Come out tonight - or don't - I'll still be your friend

I was recently told by someone in my social circle that I'm getting "boring" because I "never come out anymore". I'm not about to argue about whether or not I am boring, as I'm confident that I'm not.  I manage to keep myself near-constantly entertained at any rate.

My issue is with the supposed link between me going out to gigs and clubnights less than I used to, and how this makes me seem "boring" to some of the friends I made through those channels. It's true that a lot of my friends are people I have met through collective organising of gigs and clubnights over the years, or through friends of those friends who do similar. They're people who like a lot of the same music as me, so we'd expect to see each other when certain bands play locally, or at monthly clubnights organised by mutual acquaintances. A lot of us probably met after being drunkenly introduced one evening by a shared friend, and after bumping into each other a couple more times, we'd start actively arranging to meet up, often to go out to some gig/clubnight etc. And that's great. I enjoy that. But I don't want that to be all there is, and I'd like to think that a lot of those friendships would continue if I stopped going out to gigs and clubnights so much (as has happened lately).

And for a lot of those friends, there *is* more to our friendship than just going out together. We make music together, we have dinner together, we hangout at each others houses talking. We go on day trips, to exhibitons, on walks, to talks on things that we think are interesting. We do loads of things that aren't *going out* and have a great time. And you know what, sometimes we even go out dancing, or to see bands. It's just not the defining feature we use to check if we're having a good enough time.

What worries me is that for a small minority of people, the scale of "how often this person comes out dancing/drinking/to gigs" is doubling up as the scale for "how interesting this person is to me, really". Sure, it's great to have people to go out with and have fun, and I love doing that. But is that the only capacity I'm of any use to you in? What if I'm too worn out, or if I'm ill, or if I can't afford it, or know that there's going to be someone there I can't handle seeing? Am I now "boring"?

The people who don't find me boring, the people who find me interesting, engaging and inspiring tend to be the people who actually know me well, who don't just see me when we're 'out' at the same place. The people who, when they ask if I'd like to come out and I tell them I can't, instead of telling me I'm boring, suggest something else fun we could do together another time.

If there's a friend you miss, who you used to see out all the time, and lately they haven't been around much, get in touch and see how they're doing. Maybe they've got things going on that you didn't know about that mean they don't want to be as actively involved in your shared community as they used to be. Maybe their chronic health condition has flared up and they're having to take a break from anything too energetic. Maybe their crappy, badly paid job is wearing them out, so on top of being hard up they're also too exhausted to walk to the other side of town for drinks in a busy bar, even though they'd like to see friends. Don't try and shame them into coming out by telling them you think they're boring.