friendship being at the center of your life
NYC Gatherings and a podcast episode
What is at the center of your life? Reply back and let me know!
What feels like something that started in 2022, I think friendship has been at the center of my life since then.
Living with and near friends, recording podcasts with friends, hosting events with friends, co-working with friends, walk and talks with friends… friends are basically at the center of my life!
Speaking of walk and talks with friends…
My good friend Lani and I recorded a podcast while literally walking and talking in Williamsburg. This felt like a perfect and authentic snapshot of my life right now. I hope you enjoy the episode and I would love to hear your thoughts on it!
From the podcast episode, here are 9 ideas related to friendship that we discussed:
Good things happen when you leave your apartment. Being out and about in dense areas can lead to serendipitous interactions and conversations. I see this all of the time in Williamsburg.
Lean-in to spontaneity. Lani mentioned that she recently last minute attended a taco tour. She went and had a great time, and met people there. I see opportunities like this on social media often too. And I try not to count myself out before the event happens or I get there. Lean in!
Working remotely gives you more flexibility on who you spend your time with. This has empowered me to host and attend more events as a way to see my friends and potentially make new ones, and cowork with friends.
Recommitting to your friends. Given that people are busy and may have other things at the center of their lives, it feels like you kind of need to regularly re-commit to your friends. Hosting and attending events is one way you can do this too!
Putting your friends at the center can be tough because of how busy your friends can be. I try to go with the flow and lean-in when there is a lot of current alignment in my friend’s lives and schedules.
Press play to watch this video clip from Lani and I talking about the podcast episode for you!
Containers and rituals. I wish I spent more time thinking about this earlier in my life. Repeated interactions with someone or a group of people around an activity, topic, or a feeling can be so helpful and powerful for friendship. I have seen these emerge and/or occur in a more pre-planned way too. They are amazing either way.
Lean-into the weather seasons. While living in NYC is often fast-paced and hard-charging, the seasons tend to empower or cultivate certain interests, activities and feelings more easily. Both of us seem to be leaning towards more cozier vibes and hang-outs during this winter.
Recommitting to who you are and what you value regularly. NYC and the people in it have a way of almost creating an agenda for you, if you are not proactive about this on your own. It can be easy to say just yes to things and kind of go on auto-pilot. As such, in October and November, I have been trying to re-align to what really matters to me and the people that I want to spend more time with. It’s not easy to do this, but it’s worth it.
Build what you are looking for. It takes courage but I am regularly surprised by how my friends are interested in the things that I want to do as well. Hosting Podcast Mixers and C3 have been perfect examples of this for me.
We talked about a few other things too - so definitely check it out and let us know what you took away from it!
NYC Gatherings: check out my NYC Gatherings calendar for fun gatherings to attend in NYC!
Alright, that’s all I got for it right now. I have been thinking about “raising the stakes” more, maybe I will write about this soon. If you want to hear more about this or something else, let me know!
Also, this is Lani’s Substack if you want to subscribe to it too!
David Nebinski, who really appreciates his friends and who wants to know what is at the center of your life
PS: I really like this song, if you want a song recommendation!