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Diversify Your Friendship Portfolio

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I’ve got about 3 minutes to explain to you what the title, Diversify Your Friendship Portfolio means!  Ready!  Set!  Go!

This sounds like it has more financial implications than anything, but hear me out.  Most financial advisors recommend investors to diversify their portfolios.  In other words, as my grandparents would say, “don’t place all your eggs in one basket”!  Because, what happens if you stumble and fall and you drop your basket filled with eggs?  Well, all of your eggs crack open, are destroyed, and you can’t have a fried egg sandwich, or egg salad, or deviled eggs, or…you catch my drift.

So, gurus of finance recommend that individuals invest their valuable funds in a variety of different types of investments, commonly referred to as a portfolio.  Thus, the importance of having a diversified portfolio!  If all of your investments are in the technology market, and the technology market suffers a devastating crash (like what happened in the early 2000s), then you lose all of your gains.  However, with a diversified portfolio, and only 25% of your funds are invested in technology, you stand to only suffer a 25% loss.  At least in theory.

So, what I have tried to explain to my 13 year olds, and 9 year old, is that we are better off to not just have one “best friend”.  Okay, I lost some of you right there.  Bear with me, hear me out.  I do agree that there is something about having close, friendships, but why invest in only one or two individuals?  My suggestion is to invest in a variety of friendships, who are all unique in their own way.  Befriend as many people as you can, that way you’re never without friends.

I’ve tried to teach my children, that by diversifying their friendship portfolio, if that one and only best friend isn’t at school that day, then it’s no big deal, because you have multiple other friendship options!  No one likes to be alone.  No one likes to eat at the lunch table all by themselves.  So, the solution?  Befriend as many people as possible, so that your friendship market won’t crash!  

Finally, when it comes to best friends I try to discourage my three wonderful kids from only having a best friend.  Often times, a best friend can hijack a relationship, therefore rendering it unhealthy, to say the least!  If you’re like me, and you want the best for your children, and for those you love, suggest having multiple healthy friendships and relationships.

Just to be clear, I have a lot of friends!  Just about anywhere I travel, there’s a good chance I will run into someone I know!  I love this!  It makes life fun and interesting.  Of course, when I run into a friend at Disney World, while I’m on vacation with my family, and they’re on vacation with their family, I don’t count on that friendship to help me navigate through the difficult seasons of life.  I do reserve those moments for my close, inner circle of friends that know me better than anyone else.  So, one best friend?  Probably not.  But several close friends?  Yes.  And a lot of other wonderful friends?  Absolutely.

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