Stop Looking for Friends Who “Match Your Energy!"

Stop Looking for Friends Who “Match Your Energy!"

What drives someone to seek a life stacked with richer, more honest friendships instead of just people who “match their energy”? Friendship coach Zoe Asher is on a mission to answer that, and she starts by poking at one of social media’s favourite slogans: “If they don’t match your energy, cut them off.” Across 15 years and more than 500 meals with strangers, Zoe has seen how this mindset can quietly turn friendships into scoreboards.

She points out that when relationships become about “tit for tat” and constant reciprocity, they stop being relationships and start looking like transactions. As she puts it bluntly, “Friendship isn’t a scoreboard… If that’s our sole focus, then we’re not looking for friends, we’re looking to get even.” Zoe shares her own cringe-worthy moment of realising she was searching for clones of herself, rather than actual friends.

That honesty will resonate with anyone who’s ever demanded hype-level reactions or perfect alignment from the people around them. Instead of chasing energy, she argues for paying attention to shared values: honesty, conflict repair, generosity, trustworthiness, and consistent effort over time. She also highlights how life seasons matter. When someone is grieving or going through a tough patch, they simply can’t show up at 100%—and neither can you.

That’s why she suggests stepping back and asking: over the long haul, has this person made an effort? And just as importantly, have you? For adults wrestling with whether to end a friendship, Zoe has even created a set of questions to help work out whether a relationship needs repair, conversation, or a genuine goodbye.

If you’ve been tempted to cut people off for not matching your vibe, this conversation might nudge you to ask a better question: what kind of values-based friendships could be waiting on the other side of dropping that checklist?