Amintaou and Ann are friends who have a podcast together, Call Your Girlfriend, which I honestly had't heard of before I picked up this book. This book talks about their friendship in particular, but also how we treat friendships, the effort that they take, and how friendships are unique against other relationships in our lives.
A point that they made which I thought was super interesting was that while there is a lot of research about romantic relationships and familial relationships there is far less research done about friendships. Which on the surface makes sense because if you have a friend breakup odds are that you don't have to disentangle your finances, figure out joint holidays, childcare or other things that are associated with familial or romantic relationships. However, anyone who has been through a friend breakup knows that it can be just as devastating as a romantic breakup, even if society doesn't weigh them in a similar way. The fear of abandonment that exists in friendship doesn't necessarily exist in other relationships when you are linked together through marriage or blood.
A&A also invented the "Shine Theory" which is basically that we all "shine" more when we all shine. Supportive friendships mean that we make more room at the table for people, we amplify each other's voices, and don't worry about "well if they have success does that mean I am a failure?". A win for one feels like a win for everyone.
They cite a study (by Dunbar) that says that the average person's emotional connections max out at 150. "5 people who are extremely close to them...15 who are in regular contact with them and emotionally crucial, about 50 who are strongly and emotionally connected to them and 80 who are slightly less connected but still a strong and important presence in their lives". This made me laugh because one of my 5's husbands said that he doesn't need more than 5 friends ever and it's become a bit of a joke in our group. Like "if I do that will get kicked out of your 5?"
There was a quote that they reference, from the mutual friend who introduced them that I thought was lovely: "There's a kind of sonar with friendship. You're bouncing your personality off things and people so it's reflected back to you. Good friendships produce true knowledge about yourself, even just subliminally."
May we all be so lucky to have 1 friend (or 5 if we are really lucky!) to help show us our true selves (good and bad).
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