Unreturned Favors & How to Keep Friendships

“She was so nice to us.”

“He throws the best parties.”

“Yet I didn’t know why he stopped inviting us.”

We often wonder why friendships stop. Or why people that once were our friends suddenly go quiet.

We so often fail to realize how relationships go south because of unreturned favors. In more formal terms, it’s a lack of reciprocity. It’s not building enough social capital in a friendship.

I’ve been guilty of this too. I’ve failed to realize I was purely a taker and not enough of a giver. While living in Brooklyn, a friend in New York City stopped inviting me to his dinner parties since I was merely accepting his invites and not inviting him out as well. I was a pure taker. I coasted in the friendship and didn’t think of how I could do nice things for him as well. I hadn’t realized I made so many withdrawals yet made no deposits and the friendship social capital tank was on empty.

It took almost four decades for me to realize I should keep track of what I’m getting and what I’m giving in a relationship. Without being so transactional to record friendly gestures in an Excel doc, we can think of a balance in our heads for every relationship we have. We can think, “how many times has she done X for me compared to the times I’ve done X for her too?”

The friendly gestures can include:

• Invites out — cafes, bars, restaurants, events, concerts.