Friendships, Narcissism Recovery, and…Aristotle?

If you’ve been in narcissism recovery for a little while, chances are good you’ve noticed your relationships changing. You may find some of your friends and family members challenging to be around. Your friends or family may be pulling away from you. You may be experiencing both dynamics!

Relationships are an important topic to consider in narcissism recovery, because as you heal from narcissistic abuse, it changes you. You won’t be comfortable in one-way relationships, where you do all the giving, and the other person does all the taking.

In addition, you’ll get better at setting boundaries and enforcing them. You won’t automatically accept everything everyone tells you. You won’t automatically do anything that’s asked of you. And you won’t tolerate behavior that leaves you feeling uncomfortable.

Not surprisingly, it’s likely your friendships will change, too. Clients often come in to session feeling sad, hurt, lonely, and guilty, because they no longer enjoy spending time with friends they’ve had for years, or even decades. Many clients reduce contact with family members, and some decide to go no contact with their parents, siblings, and extended family. Clients wonder how—or if—they’ll make new friends, and worry about grieving the loss of close relationships with family members and old friends.

In particular, clients worry they’ll never find a “best friend.” This is especially challenging for people who notice that, as they become more emotionally healthy, they have a BFF that they’re spending less time with, or no longer comfortable being friends with. And sometimes clients worry that there’s something wrong with them, because they are making new friends, but not a new “best friend.”

It’s true that most people turn to their close relationships during stressful events. That said, it’s more harmful to your health and happiness to be in an unhealthy close relationship, just so you have someone during stressful times. (And if the person you’re close to has strong narcissistic tendencies, they’re probably not there for you when you’re struggling.)

Fortunately, research on both happiness and loneliness suggests that while having close relationships supports your physical and emotional health, multiple daily positive interactions with other people, even strangers, have a positive impact. These interactions can be as brief as saying hello to a stranger at the gas station, chatting briefly with the cashier at the grocery store, or texting with a friend to say hello.

This makes sense, because every pleasant interaction you have is an opportunity to feel seen, heard, and appreciated, regardless of the length of the conversation, or whether you know the other person or not. Those positive interactions recalibrate your emotional brain, helping you feel calmer, more optimistic, and happier.

Obviously, if you have many friends, having many daily positive interactions is much easier. You might not interact with all of them every day, but if you have several positive interactions with three or four of your friends, then have several positive interactions with several strangers, co-workers, etc., it’s easy to enjoy many positive interactions a day.

The topic of friendship, and whether or not different types of friendships are worthwhile, is hardly a new one, or one limited to narcissism recovery. The ancient philosopher Aristotle was writing about friendship all the way back in 350 BCE, in his brief treatise titled Nicomachean Ethics.

Aristotle appreciated the notion of a BFF, ride-or-die type of friendship, which he described as a friendship grounded in virtue—that is, both people are good, and they are good to one another, no matter how uncomfortable the challenges that arise in the relationship might be.

However, he acknowledged that other types of friendships exist. The second kind of relationship Aristotle described is the friendship based on pleasure. This relationship is similar to a virtue friendship, in that both people are good to one another. The difference is that in this friendship, the expectation that you’ll always support one another isn’t present. Examples would be the friend you go out with to see concerts or movies together, or meet up with to discuss your favorite topic or hobby. The intent behind the relationship is to enjoy one another’s company.

Finally, Aristotle wrote that some friendships are grounded in utility. These are friendships in which you both find usefulness in the relationship, often because you’re brought together to accomplish a particular task. Classes and workplaces are common places to make this sort of friend. Generally speaking, these friendships end (unless they deepen into another type of friendship) when the goal is accomplished (i.e., the class ends, one of you leaves the job).

How is this relevant to you now? Aristotle’s contemplations can help you in two ways. First, blending his writing with modern research on happiness and loneliness clarifies the importance of friendships based on virtue—and the importance of friendships based on pleasure or utility.

Obviously, friendships based on virtue are beneficial for your emotional and physical health. But friendships based on pleasure or utility are also opportunities to enjoy someone else’s company (and experience them enjoying your company, as well), which provides that emotional recalibration humans need for happiness. And as Aristotle acknowledged, while virtue-based friendships are ideal, they take time to develop, and “a wish for a [virtue] friendship may arise quickly, but a [virtue] friendship does not.”

Second, Aristotle’s descriptions of types of friends clarifies that virtue friendships begin as pleasure or utility friendships, then gradually develop into virtue friendships. This makes it easier to explore how you can increase your friend circle.

Instead of focusing on a virtue friendship, it makes more sense to seek out and appreciate pleasure and utility friendship. Then, as we’ve discussed with dating, reality test the friendship, and over time, see if it develops into a virtue relationship. Whether it does or not, you'll still reap the benefits of spending time with someone you enjoy!

If you’re interested in seeking out a pleasure or utility friendship, ask yourself what your values, interests, and hobbies are, or what interests and hobbies you’d like to develop. Get involved with activities and organizations that share your values. Take classes or lessons in activities or topics you enjoy, where you’re likely to meet people with whom you share interests.

Some opportunities, like volunteering for organizations involved in conservation, basic needs like food and shelter, or your local animal sanctuary, are ways to meet people who might share your values—and you’ll immediately have the opportunity to strike up a utility friendship, where you’re working together toward a common goal. Other opportunities, like taking a workout class or signing up to learn a foreign language, may not put you in the same room with people with whom you share the same values. But you will get the opportunity to meet people with whom you can share a common goal.

If the idea of having more friends sounds terrific, but brings up too much discomfort to follow through on doing so, I encourage you to work with a therapist who can help you explore your thoughts and feelings about friendships. If you’re in narcissism recovery, learning to trust yourself and others takes time, and you may benefit from additional support as you do so. You deserve a lifetime of health and happiness—and friendships are a part of that equation!

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