that a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language.
4. Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves.
5. Talk in terms of the other person’s interests.
6. Make the other person feel important — and do it sincerely.

I want to point something out here. Everything mentioned in the book, everything that is supposed to make you popular and adored by others — can very easily be flipped around.

You can, with not much effort, change it from ‘Six Ways to Make People Like You’ to ‘Six Ways to Make YOU Like You’.

From ‘become genuinely interested in other people’ to ‘become genuinely interested in yourself’ — in your own interests, goals and health.

Because as difficult as it may seem to slog through life alone and disliked by others, it is significantly more painful to do so when you dislike yourself.

Liking Ourselves

Yes, I do too sometimes feel like a burnt apricot, its sweetness singed away, leaving only a husk of bitterness. Sometimes, I feel like chewed-up celery, limp and discarded, its vibrancy wrung out.

And that’s okay.

Feeling utterly terrible for yourself sometimes is not only completely human but also far from uncommon. We all experience moments of self-doubt, insecurity, and despair.

But you still have to ‘like’ yourself.

But even in those moments, amidst the emotional turmoil, there’s an essential truth we can’t afford to forget: we still have to like ourselves. Every self-care buzzword we readily embrace — from boundaries to mindfulness — becomes hollow and ineffective if we don’t cultivate a fundamental sense of self-worth.

It’s like meticulously preparing a salad, washing and chopping the vegetables with care, only to forget the dressing.

The result? A dish that’s bland, unappetizing, and lacking in the essential flavour that makes it truly nourishing.

Bland and unappetizing were my nicknames in high school. But I digress.

The initial step, and frankly, perhaps the sole one that’s equally crucial and challenging to accomplish, is embracing self-approval.

I know many a folk who treat their friends better than they treat themselves.

You see it all the time: friends who readily lend a listening ear, offer sage advice and go above and beyond to support those close to them. Yet, when it comes to themselves, they struggle to extend the same kindness, understanding, and nurturing nature.

And so many of us do this. We have this just horrible habits which seem perfectly okay until we remove ourselves from the equation.

It’s like we’re all playing the main character in our own little movie, right? We tend to have these habits that, from our point of view, seem totally fine. We’re in the driver’s seat, after all, so everything’s just cruising along smoothly.

But then, if we could somehow hop out of our own heads and take a look at ourselves from the outside, it’s like, “Whoa, what’s going on here?”

This, inevitably, leads to a messy place where they somehow become the least important person they know.

The Decline

The number of close friendships among US adults has decreased significantly since 1990, with only 13% reporting having 10 or more close friends compared to 33% in 1990. (source)

That’s shocking yea. No, not the 13% part — the other one. The concept of every 1 of 3 dude to have 10 close friends is slightly mind-boggling.

Like wuh!!?

Friendships are very much fading away, and a big reason for that might just be how much we don’t appreciate them enough.

We make too many of them and care too little of most of them. It’s kinda ironic, but being a bit selfish, being picky about who you let in, and taking care of yourself might just be the key to happiness.

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Have a good day!