How are you feeling about your friends?

You probably get and annual check-up every year or so to make sure you’re in good physical health, but how is your social health? The quality of our relationships are important to our health, happiness, and even longevity. It can be helpful to periodically take time to reflect on and assess how you’re feeling about your relationships.

It’s not unusual to have friends and still feel lonely.

Just having friends isn’t enough. Maybe you don’t feel particularly connected to your friends. Maybe your conversations seem superficial or unsatisfying. Maybe you fell into a friendship a long time ago and now you’ve changed—or your friend has—and you don’t have much in common anymore. Or possibly you have a friend who makes you feel bad about yourself.

Whatever the case, it can be helpful to periodically take some time to reflect on state of your friendships. A friend of mine does an annual friendship review. But you don’t have to limit yourself to your friendships. This self-assessment can be used for family, co-workers, and any important relationships in your life.

The friendship self-assessment is meant as a tool for reflection, not diagnosis. However, be ready for a dose of truth. If you’re feeling lonely and disconnected, it can be hard to face that head on. It can also be a first step toward deeper, more satisfying connections. We recommend doing it at a time when you have the space to reflect and the capacity to take in the results.