Responding to a ‘friendship recession’

Rotary members are finding ways to make connections they cherish

By Kate Silver

When Phil Clarke was in his early 70s, he set a goal: to make new friends. This was in 2021, and Clarke felt he’d drifted far from the days when he could turn to the next desk at work or school and find conversation and camaraderie. The writer and novelist does relish a bit of solitude for his creative work. But he’s also gregarious when he wants to be. He grew up with 10 younger siblings, after all. Yet, like many people his age, he was frustrated.

He wrote about the quandary in an online community section of The Denver Post, reflecting on an uncomfortable reality of older adulthood: Close friends grow apart, or even die, and replacing them feels daunting. He mused to himself jokingly that reversing that trend would have the ancillary benefit of increasing the turnout at his funeral. And then he set out on a friend-finding mission.

He browsed studies on the importance of social networks, pondered where he could find a pool of possible friends, and decided on the ideal criteria: a group that met regularly, welcomed people of all backgrounds and interests, stimulated his mind, and inspired action. Then he found a place that checked all the boxes: the Rotary Club of Highlands Ranch, just outside Denver.

Phil Clarke, who joined Rotary on a quest for friendship, launched a film club that hosts screenings at a library. “I’m taking gradual steps to really get to know people on a deeper level,” he says. “That was my goal in the first place. And I think it’s working pretty well.” Images credit: Rebecca Stumpf

Since joining Rotary, Clarke, bespectacled with a slightly goofy grin, has worked with others to raise $500,000 to fund an endowed fellowship for pediatric mental health at a Colorado hospital system. He’s launched a film club that hosts screenings at a library; he’s formed a musical duo — called The Elderly Brothers — that performs at nursing homes and other venues; and at the weekly Rotary lunches, he feels a true sense of community. “I’m taking gradual steps to really get to know people on a deeper level,” he says. “That was my goal in the first place. And I think it’s working pretty well.”

Research shows how important friendship is to a person’s mental and physical health; it may even help you live longer. Scientists have found evidence suggesting that friends may influence our well-being as adults even more than family. And yet, in societies around the globe, things seem to be moving in the wrong direction. In what’s been dubbed a “friendship recession,” the number of close friends that adults have in the U.S. has declined over recent decades, affecting some groups — like men — more than others. The pandemic further aggravated our social isolation.

Reversing a friendship recession with Rotary

On the brighter side, scientists studying this phenomenon say that with some effort, individuals can turn the friendship recession into their own friendship boom. And, for many people, Rotary is just what the therapist ordered.

Kris Cameron was approaching retirement. After nearly 30 years as a teacher and teachers union leader, she was ready for it, but she knew she needed a plan. “I didn’t want to be one of those retirees who just sat around twiddling my thumbs and lost my social group,” Cameron says. Much like Clarke, she joined a Rotary club (Wenatchee Confluence in Washington state) in hopes of meeting new people and participating in projects to benefit her community.

Cindy Volyn was looking for a way to get more involved with community service projects. She decided to attend a Rotary meeting in hopes of connecting with like-minded people. There, she met Cameron and they quickly realized they shared a rather esoteric passion: a love of backyard chickens. Cameron has four and Volyn has 11. Both consider the birds pets, even family members. “They’re like our kids or our grandkids,” says Cameron. “It was so nice to meet someone else who had the same love and respect for her birds as we do.”

It didn’t take long to realize they had other shared interests, including the environment: Volyn works as an environmental program manager at the Washington State Department of Transportation, and Cameron is the chair of the club’s environmental committee. Volyn decided to join Rotary and threw herself into different activities, working side-by-side with Cameron within the Environmental Sustainability Rotary Action Group and its plant-rich diet task force. Together, they’ve participated in highway cleanups and pollinator garden plantings, hosted film screenings themed around the environment, and coordinated monthly plant-based potlucks.

Cindy Volyn and Kris Cameron became friends in Rotary and bonded over their shared love of raising backyard chickens. Image credit: Jovelle Tamayo

But their connection extends beyond Rotary activities: They’ve become best friends. It’s a status that neither expected to find, and both cherish. “I’m a bit of a loner,” says Cameron. “I don’t have a lot of close girlfriends. So to find a good friend like Cindy, that I actually enjoy talking to and feel a lot of kinship with, has been such a gift.” Volyn is quick to return the love. “I feel I’m always slightly guarded with people. But I’m never that way with Kris,” she says. “And it was that way immediately.”

The two are constantly texting and emailing, updating each other on themselves and their families and, of course, on their backyard birds. Recently, Cameron had an obligation away from home and couldn’t keep up her usual nighttime chicken ritual. She knew just who to call. “Cindy came and tucked them into bed,” she says.

Friendships like the one between Volyn and Cameron are special. And, sadly, they’re becoming less common. In 1990, 33 percent of Americans surveyed by Gallup reported having 10 or more close friends, and just 3 percent said they had none. Compare that with 2021, when the number of people with 10 or more close friends had fallen to 13 percent and those with none rose to 12 percent, according to a poll by the Survey Center on American Life.

Even before the pandemic, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy declared that the world was suffering from a “loneliness epidemic.” (Read an interview with Murthy on the topic in this magazine’s August 2020 issue.) A 2023 advisory from Murthy’s office points to several contributing trends in the U.S.: declining social networks and social participation, a decrease in family size and marriage rates, less participation in community groups (such as religious groups, clubs, and labor unions), and technologies that replace in-person interactions.

The report also sheds light on the mental and physical impacts of loneliness, which is associated with an increased risk of heart disease, stroke, anxiety, depression, dementia, and premature death.

The truth about loneliness

While loneliness has been on the rise, it’s certainly nothing new. In fact, it’s an emotion that’s hardwired into our biology for survival, says Megan Bruneau, a therapist and executive coach in Nashville, Tennessee. She says loneliness makes us feel uncomfortable, and that’s meant to motivate us to seek out other humans for relief. “We wouldn’t be able to mate, obviously, if we were totally by ourselves,” says Bruneau. “And we also wouldn’t be able to get in on the kill, or ward off packs of wild animals, or stay warm at night.”

In modern times, however, finding a remedy to loneliness requires more than simply opting in to the nearest group. Often, people who feel lonely also feel ashamed, as though they’ve done something wrong to feel that way, says Bruneau, author of How To Be Alone (and Together): 72 Lessons on Being at Peace With Yourself. “Especially in the age of Instagram, when you look around and it seems like everyone else has a great group and is always being social, except for you,” she says.

When Bruneau talks to patients who feel lonely, she validates their emotions and emphasizes how common this emotion is. Then she works to understand what’s getting in the way of that person connecting with others. For some people, it could be related to past trauma that’s causing them to shut down and avoid intimacy or closeness. For others, it could be circumstantial, and they just need a little encouragement to make more of a social effort. For the latter, she recommends that they put themselves in situations where people have shared interests and interact consistently, an approach known as social prescribing.

“Sign up for an eight-week cooking or art class,” she says. “Join a book club or team. Volunteer. Bring a gift to your neighbor and see if they’d be up for a walk or coffee sometime. Join [an app like] Bumble BFF and go on ‘friend dates.’”

Friendship, it turns out, is the second most common reason people join Rotary clubs, according to a 2022 member survey. (Community service is number one.) For members who are 60 and older, friendship is the top reason they stay. In a follow-up to his community blog post, Clarke suggests readers consider joining Rotary too. With a touch of humor, he writes, “My sense of it is that this will not only beef up the attendance at your memorial service, but that your life will be improved by serving others in ways that, at present, you may only vaguely imagine.”

Loneliness isn’t just an American phenomenon. A few years ago, the United Kingdom launched its first government loneliness strategy, encouraging doctors to write patients “prescriptions” to participate in social activities, and across the country, “chatty benches” are popping up to encourage strangers to talk to each other. In Australia, the “men’s shed movement” has been growing since the 1990s, with more than 1,200 tool-filled sheds doubling as community centers where men can work side-by-side and connect with one another in a low-stakes setting (some sheds are also open to women).

For Ron Bowden, a member of the Rotary Club of Toowoomba East in Australia, a shed offered community following the loss of his wife, who died from brain cancer. There, he could throw himself into projects and repairs or just tinker while standing shoulder-to-shoulder with other tinkerers, as he processed his grief. “It replaced the backyard shed where, as a kid, I was taught to use my father’s tools,” says Bowden, who went on to help set up two men’s sheds in hopes of helping others. “Sheds allow men to talk with, work with, and learn from other self-motivated men,” he says. In recent years, the movement has expanded beyond Australia, and there are now an estimated 3,000 sheds worldwide, including in New Zealand, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Kenya, South Africa, Canada, and the United States.

While loneliness knows no gender, men often experience it differently than women, and research shows that they’re struggling even more as they age. The Survey Center on American Life found that men tend to have fewer close friends than women, and between 1990 and 2021, men who reported having no close friends grew from 3 percent to 15 percent.

Bruneau says that could be because men tend to struggle more with feeling connected than women. “In order for us to really connect, we need to be vulnerable,” she says. “Men struggle with vulnerability because our society tells them to be strong and independent, not ‘needy’ or ‘emotional,’ and thus they feel shame when exhibiting the very behaviors required for the type of connection that relieves loneliness.” Plus, she adds, there are simply fewer opportunities to meet people as we get older and leave behind our regular routines like school, team sports, and work.

Filling a void and making a difference

For David Cochran, the Rotary Club of Alpharetta, Georgia, helped fill a void after spending his career working in leadership positions in global corporations. In 2017, Cochran was at a crossroads as he approached retirement age. He attended a symposium held in conjunction with the Rotary International Convention in Atlanta, at which Rotarian entrepreneur Jim Marggraff gave a speech about using technology to solve problems and connect for social good. Cochran introduced himself, and that sparked a friendship, as well as a partnership. After attending the screening of a virtual reality film from the convention that Marggraff helped develop, Cochran was inspired to join Rotary. Along with other Rotary members, they launched a nonprofit called the Global Impact Group to make a positive societal and humanitarian impact using technology.

Through this work, Cochran is finding fulfillment in ways he never expected. And he’s learned that satisfaction doesn’t just come from the output. “Not everything needs to be work,” he says. “It’s finding these crucial moments to enjoy one another, to open yourself up to different possibilities.”

When Tom Gump joined the Rotary Club of Edina/Morningside, Minnesota, in 2013, he, too, wanted to meet friends. What he found — in the midst of a tragedy that affected his household — was something even more profound.

Gump and his family hosted a Rotary Youth Exchange student from Spain, Paco Tebar Gomez, at their home in 2017-18. During his stay, Paco’s dad died by suicide, and the family’s church in Spain wouldn’t perform a funeral service. Tom and his wife, Catherine, now a member of the Rotary Club of Edina, flew Paco’s mom and two siblings to Minnesota so that the family could grieve together.

When the Gumps put out a call for help, their Rotary friends answered. One had lost his own father to suicide and showed up to support Paco and to listen. Another brought his dog over to spend time with the grieving teenager. And, together, Rotarians helped plan a heartfelt memorial service for Paco’s dad.

The service was held at the Gump family’s church on the rainiest of nights. Nearly 300 Rotarians filed in, smiling at videos showing Paco’s dad — a juggler — tossing balls in the air. Eyes welled up as stories unfolded about a man who was, to most attendees, a stranger.

Gump looked around in awe. He’d joined Rotary to meet friends. But the love and support he felt in this moment were beyond anything he could have imagined. “That’s when I realized Rotary is more than a club,” he says. “It’s a family.”

This story originally appeared in the August 2024 issue of Rotary magazine.