Let me tell you about a confession that changed everything.
Back in 2015, my recent podcast guest Terri Huggins Hart wrote something on her blog that she never expected would go viral. The title? “What Everyone Ought to Know About Never Having a Best Friend.”
It was simple. It was honest. And it struck a nerve with thousands of readers who had been carrying around this secret shame about never having that one person society told them they should have.
Here’s the truth: I don’t believe in best friends either. And after talking with Terri for episode 50 of Friendship IRL, I’m even more convinced that this whole concept is doing us more harm than good.
Listen to the episode to hear us unpack this in real time.
The Problem With “Best Friend” Culture
If you’ve been listening to this podcast, you probably already know I’m not a fan of the term “best friend.” It’s too all-encompassing. It puts way too much pressure on one relationship to be everything to one person.
But here’s what really gets me fired up: the shame people carry when they don’t fit this narrow mold.
Terri’s article went viral because so many people could relate to never having had a traditional “best friend.” Think about that for a minute… thousands of people felt seen by someone admitting they didn’t have something our culture treats as essential.
“Why many people don’t want to talk about best friends,” Terri explained to me, “is both because they feel ashamed and because they don’t want their own friends to feel slighted.”
We’re literally avoiding conversations about our friendships because we’re afraid we’re doing it wrong. How messed up is that?
Reframing Friendship: The Healthcare Model
During our conversation, Terri shared an analogy that completely shifted how I think about friendship expectations. She said we should think about friendships as we think about healthcare providers.
You don’t want your dentist handling your gynecological needs, right? Different specialists serve different purposes. They’re all important. They all contribute to your overall health. But you’d never expect one person to handle everything.
So why do we expect one friend to be everything?
“Everything does not need to be deep,” Terri told me. “You don’t need to have only friends who will talk about your deepest secrets, your life goals, and investments. It’s nice to have somebody with whom you just talk about your favorite meal last night or your favorite TV show.”
Let that sit with you for a minute…
In the full episode, Terri goes much deeper into how she’s built meaningful connections without the pressure of finding “the one” friend. Her perspective on building a friendship care team rather than searching for a best friend might completely change how you approach your relationships.
The Wellness Culture Problem
Here’s something Terri brought up that I can’t stop thinking about: how wellness culture has created narrow definitions of what makes someone “well,” “fit,” or “healthy” in friendship.
Just like fitness culture often excludes people who don’t fit a certain mold, friendship culture has created the idea that if you don’t have a best friend, something’s wrong with you.
But what if nothing’s wrong with you? What if you’re just wired differently? What if your version of healthy friendships looks different from what Instagram tells you it should look like?
Terri’s experience proves that you can have a rich, fulfilling social life without conforming to society’s expectations for friendship. The key isn’t fitting into someone else’s definition – it’s creating connections that feel good to YOU.
When Did We Make Everything So Complicated?
“One thing my mother told me and I keep it in the back of my head,” Terri shared, “she always said, ‘Everything is simple. We make it complicated.’ And I try to remember that every time that I’m feeling lost or just spiraling.”
This hit me hard because it’s so true about friendship. We’ve taken something that should feel natural – connecting with people we enjoy – and turned it into this complicated performance with rules and expectations.
What if friendship could be simple again?
What if you could enjoy surface-level conversations with some people and deep, meaningful connections with others without feeling like you’re failing at relationships?
What if you could have work friends, hobby friends, family friends, and online friends without needing to rank them or find “the one”?
The full episode is packed with examples and stories I couldn’t fit here. Listen now.
Building Your Friendship Care Team
Instead of searching for that elusive best friend, what if you built a friendship care team?
Think about the different roles people play in your life:
- ▪️ The friend who makes you laugh until your stomach hurts
- ▪️ The one who gives the best advice about work stuff
- ▪️ The person who’s always down for trying new restaurants
- ▪️ The friend who listens without trying to fix everything
- ▪️ The one who shares your obsession with reality TV
Each of these connections serves a purpose. Each one adds value to your life. And none of them has to be perfect or all-encompassing.
“Could you imagine if everything in our lives was intense and just deep?” Terri asked me. “That’s exhausting!”
She’s absolutely right. We need variety in our friendships, just as we do in everything else.
The complete episode explores how Terri has built this diverse friendship network and the specific mindset shifts that allowed her to stop feeling ashamed of not having a traditional best friend. If you’re tired of feeling like you’re doing friendship wrong, her perspective might be exactly what you need to hear.
Permission to Redefine Friendship
Here’s what I want you to take away from this: you have permission to define friendship on your own terms.
You don’t need a best friend to have a fulfilling social life. You don’t need to have deep, intense relationships with everyone. You don’t need to feel ashamed if your friendship style doesn’t match what you see in movies or on social media.
What you need is connections that feel good to you. Relationships that add joy, support, or simply pleasant conversation to your life. Friends who accept you as you are, not as society says you should be.
The most important thing isn’t having the “right” kind of friendships – it’s having the friendships that work for YOUR life.
Your Turn to Reflect
So let me ask you this: Who are your familiar friends? Where do you see them? What do you talk about? And what do you get out of these friendships? How do they make you feel?
Maybe it’s time to stop measuring your friendships against some impossible standard and start appreciating them for what they actually bring to your life.
I share so much more in the full episode about what it means to challenge friendship expectations and build connections that actually work for you. Terri’s story and insights go way deeper than what I could cover here, and I think hearing her full perspective will shift how you see your own relationships.
Ready to give yourself permission to redefine friendship? [Listen to the complete episode here] and subscribe to Friendship IRL wherever you get your podcasts. Because the conversation about authentic connection is just getting started.
