This week, I found myself scrolling through old photos—a digital archaeology of friendships past. There I was at university, arms draped around people whose names I’ve forgotten. Wedding photos with couples I haven’t spoken to in years. Group shots from film sets in LA, beach gatherings in South Africa, dinner parties in Caracas—a trail of connections that once felt essential, now dissolved into polite social media likes.

The ache surprised me. Not grief, but a quieter wondering about why friendships fade: What happened to all these people who once knew me so well?

Then I found a photo of Marcus, my university mate from nearly three decades ago. We have almost nothing in common. He’s in finance, living a conventional suburban life. I teach heart leadership, constantly moving between countries. Our worlds couldn’t be more different. Yet when we talk every few weeks, something immediate and alive sparks between us. The conversation picks up as if no time has passed.

What makes certain friendships endure across decades and continents while others—seemingly stronger ones—fade within months of a job change or a move? This question has haunted me through my own journey of perpetual relocation. Each move brought beautiful new connections. Each departure left friendships behind that I believed would last forever.

Recently, a viral conversation between Mel Robbins and Jay Shetty offered an answer. They outlined the “three pillars of adult friendship”: proximity, timing, and energy. The framework is compelling and explains much about why adult friendships are so challenging to maintain.

But as I sat with their insights, I realized something: these pillars explain why friendships form and why they fade. They don’t explain the mystery of bonds like mine with Marcus—connections that defy every logical reason to dissolve yet remain vibrantly alive.

There’s something deeper operating beneath the surface of our connections. Something the research can’t quite capture. And in this week’s article, I’d like to share with you what that is.

The Hidden Truth About Why Friendships Fade (And the Deeper Forces That Make Them Last)

The Surface Level: What Science Tells Us

Let me first honor what Robbins and Shetty got right, because their framework illuminates important truths about how human bonds work at the practical level.

Pillar One: Proximity

We become friends with people we’re physically near. Studies of college dorm assignments show that students are far more likely to become close friends with hallmates than with people on different floors—not because of mystical compatibility, but simply because they bump into each other more often.

As adults, proximity becomes scarce. Remote work scatters us. Career moves relocate us. The natural gathering places of youth—classrooms, dorms, neighborhood playgrounds—disappear.

Pillar Two: Timing

We connect most easily with people navigating similar life stages. The exhausted new parents bonding over sleep deprivation. The recent divorcees who understand each other’s grief without explanation.

But life stages shift. One friend has kids while the other remains child-free. One pivots careers while another climbs the corporate ladder. Suddenly, the shared reference points disappear. “Let’s catch up soon” becomes a phrase that means “I care about you but no longer know how to be present in your world.”

Pillar Three: Energy

The third pillar refers to shared interests and values—the effortless flow when you bond over hiking, or cooking, or debating ideas until 3am. Without this common wavelength, even proximity and timing struggle to sustain connection.

These three pillars explain the natural ebb and flow of adult friendship. They’re why research shows that moving from acquaintance to close friend requires around 200 hours of quality time—time that adults simply don’t have in abundance.

But here’s what’s been nagging at me: these pillars operate at the level of circumstance and compatibility. They explain the mechanics of friendship formation. What they can’t explain is why some friendships transcend these limitations entirely.

What the Research Can’t Measure

Marcus and I share no proximity—we live on different continents. Our timing is completely misaligned. Our energy, by conventional measures, shouldn’t match. Yet the bond remains vital and essential.

Or consider the opposite: that childhood friend you reconnect with at a reunion. By all measures, you should click—you share history, proximity once created deep familiarity. Yet within twenty minutes, you realize you have nothing to say beyond “remember when…” The energy feels hollow.

Here’s what’s happening:

Your brain has been selectively storing memories, filtering out the mundane and preserving only the highlights. When you think about this person, you’re viewing them through a nostalgic lens—an idealized version of who they were. But nostalgia isn’t memory; it’s edited memory.

When you actually reconnect, you’re meeting who they are now. And more importantly, you’re discovering that you’re not the same person either. The glue that once held you together no longer exists.

What creates this difference? What invisible force determines which friendships survive the dissolution of all three practical pillars?

The mystics and poets have always known the answer, even if researchers struggle to quantify it.

The Heart Level: What the Soul Knows

Before we explore these deeper pillars, I want to share a perspective that has profoundly shaped my understanding.

David Hawkins taught that the world exists for two primary purposes: the evolution of consciousness and the accumulation of karmic merit. If this is true, then this is exactly why our relationships exist. Every person who enters your life is participating in the evolution of your consciousness.

The ones who trigger your deepest wounds are showing you what still needs healing. The ones who break your heart open are teaching you forgiveness. The ones who inspire you are reflecting back your own potential. Even the difficult relationships serve this sacred purpose.

The Ubuntu philosophy captures this beautifully: I am because you are. We discover who we are through the mirror of relationship. Every connection is an opportunity to know yourself more fully.

This is the foundation. When you understand that relationships exist primarily for consciousness evolution, the pillars take on deeper meaning. They’re not just about companionship—they’re about soul-level growth.

In my years of studying heart intelligence, I’ve come to understand that beneath the visible pillars, there are three deeper foundations operating at the level of heart and soul. These determine which bonds truly endure:

Pillar Four: Emotional Connectivity

This is that immediate sense of recognition when you meet certain people—a feeling of “Oh, there you are.” As if some part of you has been waiting for this connection.

Rumi wrote, “Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere. They’re in each other all along.” This truth applies to all soul-level connections. Some people don’t feel new. They feel like a remembering.

This isn’t mystical romanticism—it’s pointing to something real about energetic resonance. You might meet someone and within one conversation feel more seen than with people you’ve known for years. There’s an emotional transparency, a permission to be fully yourself.

These connections often carry a quality of mirroring. The person reflects back aspects of yourself you needed to see—sometimes your light, sometimes your shadows. A Course in Miracles teaches that every relationship is a “special assignment.” When you experience this connectivity, you’re being shown something about yourself that you couldn’t discover alone.

Compare this to surface-level friendships where you can spend years together without ever really being seen. These relationships rarely survive major life transitions because there’s no deeper tether holding them.

Pillar Five: Consciousness Alignment

This goes beyond emotional connection to something even more subtle: the level of awareness you’re each operating from, and the direction you’re growing toward.

Eckhart Tolle teaches that relationships exist to wake us up. When two people are both committed to that awakening—to greater awareness, deeper truth—there’s an alignment that transcends circumstances.

You might describe this as vibrational resonance. You’re both tuned to a similar frequency, even if you’re expressing it differently. One through art, another through service, another through spiritual practice—but there’s a shared quality of seeking, of refusing to settle for unconscious living.

This is why Marcus and I remain connected. We’re both committed to growth, to truth, to living with intention. When we talk, we’re exploring the edges of our understanding together.

I notice this alignment—or its absence—immediately. Some people, no matter how lovely, are simply not interested in examining their lives deeply. There’s no resonance with someone who’s constantly questioning and evolving.

When consciousness alignment is present, friendships can survive radical differences in lifestyle, belief systems, even values. You’re both dedicated to the same underlying journey—waking up—even if your paths look completely different.

Pillar Six: Shared Mission or Purpose

This is perhaps the most powerful force in sustaining long-term connection: alignment around a calling or mission that transcends personal circumstances.

Not shared hobbies. Shared mission.

After decades of making and releasing friendships across continents, I’ve noticed that the bonds which endure longest are anchored in this dimension. There’s an underlying thread of shared purpose that keeps the connection alive even when everything else shifts.

Perhaps you’re both committed to creative expression, or to justice, or to healing. The specific mission matters less than the fact that you’re both in service to something larger than yourselves.

Think about the friendships in your own life that have survived everything. If you look closely, you’ll likely find this thread. You don’t need weekly coffee dates to stay connected when you’re both moving toward the same North Star.

This is why I can maintain a deep connection with people I rarely see in person but feel distant from neighbors I interact with weekly. The frequency of contact matters far less than the depth of alignment at the level of purpose.

How the Two Levels Work Together

So we have six pillars operating across two distinct levels:

The Surface Level (explains formation and opportunity):

• Proximity
• Timing
• Energy (shared interests)

The Heart/Soul Level (explains endurance and depth):

• Emotional Connectivity
• Consciousness Alignment
• Shared Mission/Purpose

Both levels are real. Both matter.

The surface pillars create the conditions for friendship to form. They provide the container, the opportunity, the initial spark.

But the heart-level pillars determine what endures beyond those initial conditions. They’re what allow certain bonds to survive the dissolution of every practical support.

Think of it this way:

The surface pillars are like the weather conditions needed for a seed to sprout. But whether that seed grows into a mighty tree that withstands decades of storms? That depends on the essence of the seed itself—the deeper DNA, the soul-level purpose.

A friendship might begin because you live next door, are both navigating new parenthood, and enjoy the same Netflix shows. But whether it survives one of you moving across the country depends entirely on whether there’s emotional connectivity, consciousness alignment, and shared mission beneath those surface similarities.

The Mysterious Seventh Pillar

And then there are those inexplicable connections—the ones that make absolutely no sense by any of these six measures yet persist with mysterious insistence.

The acquaintance who keeps showing up at pivotal moments. The person you met once who somehow remains present in your awareness. The friendship that defies every pillar yet refuses to dissolve.

Perhaps these are assignments only your soul and God fully understand. I’ve learned to simply bow to these mysteries with gratitude, trusting there’s a reason even when I can’t see it.

When Friendships Complete Their Purpose

Understanding these levels brings relief and clarity: not every friendship is meant to last forever, and that’s not a failure—it’s grace.

From the perspective of consciousness evolution, every relationship enters your life with a specific assignment. Some are brief—a single conversation that shifts your perspective. Others span years, working through layers of healing or growth.

That work friend who felt like a soulmate during a challenging project but drifted away afterward? Perhaps the assignment was to support each other through that specific trial. The emotional connectivity was real but temporary. Its work is complete.

The childhood friend who now feels like a stranger? Maybe their role was to witness and hold you during your formation years. That sacred function is complete.

The relationship that ended in heartbreak? Perhaps it was designed to break your heart open in exactly the way needed for your evolution.

This doesn’t diminish what those friendships meant. It honors them. As Tolle reminds us, relationships exist to wake us up. Some wake us through their presence, others through their absence.

There’s a beautiful teaching here:

Every relationship that enters your life is a teacher arriving exactly when you need the lesson. And when the lesson is complete, clinging to the form of the relationship out of nostalgia prevents new teachers—new connections aligned with your current growth—from entering.

The invitation isn’t to become callous. It’s to recognize the natural rhythms of connection and release with compassion. To honor what was without demanding it remain what it can no longer be.

Some friendships are meant to be lifelong companions. Others are intense but brief catalysts. Still others are seasonal guides. All are sacred. All serve purpose. Not all are meant to last forever.

What This Means for How We Connect

Understanding these six pillars changes how we approach all of our relationships.

It invites us to ask different questions:

• Instead of “How do I make this friendship last?” we might ask “What is this relationship here to teach me?”
• Instead of “Why did this friendship fade?” we might wonder “What purpose did this connection serve?”
• Instead of “How do I find more friends?” we could ask “What is my mission, and who else is aligned with that calling?”

This shifts us from a consumer mentality about relationships to a more sacred understanding. Every person is a mirror, a teacher, a catalyst.

Your heart’s inner wisdom already knows the difference. You can feel it—the expansive rightness of certain connections, the subtle contraction of others that have completed their purpose. The key is learning to trust that knowing.

So yes, if you want to cultivate friendships, honor the practical pillars. Make time for connection. Seek out people in similar life stages. Cultivate shared interests.

But also pay attention to the deeper currents. Notice which connections feel effortless despite distance. Which friendships leave you feeling more yourself, more awake. These are the relationships worth investing in even when the surface pillars crumble.

When you align yourself with your deepest purpose, the right people begin appearing almost magnetically. These aren’t just friendships. They’re soul alliances, or as I like to call them, ‘mission mates’.

A Personal Reflection

As I sit here in Spain, five years into building yet another new life, I find myself less concerned with maintaining a large circle and more interested in cultivating a few deep connections with people who share not just my interests but my purpose.

I’m less willing to spend energy on relationships that no longer serve mutual growth, and more committed to honoring the bonds—however scattered—that continue to awaken something essential in me.

This isn’t about being selective. It’s about being honest with yourself. Our time and energy are finite, and every yes to one connection is a no to another. Let that sink in.

The world doesn’t need you to maintain every friendship you’ve ever formed. It needs you to be fully present with the connections that matter most—the ones that call forth your best and highest self.

Final Thoughts

If you find yourself mourning lost friendships, place your hand on your heart and ask: “What was this relationship here to teach me? What did I learn that I couldn’t have learned any other way?”

Then ask: “Has that purpose been fulfilled?”

If the answer is yes, can you honor that completion with gratitude rather than grief? From a heart filled with gratitude, send them your love.

And if you’re longing for deeper connection, ask yourself: “What is my mission? What am I truly here to create? Who else might be on that path?”

Then watch what happens. When you align with your deepest purpose, the right people have a way of finding you—through resonance, through recognition.

Your feeling heart already knows who belongs in your life and who has completed their sacred assignment. The invitation is simply to listen, to trust, and to honor what your deeper wisdom reveals.

From my heart to yours,

—Gabriel

PS. If this exploration of what makes friendships last resonates with you and you'd like to go deeper, I invite you to join our Heart Mastery Circle—a supportive community where we practice these principles together. Here, we cultivate the heart-level connections that endure, release what's complete with gratitude, and align with the people who share our deepest mission.

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