Mi'sen

Do you need a mutual attitude of openness to establish communication? I suspect yes, otherwise people are just talking to themselves in vague proximity to other insulated people.

This all reminds me of @visakanv talking about finding ‘soulmates’. I find making friends difficult, historically at least, but the friends I do have are high quality. How to make good friends is super interesting to me (I’m pretty good at being a friend, less good at matching)

One problem with seeking connection via shared interest, related to Sloteridijk’s thermotope; the shared pampering space, which insultes the person — a shared ‘escaped reality’, a We-Cave — and the connection never comes a cross-context friendship. eg: church people

There is a concept of tendrel — something like auspicious connection — which is pivotal to vajrayana praxis. Good friends share a lot of connection, maybe. So, how? This often gets used in some weird metaphysical magical thinking way, but good friendship _is_ magical/ish:

‘Magic is not always trickery; the world itself encourages a magic-like approach to many circumstances, because it offers the experience that success occasionally exceeds what was actually undertaken. The oldest concepts of happiness and power are a response to this.’ Foams, 372.

By virtue of connecting with another person across time and contexts — which I think is key — the result ‘occasionally exceeds the undertaking’ and you end up with a really good friendship, which is way rarer than a lot of neurotypicals seem to assume (lots of acquaintances).