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Wellness Wednesday for December 14, 2022

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

  • Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.

  • Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.

  • Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.

  • Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).

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How much time do you spend each week on social engagements? And does that differ from the amount you'd like to be spending?

I've had some weeks recently where I was asked to do something on every day of the week. I work full time, and I have various solitary hobbies that I'd like to spend more time pursuing; and so weeks like that feel far, far too busy for my optimal happiness. At times like that, I wish I could have an entire week all to myself with no disturbances. But I don't think that would make me happy either.

Recently I was talking with a friend of mine about the "optimal number of friends who you see often." I think I concluded that it would be no more than two or three.

I have a family and I see them all the time, but otherwise I feel like one social engagement a week is a good rate for me. But the optimal number of friends to maintain for that one social engagement feels like it's around 6-8 people.

I see one of my good friends once a week, my girlfriend 3-4 times a week, and other friends/acquaintances once a month or so. I also see my family and brothers every couple of weeks and random parties every now and then. Many of my best friends have moved away and I try to see them once or twice a year.

I wish I had one or two more close friends nearby who I could see on a weekly basis. My sweet spot would be hanging with my friends maybe two to three days a week, my girlfriend a couple times a week, and alone time a couple days a week. I like reading and other hobbies that I do solo, so seven nights a week of social time would be too much. That’s some Teddy Roosevelt level of socializing that I could not handle.