Reader question: Do I have enough friends?

"There is something that niggles at me, that I should have more."

Question: I don’t think I have enough friends. There is something that niggles at me, that I should have more. I don’t have a big group of pals like other people. I don’t really enjoy socialising. But I just feel really insecure about it. I wondered if you had any advice for this?

A: Thank you for this question. Firstly I’d like to shine a light on a phrase that became part of our common parlance around the year 2015: the “squad goal”. Created in part by social media ‘tagging’ and Instagram culture, it was the idea of the clique, the crew, the girl-gang, the group selfie. The Squad. The 17-women-on-a-hen-do. And if you didn’t have one? Well, you were (inadvertently) made to feel a bit crappy.