The Cost of Having Diverse Friends
Diversity in friendship is great, except there’s one major challenge.
I’ve strived my whole life to have friends from a diverse array of backgrounds. Different socioeconomic classes, different races, different ages, different interests.
Some of my friends eat, sleep, and breathe sports while other friends can’t name three professional basketball players.
I would form individual connections with each of these people. In most cases, we were not bounded by an inner circle or a clique.
It was simply 1:1 friendships. To be able to bounce between friends who could bring out different parts of me. It was beautiful.
But I always wondered, what was the cost of having such vastly different friends?
Diversity = Less Cohesion
Imagine you have two close friends: Joe and Chris.
Joe spends his free time immersing himself in the arts. His dream Sunday is attending a play and discussing the quality of the show over coffee.
Chris on the other hand is a massive sports fan. His dream Sunday is huddling up by the TV and watching nine consecutive hours of football while crushing a 6-pack of beer in the process.
