Sophie Sanders decided to try the latest friendship craze: an ‘admin date’ – where friends meet up to tackle life admin together. But after giving the trend a go, she began to wonder whether our attempts to multitask are actually costing us the deep, life-giving friendships we were created for.
If you’re anything like me, life admin is the bane of adulthood – think spending hours on the phone sorting out your car insurance, replying to a shed-load of messages that have piled up, completing your oh-so-tedious tax return and all the other things you dread having to do when you finish your bill-paying job. It’s the to-do list that never ends; a bottomless pit of tedious tasks that cannot be ignored.
It’s no wonder that 71 per cent of us are putting off these tasks at all costs, conjuring up a plethora of procrastination techniques in our state of errand paralysis – especially, said the study, if it involves renewing a broadband contract. If you know, you know.
So, when I came across admin dates, my ears perked up. Perhaps this was the silver bullet that would save me from endless extrovertedy ennui…
In my mind’s eye, the admin date was going to take place in a vibey coffee shop with batch brews, oversized houseplants and an indie playlist.
In my mind’s eye, the admin date was going to take place in a vibey coffee shop with batch brews, oversized houseplants and an indie playlist. But the reality looked rather different – and much less Instagrammable.
READ MORE: Friendship, Romance and the “Relationship Recession”
Given the volume of life admin that needed to be done, my housemate and I simply locked in one evening, with cups of tea in hand and a healthy stash of chocolate – dark chocolate with freeze-dried raspberries, truly top tier. The tedious tasks were punctuated with externally processed frustration and moments of light interlude before focus would once again resume.
While it was nice to have company and camaraderie whilst ticking off tasks, it felt like it neither achieved one thing nor another – I was more distracted than I would have been firing off emails and filling in forms solo, yet didn’t get to enjoy the deep connection that comes from spending an evening with a dear friend.
I’m not opposed to a repeat event, but unlike our converted counterparts, my housemate and I have not yet diarised a regular slot – the pressured parameters of such a decision feel pretty intense, even for me as a self-confessed Type A personality. But what makes me particularly uneasy is the type of friendship these dates are fostering.
READ MORE: Letter to the Next Generation: Friendship can be messy and fragile but Jesus at the centre makes it stronger
We all have an Edenic ache for friendship – an inbuilt desire for connection and companionship that is vital for our flourishing.
We all have an Edenic ache for friendship – an inbuilt desire for connection and companionship that is vital for our flourishing. After all, when God created Adam, he declared it wasn’t good for him to be alone (Genesis 2:18). To be fully alive in the image of our triune God, who exists in intimate friendship with himself, we need deep friendships.
In his book Made for Friendship, the American pastor Drew Hunter said that “three aspects of modern culture create unique barriers to deep relationships: busyness, technology and mobility.” And that’s where the arguments for admin dates fall down. Ostensibly, they’re pragmatic ways to carve out time with our friends in the hustle and bustle of our daily lives – but beneath the surface, they’re totally missing the point of friendship.
Friendship is not merely coexisting in the same space as other people. It’s slowing down to see and hear the person in front of us, not being separated by screens and distracted by tasks. It’s sharing experiences and conversation together rather than getting on with our own tasks in isolation. It’s forging meaningful connections that reflect and refract the friendship of God to one another.
Friendship by God’s design: finding and becoming faithful companions
And so, reader, I challenge you to reconsider your admin dates – to pursue friendships that transcend the modern barriers of busyness, technology and mobility and intentionally clear space in your diary to build deep and meaningful connections.
It doesn’t need to be complicated. Maybe you could whack some pizzas in the oven and host your friends for a meal, grab coffee with your bestie with no other agenda than sharing the joys and sorrows of your weeks, or even just turn your phone on silent when you go for a walk so that you’re not distracted. As you do so, you’ll be walking at the pace of love and being truly present with your friend, just as Jesus would.
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