How do some people manage to juggle so many friends?

[MitzyMook]

And keep loads on the backburner just to be picked up occasionally? These friends on the backburner practically fall over themselves to spend time with them?

If I don't make an effort with friends and see them regularly then I would have precisely zero friends. I definitely couldn't get away with picking friends up and dropping them then picking them up again, with them waiting keenly for me to next see them.

Someone that I know seems to do this all the time. She is always tagging different people on Facebook as she is out with them or spending time with them, and seems to move from best friend to best friend yet all of the 'dumped' friends are all still eager to see her whenever she decides to fit them in.

I am probably not a very liked or popular person, which I suppose is why I couldn't get away with this kind of thing, but it's just a bit galling that some people can get away with this?

Like Vegan I have a very large circle of friends from different aspects of my life - some from nursery school {grin} (we are now in our late 50s!!), primary school, secondary school, university, different work locations, mother & toddler groups, different schools, different communities, Church, voluntary groups - we move a lot. Some I don't see for a couple of years or even more but I don't consider I am 'dumping' them in between meeting up.

But I don't do Facebook, I think half these issues are because people are over obsessed with Facebook and posting pictures of what they are doing etc etc. As someone else said, 'when I am with friends, I am with friends'.

You do sound a little 'needy' in what you expect from a friendship, I have met plenty of people like that over the years - almost wanting an 'exclusive' friendship.

I've had this thought now and then.

I reckon some people are just really brilliant at convening fun wider social occasions, and put quite a bit in to fairly trivial social exchanges that keep things going. Others (like me) focus on people they are close to.

It's also worth saying that some people just happen to operate in an environment with a lot of 'mini communities' - university friends, nursery, , church, school - whereas others don't. If you are part of these communities there are more 'go out in a group' chances with less effort. I have a very strong network of uni friends for instance but my school friends are scattered and are not a group at all.

Social media can be very misleading. I'm a 'turn to in crisis' type friend and some of my friends are prolific social users - last year I had a patch where two close friends were weeping on me personally about marriage crises whilst posting loads of 'me and DH drinking champagne in the Ritz' type pics. So don't believe a word of it.

Fundamentally, you need to concentrate on what you actually are rather than who you feel you ought to be. Personally, a couple of my friends live whirlwind social lives that me make me think I'm the least popular person EVER and need to be more sociable, but actually the real issue for me is that I don't put enough time and effort into a couple of my very dearest friends who live a long way away - mainly because of my young kids and hectic job.

And stop focussing in other people and what they're doing.

Focus on YOU. What do you want? How are you going to get it?

Paying attention to what other people are doing and comparing them to yourself is just a disaster in self esteem. Do yourself a favour and stop if. It achieves and proves nothing.