One of the great revelations of my life is coming to full consciousness (to wholeness) by facing my contradictions, making friends with my mistakes and failings, and realizing that every one else has them too. This has tempered my need for approval and the unreasonable expectations I’ve had for myself, my family, and my friends.

Instead of approaching each relationship expecting 100 percent—but being bitterly disappointed by getting only 50 percent—I’m learning to come to each relationship expecting zero and being pleasantly surprised when I receive anything at all.

Three qualities have emerged as the essential—the non-negotiable—qualifications of close, reciprocal and meaningful relationships. In other words, a true friend.

Ironically these three qualities are the acrostic of my non-profit company name, Creative Community, Inc.

Three Essential Qualities of a Priceless Friend

Cogeniality—At this stage in life, I want to form close relationships only with people I find congenial.

Congenial friends are pleasant to be around and enjoyable to be with. One doesn’t have to “work” at a relationship with a congenial person. When a congenial friend departs, it is bittersweet. One feels the loss of their immediate presence, but an afterglow remains—a strong feeling that one is better for the time spent together.

Congenial friends are harmonious. The Four Harmonious Friends is one of the most universal and beloved of the Jataka Tales. The image of a bird, rabbit, and monkey standing on each other’s shoulders on the back of a patient elephant portrays social harmony.

As the story goes, the bird finds a seed and plants it. Then, the rabbit waters it, and the monkey fertilizes it. Once the seed sprouts and begins to grow, the elephant protects it. After some time, the small plant grows into a big, beautiful tree full of healthy fruit. By working together and using their individual talents, the four friends are able to reach and enjoy the fruit.

Congenial friends have a kindred spirit. When we say someone is “of my tribe”, it connotes those rare ones with whom we feel a special connection. This deep and sometimes “soulish” connection draws us together on a higher level of consciousness. When we get together after a long absence, it is as though we have never been apart.

The secret of happiness is to find a congenial monotony. —V.S. Pritchett

Curiousity—In my memoir, A Renaissance Redneck In A Mega-Church Pulpit, I noted: “I have always possessed an astonished curiosity touched with concupiscence”.

In its widest acceptation concupiscence is “an ardent yearning of the soul for good”. Curiosity is an openness to the world around us and an interest in finding out about it, in order to live life as fully as possible.

Curious friends yearn to investigate. As we make our way through this journey called life, we learn that it is much riskier, more powerful, more mysterious than we ever thought possible. Curious people discover the world is more magical, less predictable, more autonomous, less controllable, more varied, less simple, more infinite, less knowable, more extravagantly complex than we could have ever dreamed.

With age most of us lose the sense of magic, the feeling of awe when we encounter the majesty and glory of the world. Life becomes mundane. But curious ones delight in the mysterious and the unknown. And because there is no end to the unknown, their delight is also endless, and remains fresh even into their seventies, eighties, and nineties.

Curious friends yearn to learn. Learning is a way to make sense of the world in which we live. We find ourselves in an unprecedented time in history. The difference between what our ancestors could see of the processes of life and what we can see is enormous. Curious ones are constantly expanding their reach, renewing, extending, and innovating.

This commitment to curiosity creates a refusal to ritualize life and make it static. Curious ones are ever on a quest for the holy grail—a  lifelong search for meaning. Curious ones question everything.

Curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back. —Ben Jonson

Intelligence— defined: is having or showing the ability to easily learn or understand things; or to deal with new or difficult situations.

One theory suggests that intelligence is composed of a number of different abilities that interact and work together to produce overall individual intelligence.

While many people claim their intelligence seems to decline with aging, the Cattel-Horn theory suggests that while fluid intelligence does indeed begin to decrease after adolescence, crystallized intelligence continues to increase throughout adulthood.

Fluid intelligence involves being able to think and reason abstractly and solve problems while crystallized intelligence involves knowledge that comes from prior learning and past experiences.

Intelligent friends love to accumulate new knowledge and understanding. And so their intelligence becomes stronger as they grow older. They refuse to get stuck. They use emerging ideas from diverse sources and help create new ways of understanding the intricate web of life, by taking these elements of knowledge and putting them together in a coherent conceptual system.

Intelligent friends want their ideas to continue into the future. They know how to do slow, methodical work—yet they fully embrace intuitive insight. They can endure the daily grind of a mundane job—yet they are quick to embrace their entrepreneurial spirit when the need arises.

Intelligent friends utilize whole-brain thinking. They embrace both the right and left sides of the brain. The ability to shift rapidly between divergent and convergent thinking, (left and right) is the key to innovation, and can be sharpened and improved by capturing new ideas, engaging in challenging tasks, broadening knowledge, and interacting with stimulating people and places.

Live and act within the limit of your knowledge and keep expanding it to the limit of your life.― Ayn Rand

In summary: To experience life fully, we all need an intellectual community that helps satisfy our curiosity as well as our desire for congenial company.