Initiation

Those who are low in initiation may have these characteristics:

• Relies on others to reach out
• Expects new friends to approach them
• Feels anxious over being rejected so you they don’t put themselves out there
• Says things like “I like friendship to happen organically” to keep from feeling responsible for creating and maintaining friendships.
• Establishes lukewarm friendships because they do not actively choose friends
• Friends may be frustrated and feel like the friendship is one-sided
• Friendships are less likely to last

To Work On: If you want to get better at initiation, try the following: work through anxieties around rejection, set aside time to reach out to old friends, ask someone you like to hang out oneon-one, and take responsibility for creating and maintaining your relationships.

Affirmation

Those who are low in affirmation may have these characteristics:

• Rarely praises friends
• Harbors fears that affirming others takes away from their specialness
• Takes for granted the importance of affirming friends; assumes their love for friends should be readily understood, rather than expressed.
• Friends may feel nervous about whether they are liked
• Sometimes perceived as self-interested, boastful, or untrustworthy
• Friends may limit contact

To Work On: To become better at affirming others, looking for things to like in your friends, express joy over friends’ success, tell friends how much they mean to you, and recognize your friend’s success as your own success.

Vulnerability

Those low in vulnerability may have these characteristics:

• Shallow friendships, as if friends don’t truly “know” one another
• Struggles with distrusting others
• Worries about other’s judgments
• Feels confused as to how they think and feel
• Loneliness
• Claims not to need anyone
• Friendships don’t last when no longer in one another’s vicinity

To Work On: Vulnerability is perhaps one of the most essential ingredients of friendship. To work on being more vulnerable, talk to a close friend about something you’re struggling with and censor yourself less in friendship. There may also be some deeper issues around being shameprone and not trusting others, in which case attending therapy may be helpful.

Support

Those low in support may experience the following:

• Discomfort with strong feelings
• Avoids or limits contact with friends who need support
• Shallow friendships
• Loneliness
• Endorses unwritten rule that friendship should always be easy and never stressful
• Compartmentalized friendships—“party friend” or “basketball friends.”
• Friends feel betrayed
• Friends harbor resentment that goes unexpressed

To Work On: To become better at supporting friends, reach out to friends and ask how they’re doing, lean on friends when you need support, instead of trying to escape when friends express strong feelings, pause and stay present, or look at offering support as an opportunity to deepen friendships. People who have trouble giving support may have some deeper issues around being uncomfortable with strong emotion, so therapy can be helpful as well.

Identity Acceptance

Those low in identity acceptance may experience the following:

• Projects their values onto friends, wanting friends to act in ways that they consider right, without realizing that friends have distinct needs
• Friends shrink into a watered-down version of themselves to avoid judgment
• Keeps friends around only if they are submissive
• Quick to offer friends advice
• Struggles to hear friends out
• Friendships feel hierarchical, as if one person is dominant and the other is submissive
• Friends may back away from the friendship because they don’t feel accepted

To Work On: Those low in identity acceptance tend to struggle with forming deeper connections. To work on accepting your friends identity, take your friend’s perspective, be curious about your friend’s internal world, ask questions instead of offering advice, see the best in your friends, or value your friend’s perspective even when it is different from your own.