Sunday Pick: How to value friendship (w/ Rhaina Cohen) | How to Be a Better Human

Summary

Podcast Summary: TED Talks Daily Episode: Sunday Pick: How to Value Friendship (w/ Raina Cohen)
Host: Chris Duffy
Release Date: July 20, 2025

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Introduction

In this enlightening episode of How to Be a Better Human, selected by TED Talks Daily, host Chris Duffy engages in a profound conversation with Raina Cohen, author of The Other Significant Others: Reimagining Life with Friendship at the Center. The discussion delves deep into the essence of platonic relationships, challenging societal norms and exploring ways to cultivate meaningful friendships that rival the significance of romantic partnerships.

Friendship Fidelity

Timestamp: 07:10

Raina Cohen introduces the concept of friendship fidelity, drawing parallels to romantic fidelity but tailored for platonic bonds. She explains, “Fidelity is not about exclusivity but about caring for a friend in a way that anticipates their needs in difficult times” (07:16). This involves being both a fair weather and a foul weather friend—steadily present through joys and challenges alike. Cohen emphasizes the importance of sticking through conflicts and seasons, ensuring that friendships remain resilient and supportive.

Redefining Friendship

Timestamp: 20:16

Cohen reflects on how writing her book expanded her understanding of what constitutes a friend. She shares, “The definition of a friend feels much more expansive to me than it had before” (20:16). Through her research, Cohen illustrates friendships that transcend traditional boundaries, such as legally recognized platonic co-parents and friends who support each other through severe personal struggles. This broadened perspective advocates for recognizing friends as integral pillars in our lives, capable of fulfilling roles typically associated with family or romantic partners.

Handling Friendship Loss

Timestamp: 25:58

The conversation addresses the profound pain of losing a friend, whether through drifting apart or unforeseen circumstances. Cohen highlights the concept of disenfranchised grief, stating, “If someone is suffering because a friend is gone from their life, that should be a really clear indication of how much the friendship meant to them” (26:29). She underscores the societal tendency to minimize platonic grief, urging a more compassionate acknowledgment of the emotional turmoil that comes with losing a significant friendship.

Navigating Differences

Timestamp: 32:26

In an era marked by increasing social and political divides, Cohen offers strategies for maintaining friendships amidst differing ideologies. She advises, “Viewing differences as something that isn't a liability, but a way that you can help sharpen each other's thinking and open your minds” (32:26). By approaching relationships with curiosity and openness, friends can enrich each other's perspectives and foster mutual understanding despite divergent views.

Strengthening Friendships

Timestamp: 33:56

Cohen provides practical tips for nurturing and strengthening friendships:

1. Establish Routines: "If you have a friend that you want to see more, don't make it so that you have to plan every single activity" (33:56).
2. Recenter Friendship Importance: Treat friendships as central, not supplementary, to your life structure.
3. Proactive Support: Create methods, like specific emojis, to signal when a friend needs support without needing extensive explanations.

These strategies emphasize the need for intentionality and proactive engagement in cultivating deep, lasting friendships.

Friendship and Romantic Relationships

Timestamp: 40:19

The interplay between friendships and romantic relationships is another focal point. Cohen discusses the complexities that arise when romantic feelings intersect with platonic bonds. She suggests conducting a pre-mortem to anticipate potential issues by asking, “Imagine a year from now, we decide the romantic relationship isn't for us. What are the three most likely reasons?” (42:11). This proactive dialogue helps in setting clear expectations and maintaining the integrity of both relationships, even if the romantic aspect fades.

Conclusion

Throughout the episode, Raina Cohen challenges listeners to reimagine their approach to friendships, advocating for relationships that are as cherished and complex as romantic ones. By embracing concepts like friendship fidelity, acknowledging the depth of platonic grief, and actively cultivating friendships, individuals can lead more fulfilling and balanced lives.

Cohen leaves listeners with a powerful metaphor from her book: “Experiencing a friendship like Andrew and Tali's can sharpen our vision, allowing us to notice the trellis that had been directing our path all along” (15:03). This encourages breaking free from rigid societal structures to grow towards the light through diverse and meaningful friendships.

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Notable Quotes

• Raina Cohen at 07:16: “Fidelity is not about exclusivity but about caring for a friend in a way that anticipates their needs in difficult times.”

• Raina Cohen at 20:16: “The definition of a friend feels much more expansive to me than it had before.”

• Raina Cohen at 26:29: “If someone is suffering because a friend is gone from their life, that should be a really clear indication of how much the friendship meant to them.”

• Raina Cohen at 32:26: “Viewing differences as something that isn't a liability, but a way that you can help sharpen each other's thinking and open your minds.”

• Raina Cohen at 42:11: “Imagine a year from now, we decide the romantic relationship isn't for us. What are the three most likely reasons?”

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Final Thoughts

This episode serves as a compelling call to revalue and deepen our friendships, recognizing their critical role in personal fulfillment and societal well-being. Raina Cohen’s insights provide actionable frameworks for fostering robust platonic relationships that can withstand the tests of time and difference.

Whether you're seeking to enhance existing friendships or build new ones with greater intentionality, this conversation offers valuable perspectives and practical advice to help you become a better friend and, consequently, a better human.

Transcript

[Elise Hu]

Hey, TED Talks Daily listeners, I'm Elise Hu. Today we're bringing you a Sunday pick where we share an episode of another podcast from the TED Audio Collective handpicked by us for you. What would it look like if we took friendship as seriously as we take romance? To explore this question, we're sharing an episode of how to Be a Better Human featuring Raina Cohen, author of the book the Other Significant reimagine Life With Friendship. At the center, she sat down with host Chris Duffy to talk about the value of platonic relationships. And they get into everything from what it means to offload expectations from a romantic partner onto friends instead, to how to cope with the loss of a friend and what to do when politics divide friendships. If you want to strengthen your relationships of all kinds, this episode is for you. How to Be a Better Human is a show that looks in unexpected places for new ways to improve and show up for one another. If you want to hear more insights like this, listen to how to Be a Better Human wherever you get your podcasts, learn about the TED Audio Collective at audiocollective.ted.com this episode is sponsored by Dell Introducing the new Dell AI PC powered by the Intel Core Ultra processor. It's not just an AI computer, it's a computer built for AI. That means it's built to help do your busy work for you so you you can fast forward through editing images, designing presentations, generating code, debugging code, running lots of apps without lag, creating live translations and captions, summarizing meeting notes, extending battery life, enhancing security, finding that file you are looking for, managing your schedule, meeting your deadlines, responding to Jim's long emails, leaving all the time in the world for more you time and for the things you actually want to do. No offense, Jim. Get a new Dell AI PC starting at $699.99 at Dell.com AI PC how those ahead? Stay ahead. This episode is sponsored by McDonald's. Okay, confession time. I love a good comeback story, especially when it's delicious and totally unexpected. Back in 2006, McDonald's released the snack Wrap and it quickly became the Go to bite portable, crunchy, juicy perfection. Then it vanished. Gone. Poof. But the fans like me, oh, they never gave up talking. Nine years of petitions, Facebook groups, memes, international snack wrap, scouting missions. People built entire identities around this thing. It was intense in the best way. And now it's back. Yes, really. Thanks to relentless sauce loving dedication, McDonald's brought back the snack Wrap. Think crispy, juicy white meat, shredded lettuce melty cheese all hugged in a soft tortilla and drizzled with ranch or your pick of sauces. It was never supposed to return, but the fans made it happen because sometimes passion wins and sometimes it tastes like a snack wrap. Try the snack wrap that broke the Internet at a McDonald's near you. This message is brought to you by Apple Card. Each Apple product, like the iPhone 16, is thoughtfully designed by skilled designers. The Titanium Apple Card is no different. It's laser etched, has no numbers, and it earns you daily cash on everything you buy, including 3% back on everything at Apple. Apply for Apple Card on your iPhone in minutes, subject to credit approval. Apple Card is issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA, Salt Lake City branch terms and [e-mail].

[Chris Duffy]

Youm'Re listening to how to Be a Better Human. I'm your host, Chris Duffy. My college friends always make fun of me for describing pretty much everyone I've ever met as one of my very best friends. They're like, I actually don't think it's possible for a person to have 10,000 best friends. One time I got into an argument with someone and when I told them about it, their immediate response was, oh no, are they no longer one of your best friends? And now they're just one of your very good friends. Which I have to admit is an excellent roast of me, a very precise and cutting zing. But it also taps into something sort of essential about me. I have always cared a ton about friendship. I'm really interested in how friendships work. There's so much that I want to unpack and to understand what are the unspoken rules when it comes to friendship and should those be the rules or do we need to re examine them? We're going to be talking all about platonic relationships with Raina Cohen, an award winning journalist and the author of the other significant reimagining Life with Friendship at the Center. To get us started, here's a clip from Raina's TED Talk.

[Raina Cohen]

Regardless of whether we are partnered now, we need to rely on more than one relationship to sustain us throughout our full, unpredictable lives. We need other significant others and there's an overlooked kind of relationship that we can turn to friendship. I got the sense that friendship could be this stronger force in our lives because of a friendship that I stumbled into. We would see each other most days of the week, be each other's plus ones to parties. I went out and interviewed dozens of people who had a friendship like ours and I wrote a book about them. Natasha and Linda are the first legally recognized platonic co parents in Canada. Joe and John have been best friends for many decades. When Joe was struggling with alcohol and drug use, John got him into recovery. And then John decided that to support his friend, he would also become sober. Joy took care of her friend Hannah during Hannah's six year battle with ovarian cancer. And that included flying out to New York where Hannah got specialized treatment. Joy had trouble actually sleeping overnight in the hospital because she was too busy watching to make sure her friend's chest was still rising and falling. Some of the friends that I spoke to had this friendship occupy the space that's conventionally given to a romantic partner. Some had this kind of friendship and a romantic partner. It's not either or. As I spoke to these people, I realized that they were at the frontier of friendship, helping us imagine how much more we could ask of our platonic relationships.

[Chris Duffy]

Okay, I am so excited that we have Raina Cohen here with us today to dive deep into friendship and to explore the possibilities and potential of platonic relationships.

[Raina Cohen]

Hi, I'm Raina Cohen. I'm the author of the book the Other Significant Reimagining Life with Friendship at the Center. I'm also an editor and producer for the NPR podcast Embedded.

[Chris Duffy]

Let's start with what is friendship fidelity and how can that enhance our friendships?

[Raina Cohen]

Well, fidelity is really a word that I think we associate with romantic relationships. And when I was thinking about what does it look like to be fidelitous within friendship, it's not necessarily having one friend who you are exclusive with, which is maybe the way, you know, we would think about fidelity. But caring for a friend in a way that isn't just responsive but is also anticipating what might they want or need from you in a difficult time. It's being both a fair weather friend and a foul weather friend. Like being there for all of it and not running away. Whether something is hard for that person or whether conflict has come up between the two of you, it's really sticking it out through all of those seasons and all of the challenges that come up.

[Chris Duffy]

Having that idea of you're a fair weather friend, but you're also a foul weather friend. I feel like we often really prize that in romantic relationships, right? Like if someone said, oh, my boyfriend left as soon as things started getting hard, they'd be like, what a monster. But if someone said, oh, my friend is hanging out with me less because I've been having a really hard time, we don't have the same level of judgment. I don't think for that person.

[Raina Cohen]

I do think that we have this idea that friendship shouldn't be hard. I mean, one of the people that I interviewed for my book had said that he had gotten this message growing up that if you are thinking that much about a friendship, you're trying too hard. Like, you shouldn't even be exhausting your emotional and mental energy on a friendship. And I think that there's something a little bit maybe unintentionally malicious about saying that a friendship should be easy. Because I think we have all experienced that the closest relationships in our lives are also the ones that are the trickiest. You know, familial relationships, romantic relationships, we get it. Like, if you are spending a lot of time around each other, if you are invested in each other's lives, that kind of proximity and time together is going to create friction. And the trick isn't to exist without friction. It's to figure out how do you run toward it in a way that can resolve it for the different people involved. So maybe, you know, people want to have a respite from these other complex relationships in their life and see friendship as an outlet, but that might lead to less close, platonic relationships as a result.

[Chris Duffy]

You talk in the book about how we have these very set ideas often about what a romantic relationship is, especially what a good romantic relationship is, and how sometimes that can be really positive to have, like, a set, clear model. But other times it can also lead to us being not actually aware of what each of us in the relationship thinks about the relationship. You talk about how there's a couple who are in couples counseling and they realized that they had different ideas about what it meant to be monogamous and that because of that, they actually broke up because they both thought they were, like, doing the thing that was just a regular old romantic relationship, but the regular old romantic relationship was different for each of them. And you talk in the book about how not having that kind of plug and play template for friendship is a strength, right? It allows us to define it for each other, but it also can make it hard to know exactly what we want or how to handle those tougher conversations and those hard times.

[Raina Cohen]

There are trade offs to everything. And absolutely having social templates is a plus and a minus. I mean, it is. We're trying to avoid awkwardness by having social scripts. And there's something that seems efficient and it just kind of like takes it out of your mind and hands to know that there are certain things you're supposed to do. But that assumes that everybody has the same expectations. And people don't realize until sometimes they are deep into a romantic relationship that they are not on the same page.

[Chris Duffy]

It makes me think we are supposed to get everything from our romantic partner, that they're supposed to be our best friend and we're supposed to be extremely attracted to them physically and they're supposed to be cheerleader for our professional life and we're supposed to be inspired by their professional life and they're also supposed to be great with the kids. It's all of these things which are really not the same role over and over. And we somehow think that like the perfect partner would have all of those at the same time.

[Raina Cohen]

What I've seen is that there's this kind of interplay between our expectations around friendship and romantic relationships that I think we undermine romantic relationships by expecting too much of them. And then on the flip side, we expect so little of friendships that we end up weakening them or not realizing their full potential. When really these different types of relationships, if we sort of maybe offloaded some of the romantic ones onto friendships that could make it so that people could feel more fulfilled in their romantic relationships because they have realistic expectations of them.

[Chris Duffy]

For me, I feel really good about my marriage. I feel like it's a strong one. But I think that so much of what makes it strong is also that we both get pieces of what we need emotional fulfillment from outside of the marriage. That we have friends, right? Like I am a comedian. I need like silliness and goofiness and total like someone who could just do bits. And I also don't want to be married to that person. It's really helpful for me to have friends who I can go and be like, we're gonna spend an hour and a half just talking in accents and it's gonna be totally hilarious and bonkers. But then I like that I go home and it's like I can have a real conversation and she's not also like, hello Gomphra. Like, I don't want that at night. And then a more serious piece for me is my wife and I do different things. And so it's really helpful to me to have friends who I can have serious long ranging conversations about career goals, who really totally get it. And then I'm not frustrated when she doesn't totally understand all the ins and outs of exactly what my career is. And I know it's the same for her. She gets plenty of pieces fulfilled by people who are not me. But sometimes that feels weird. I think your book clarified for me that like there is this very real kind of stigma to getting that from a friend to having a super close friendship when you're in a romantic relationship.

[Raina Cohen]

Yeah, I mean we distinguish between certain kinds of relationships, so romantic, familial, platonic, and have certain things that we deem appropriate and certain things that you're, you're not supposed to do. And I think particularly within friendship that you're not supposed to, that's too much that you're not supposed to ask of friends. And I guess my question is a little bit, why, you know, on what basis have we made those decisions? And going out and talking to many dozens of people who have friendships that really even break our definition of what a friendship is by going so far as to be living together, maybe raising kids together, taking care of each other through cancer and in old age it's like, well, these people have platonic relationships and they're doing it and it's not breaking the friendship and it's not breaking their other relationships. So it's not like by definition friends can't do these things. So there's something else that's shaping our ideas about, well, maybe this is asking too much. And then on the other point that you were making about is your marriage strong enough if you have to turn to other people? That seems like a really insidious effect of these expectations around marriage. I think that there are people who end relationships too soon because, or end up having grave doubts about their relationships because they think that what they're supposed to do is get everything from this one person as opposed to feeling like, yeah, this is a great situation right now that I have somebody that I love and that I can go home to and I can have the serious conversation with, without the accents, who loves me and who's a great co parent. And I have other people that I can go to. Like, I don't know that I would want to be married to a journalist. And I think it would be shop talk all the time. I really value having different forms of separation in my life, but maybe that means that I can't talk about everything with my spouse. And I think it's kind of creating these unnecessary doubts in people's minds because they're told that everything is supposed to come from this one person. Or like one person I interviewed called it a one stop shopping approach to relationships.

[Chris Duffy]

If you'll indulge me to read to you from your own book. I thought this was really kind of profound. It's like the final paragraph of the book, he said, experiencing a Friendship like Andrew and Tali's, or witnessing one, can sharpen our vision, allowing us to notice the trellis, as Art and Nick put it, that had been directing our path all along. An encounter with just one of these friendships can dislodge fixed ideas about who and how many people we can spend the rest of our lives with. The trellis may be ideally suited to some of us in use, its use by so many others a source of meaning and its preset structure reassuring. But for those who have doubts or are curious, these friendships can give us the nerve to detach from the trellis and grow towards the light.

[Raina Cohen]

So I'll just kind of explain that a trellis idea because it did not come from me. It came from this. This guy, Art Pereira. He is a man who has trained as a pastor in a conservative Christian denomination and is gay and has had a really hard time reconciling those two things, has since done it, but it has meant that his life looks really different than it had before. He had realized all of this and he has forged this very close relationship with a friend. He was making a comparison to an iving plant and that if you put an iving plant on a trellis, it'll grow in the shape of a trellis. But if there is no trellis, it grows toward the light. And he felt like before he had kind of figured all this stuff out with this really close relationship that this really close friendship that he considers a familial level relationship. At this point, he was on the trellis and that he and his friend needed to bring to break the trellis to find something that's better. And what I really want to encourage people to do and what I love, especially Art and his friend Nick's story for is that it's really about how do you figure out what you want in a world that's telling you that there are only certain things that are possible. People who have created friendships that are so close that they are life partnerships are one example of people really breaking out of this narrow idea of what's possible in our closest relationships and showing us that there are other ways. And there might be many other kinds of things that work for you in particular. So it's really kind of a call for us to ask what would we pursue if we thought it was possible.

[Chris Duffy]

I imagine anyone who heard that is going to be convinced by that. How do you. How do you figure out what it is that you really want?

[Raina Cohen]

It is not easy. One exercise that actually other people that I interviewed and ended up talking about was drawing what's called a social atom. So like, you make a circle for yourself and then you draw other people who are close, you know, who are important to you in your life. And you make how close they are to your bubble and how big they are an indication of sort of how significant they are in your life. Just putting that on the page can be illuminating for like, who do you want to become closer to? If in the process of drawing it you're like, I feel close to this person, but I actually don't see them that much that you can maybe get a sense of that gap. You know, there are also on a societal level, like, it helps to have more models, it helps to have more stories of people who show you different ways of living life. And I think to the extent possible, trying to seek out the stories that maybe are like a little bit different than the ways that people immediately around you might live can be helpful for asking questions about what you yourself might want.

[Chris Duffy]

Personally, one thing that I really want is for us to talk so, so much more about all of this. But my bosses also want us to have a quick break for podcast ads, so we will be right back after this.

[Elise Hu]

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[Unknown]

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[Chris Duffy]

And we are back. We're talking with Raina Cohen, author of the book the Other Significant Reimagining Life with Friendship at the Center. So, Reyna, how did writing this book change what you think a friend is?

[Raina Cohen]

I think the definition of friend feels much more expansive to me than it had before. I mean, one of the early interviews I did, I remember talking to a woman in her 60s who I'd asked, like, does she wish it was a term for, like, the friendship as close as hers? It was like a friendship of decades where they saw each other basically, you know, as sisters. And she was like, I don't want another term. I just want us to use the term friend to treat it with more value, to not diminish it. And I think kind of related to that. I just see all of the possibilities that exist within friendship. And I really bristle when anybody says just friends or more than friends. Nothing that is, I think, is categorically excluded from what a friend can do. I've seen now friends do just about anything a family member or a romantic partner would do. Let's say something in my life comes up. Like, I had sort of very difficult sort of incident happen a couple weeks ago. And to me, it wasn't like, oh, the first person I contact about this is my husband. It was like, who are the people who could be most helpful in this moment to me? And my husband was on the other side of the country. And I eventually did talk to him about it, but I went to other people first. And so I think not kind of operating by default with what are roles and more like, what is the task or the need at hand and who can best respond to that. And also, you know, if somebody. If a friend needs something, I try to ask, like, what can I do? And that feels reasonable given what my capacity is.

[Chris Duffy]

With that in mind, what makes a good friend? What makes a really good friend?

[Raina Cohen]

Man, simple question. That feels hard. I think good friend is going to depend on who you are to each other. When I think about the friends I run into at swing dance, my expectations of what makes them a good friend are very different than my absolute closest friends, who I see all the time. But I think in general, showing care for one another, showing affection, not holding back about how you feel about one another, which is something that is very common in friendships, to let a lot of things go unsaid. Not calling it quits when someone is going through something difficult or when you within the friendship, are going through something difficult.

[Chris Duffy]

There's a comedy show here in Los Angeles where I live, that is Literally called my therapist knows your name. And people instantly get why that's a funny thing to name name a comedy show. Because I think so many people do have this experience of, like, even though these are quote, unquote, not serious relationships, they often do take up so much of our mental energy and brain space.

[Raina Cohen]

I'm just thinking about if you were Talking to a 13 year old, we would be like, of course you're going to spend a ton of your brain space thinking about your friends. Like, peers really matter. But why is it that as adults, we don't think that you should be like, that's. That shouldn't be your focus? I mean, that it's. I think it's just, that's not the reality for a lot of people, that their friends do matter a lot and they, you know, ground their lives and cause heartache sometimes. But there is really this mismatch between what we're told is what an adult should care about and what we actually do.

[Chris Duffy]

This is a very particular type of millennial complaint. But I feel like it's quite common to hear people lament that we live in single family homes or single family apartments and that we don't live in, like, the dorm structure. That would be normal if you were living in a university where you. You have your friends right next door, you have your friends down the hall, you have your friends at least within a walk away. And I feel like it's so common to hear people wish for physical proximity to friends to take away some of the logistics of it being difficult, because as you get older, there are more obstacles to hanging out. And yet we also create these physical obstacles.

[Raina Cohen]

The specific obstacle that I feel ashamed about is my husband and I were, like, thinking very seriously about moving in with a couple of our close friends. And at first we talked about buying a home and realized that that was just not going to be feasible given the timeline of when our friends were going to move to D.C. from where they had been in Massachusetts. And I was like, well, you know, if we can't buy and we have to rent, is that really a good. You know, you and I, we really, we, like, we want to be able to save for a down payment. This will slow down the process because, you know, we won't have as cheap of an apartment. We had a really good deal on this one bedroom. And he was like, do we actually care about buying? Is that important to us? Like, what do we value here? And it was immediately clear, like, oh, okay. Community is this thing that we've been talking about that we value or our friends. And I had just put this, the idea of buying a home, this kind of adult stepping stone in front of a value that that was the one thing that stood in the way. And I can go on and on about living, you know, with or near friends I'm currently in the process with. There are a group of us who are trying to buy property together and we'll have some people like living even more people living in my house at the moment to start testing out. Do we actually want to be in such close proximity for the long haul? And for me, I love coming home to having more people in the house who are playing piano and can run and spontaneously sing some songs with or coming home after a long day and having my housemate having cooked a meal. I wish the structures around it were easier. We're kind of having to figure out a lot of things as we go. I think the trade that you make is that you put a lot of work in the front end to get the support and the ease in friendship on the back end. But you have to coordinate with more people to find the right kind of house, for instance, or the right neighborhood or so on. But then it means that you are able to have these spontaneous interactions and you don't have to schedule three weeks out. A one hour coffee with somebody and then you won't see them for three more months because you can't fit them into your schedule.

[Chris Duffy]

I think that regardless of what's the primary relationship in your life, people often experience real, true, deep heartbreak when they lose a friend. Whether that's someone passing away or whether that's a friendship falling apart. And yet once again, there's not really a structure for like friend loss, the same way that there is a structure for a breakup with a romantic partner or for the loss of a spouse. Can you talk to us about what you can do if you're in that situation where you lose someone who's really important, but you feel like other people just don't get it?

[Raina Cohen]

The first thing I want to say is that you are not alone in this. I've come to expect now when I give do any kind of book related event, that someone will come up to me afterward and will cry because they will tell me about a friendship that they lost because of a falling out or the person passed away. And the sense of isolation that people feel because nobody took them seriously adds this. This extra layer of suffering that I think is completely unnecessary and is really imposed by our society not treating this form of grief as legitimate I mean, there's. And there's a term for this. It's called disenfranchised grief. That, like, there are some forms of grieving that we. That we do not recognize as legitimate. If someone is suffering because a friend is gone from their life, that should be a really clear indication of how much the friendship meant to them. Not that they are making too big of a deal of it. I think as a society, we're probably, you know, we're pretty uncomfortable with grief in general, but there's a dismissal of platonic relationships that you should just, you know, it's just not that big of a deal. But the proof is in the pain, that it is a big deal. The most recent encounter I had just a few days ago, where a woman came up to me crying, probably in her 40s, maybe 50s, and said that she felt like she had had a divorce with her friend and that it was devastating and that nobody understood it. And she and her friend have since reconciled. But that is the kind of thing that people have to sort through. So I think, to the extent possible, removing any judgment of yourself for the pain is maybe the best advice that I can offer.

[Chris Duffy]

When you lose a friend, because it's more on the breakup or the relationship part rather than that they've died or passed away, and that's the reason for losing them. When you lose a friend, there's this weird gray area where it's like they could float back in, right? Like they could float back in, and maybe it will just be like it was because we don't have as clear lines. And I think in some ways that can make it harder because you're like, am I grieving something that will return before I'm even done grieving, or is it gone forever? And it's so much harder to know, I think, than when you are in a romantic breakup.

[Raina Cohen]

We also just don't have really good concepts or language for this. I mean, I've thought about leveling down in friendships or transitions, but the kinds of ways that we think about loss are really about categorical shifts. Like, somebody was your partner and now they aren't, or somebody was alive and now they're dead. This kind of gray area is a lot messier, I will say. Like, I have dealt with the gray area, and I. And I found it really hard both to talk about because it felt like, well, maybe am I making too much of this? Because it's not like we're not friends anymore. It's just we are less close than we were, but there is a kind of loss to grapple with. But also it's not like, okay, this person's gone from my life and now I come up with some story about how they were, you know, we were never a good fit or they were a terrible person. It's like you're having to then rework, like, who are you to each other? Which means potentially ongoing conversations. And each of those ongoing, each of those new conversations can itself be a reminder of the gap between where you were and where you are now. And that can create more pain, but ultimately be worth it because you still want to be in each other's lives just in a different way. And I just think that there's much more kind of improvisation that has to happen and really open communication when you're not just kind of slamming a door or have a kind of black and white on off switch to the friendship.

[Chris Duffy]

We're going to take a quick break, but we will be right back after this.

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[Raina Cohen]

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[Chris Duffy]

And we are back okay, Reina, in a world where it feels like there is an increasingly wide social and political and ideological divide, do you have any advice for people to navigate friendships where maybe the day to day feels totally fine, but there's also this big weight of the broader political or ideological differences that two people might have?

[Raina Cohen]

I have struggled with this, I think partly because I really like my friends to be friends with one another. And one of the ways that kind of political differences can play in can be like if people have views that feel like they would cut, they would be really in conflict. Even in everyday life, if you're spending time in smaller groups or one on one doing activities together, or spending time doing kind of making memories in a way that don't poke at the things that are, that are different. It's like a gift to be close to people who are different from you. You know, I lived for three years with friends who are very religious. I learned a ton from them and love having a different perspective. I don't know that there was sort of like conflict over that per se, but I think instead of, to the extent possible, viewing the differences as something that isn't a liability, but a way that you can help sharpen each other's thinking and open your minds and to just approach the relationship with as much curiosity as possible. Especially in a time where people really kind of operate in their silos and it just feels like actually something to cherish and nurture. If you do have relationships with people who, who are pretty different from you.

[Chris Duffy]

If you could give people three tips or actions that they should do to nurture and strengthen their friendships and non romantic relationships, what would you tell them to do?

[Raina Cohen]

One is make a routine. Like if you have a friend that you want to see more, don't make it so that you have to plan every single activity. So I have a friend where Thursday mornings we go on a run together and we joke that it's our free therapy session and sometimes we have to reschedule it. But the kind of standing event really makes a difference. The second is to rethink the idea that friendship is something that you kind of stuff into the rest of your life. Like the image that comes to mind for me is like when I'm packing a suitcase and I put the shoes in first and that, that's, you know, that's the romantic relationship or your work or your marriage. And then the friends are like the extra pairs of socks that you fit in wherever you can. Like to not treat friendship as this, this sort of added thing. If you can fit it in and to consider it as something that is actually going to be an anchor or the central part of your life. And one way to do that is really to think about how is the architecture of your life set up. Friendship can be a lot easier if you are in close proximity to people. And that opens up a whole process of how do you find your way to living in close proximity to friends. But certainly one thing is when you're deciding where to live, consider friends, like consider friends as part of it. I think for, you know, a lot of people it is about a commute or maybe being, you know, being near family or there. There are other kinds of factors, but treating friendship as something maybe worth making trade offs for, I think it can make life more, more meaningful. It allows for more spontaneous interactions. We are social animals. We need people like let's build our lives around them or at least consider that as an important factor. And the third thing is something that's just maybe on my mind right now about not expecting people to always come to you when they need something and not necessarily expecting that people are always going to accept your offer when you offer something and trying to make abundantly clear that you will be there to support them. And like a conversation I had this week was with a friend who had mentioned that she has been really down a couple weeks ago. And I spent time with her and I had absolutely not noticed that because she's good at covering it up. And we talked about, you know, when she mentioned that, I was like, well, how, how can I notice this in the future? You know, rather than waiting for her to tell me a week after she's had a really low point. And I borrowed a kind of method from somebody else I know, which is that she would send like a specific emoji that meant that things were not going well to her close friends as a way of indicating, you know, I need some support. I can't really, I don't really have the, the mental or emotional space to explain it. And I think that it's an example of like friends kind of coming up with solutions for their friends. You know, once you've seen something happen once to try to get ahead of it. And that I think for so many people it's really hard to ask for help. It's really, really, really hard to ask friends for help because we have these ideas that we shouldn't depend on them so much. So trying to get ahead of it. And in the end I think you'll get it back to you once you, you model it for the people in your life. Two other things. One is to not operate from a place where you are assuming you are a burden. As people in places like the US get older, make more money, we farm out our like the things that we need. We pay like we pay for people to move our stuff. We pay for people to paint our walls. Instead of asking people around us, we, we pay for, for strangers to do it. The, the office that I'm in right now, I had two people help like two friends of mine help me paint it and like hang up this art piece that I'd had for years finally behind me. And they were thrilled to be able to do it. So it brings you closer to people and I think, yeah, if you're questioning it, draw on your own experience. When's the last time someone has asked you to do a favor and did you resent them or did it actually feel like it was an opportunity to get closer? And then the way that so many people as adults operate in their friendships is that they are doing the catch up. So they are going for a meal or something and then they're summarizing their lives over the last few weeks or months to each other, which is so different from, you know, when we were younger. We're probably making memories with our friends. We are, you know, going on little adventures even like in the woods or just scheming together. And adult scheming might mean painting your office walls like that is the most fun thing you have. But you know, when you get covered in paint and you listen to some Lizzo while you're doing it or there are ways that even doing the most mundane things can become these really wonderful experiences that you remember. But if the conversation is all about catching up and summarizing your life, it's not gonna deepen the friendship in a way that doing things together that you're going to remember Will.

[Chris Duffy]

I never thought about it that way. I think, yeah, you just really shifted something for me in the idea of it's really fun to be scheming as adults. We need that more scheme. I need more scheming in my life. I think that's right.

[Raina Cohen]

You know, sorry. Now I'm like, I had an idea for the other thing. We celebrate romantic relationships. We don't really celebrate friendships. People I know have like a. They celebrate the anniversary of their friendship or they have, they do things to commemorate the friendship that is also like a mark of really close friends. This woman and her friends, they had, yeah, they had rituals, they had a secret language. They like had these notebooks that they wrote in every day that they filled. They would do. They had these, like, basically, like, holidays that they made together and, like, artwork that they would make. I mean, it was. It was very elaborate. And she just felt that adult friendship was not doing it for her because, like, everything felt so stale and just like, you're having a conversation over dinner, and it was just so different from what it was like in childhood for her.

[Chris Duffy]

Okay, so the one thing I wanted to ask you about is we haven't really talked at all about the way that attraction or, like, a sexual relationship, or even the possibility of a sexual relationship can sometimes change the tenor of a friendship. Something that I've always kind of thought is like, an interesting, funny, little strange thing is how people complain. Like, oh, I just got friend zoned. And I'm like, it's so hard to make friends. That's a great thing. Like, you got friend zoned. Okay, maybe you're not dating that person, but, like, it's a good thing that you made a friend now. And yet I think there is this tension of, like, friend isn't as good as the other. What happens when you have a relationship? And there's this question of whether it would cross the boundary and become a romantic or sexual relationship as well.

[Raina Cohen]

I've seen people navigate this, and I think the one thing that I would encourage people to ask themselves is what is driving me toward the romantic version of this relationship? I have seen cases where friends are extremely close, and one of them is like, well, I love you, so this should be a romantic relationship, right? Like, that is the highest expression of what love for another person looks like. And I have seen friendships absolutely dissolve over that because somebody can't put up with the possibility of, you know, being rejected romantically. Is the desire for a romantic relationship because you actually want to be in a romantic relationship with this person, or because there is an idea that friendship is lesser, and therefore, the. The way to fast track closeness is to be romantically involved with somebody. There are different forms of attraction, and romantic and sexual attraction are not the only kinds. Like, you can be really drawn to somebody. There are. There are studies on, like, a lot of people have experienced forms of attraction that have nothing to do with sexual desire. And it. So it helps to know that, like, if you are really into somebody, you could. There are different ways for that to be true. But if you do, you know, end up pursuing a romantic relationship. And a lot of romantic relationships come. Come from being friends, I think trying to. To not feel like There has to be an on, off switch that if it. If it turns out that the romantic relationship is not kind of the best way to do things, sort of talk on the front end about how you guys can be open minded about how do you change the terms of. Of the relationship.

[Chris Duffy]

You call this in the book a pre mortem. I think that's a really great idea. Like, before it ends, what would end it? And so we can talk about what would end it and how do we want it to end when it does end.

[Raina Cohen]

Some of the things people most hate is having to imagine bad outcomes. So we like to say, like, everything's going to work out great. But if you are forced with this question to say, like, imagine a year from now, we decide the romantic relationship isn't for us. What are the three most likely reasons, you know, what are the things that might lead to this not working out? And then you could potentially address them ahead of time to prevent them. And then in addition to that, it's like, okay, if it doesn't work out and we can't, you know, we can't do anything to prevent it, like, what do we want our relationship to look like? And it doesn't. You know, you might feel very differently on the other side of it, but I just, I think particularly in heterosexual relationships, romantic relationships, there's this very, you know, strict idea that you're not supposed to be friends with your exes. So to enter a romantic relationship feels like you're really, really risking something. And I think, you know, in the queer community, there's just much. It's just much more common because you can't hate all your exes because you're gonna run into them, like, at, you know, your friend's party. So I think also taking a bit of a cue from the queer community and how this kind of toggling between romance and friendship actually is really okay and possible. Mm.

[Chris Duffy]

Raina, that is such a perfect note for us to end on. We need to think really deeply about what shape of a relationship is going to work for us and then put in the time and the energy and the effort to make sure that we pursue that. Thank you for being here. Thanks for making the time to be on the show. Thank you for your book. The other significant others. I really appreciate the work you do.

[Raina Cohen]

It's been so nice to talk to you and yeah, really just appreciate all the care that you and the people behind the scenes have put into the questions here.

[Chris Duffy]

That is it for this episode of how to be a better human. Thank you so much to today's guest for Raina Cohen. Her book is the Other Significant Others. I am your host Chris Duffy and you can find more from me, including my weekly newsletter and other [e-mail] how to be a Better Human is put together by a team of others who are all significant to me. On the TED side we've got the platonic ideal of Daniela Valorezzo, Banban Cheng, Michelle Quint, Chloe Shasha Brooks, Valentina Bohanini, Lainey Lot Tangsika, Sungma Nivong, Antonia Ley and Joseph de Bruyne. This episode was fact checked by Julia Dickerson and Mattea Salas who cut everyone out of their lives who exaggerates statistics who exaggerates statistics and sadly that includes me. On the PRX side, they are the gold standard of friendship. Morgan Flannery, Norgill, Pedro Rafael Rosado, Patrick Grant and Jocelyn Gonzales. Thanks again to you for listening. This show would be extremely insignificant if it was not for your support. So share this episode with someone in your life who you care about. Someone who you think would enjoy it. We would love and appreciate that so much. We will be back next week with even more how to Be a Better Human. Until then, take care and thanks again for listening.

[Elise Hu]

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[Chris Duffy]

I'm just helping us catch people's attention.

[Raina Cohen]

This is a great deal.

[Elise Hu]

Exactly. So it doesn't need all that.

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[Elise Hu]

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[Chris Duffy]

Visit your nearest Boost mobile store for full offer details. Apple Intelligence requires iOS 18.1 or later. Restrictions apply.

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[Raina Cohen]

The snack wrap is back.

[Elise Hu]

This episode of Giggly Squad is brought.

[Raina Cohen]

To you by McDonald's and I'm so excited to tell you that the snack wrap featuring juicy white meat, chicken, shredded.

[Elise Hu]

Lettuce, melty cheese, creamy ranch.

[Raina Cohen]

Sorry, I'm drooling on the microphone right now.

[Elise Hu]

All wrapped in a soft tortilla is.

[Raina Cohen]

Back on the menu. They have it in ranch or spicy.

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[Raina Cohen]

Wrap that broke the Internet at a McDonald's near you.