It’s impossible to overstate how much the people we’re close with affect us. I tweeted recently that “romantic relationships/best friends/therapists are critical for the same reason, where this person can become the primary person who explains you to you, the supplement to your internal monologue, and can rewire your understanding of yourself for way better or for way worse.” I know this for sure because I’ve lived it. We all know this is true in the romantic sense—good partners can make us way better people, and a bad person can make you way worse. But I think friends affect us to an even larger degree, because in your 20s many relationships only last for a year or two, whereas I have friends who I’ve seen regularly for almost 10 years at this point. I’ve talked to them at length about crushes, boyfriends, friend disputes, work anxieties, dreams, books. And in return I’ve listened to them talk about all the things on their minds, major and minor. Every job I’ve had I’ve pretty much gotten through a friend. Every person I’ve ever dated has been a friend of a friend.