In about a month we will be leaving our Minnesota home of more than thirty years and moving to Florida where we have spent the last few winters. I am excited about our future plans and meeting new friends in Florida, but I am especially aware right now of how much I will miss my Minnesota friends. As our moving date approaches, I am trying to schedule as many lunches, dinners, golf games, walks in the parks and bike rides with friends as possible.

My friends are treasures, and I have thought a lot about how to stay connected with my Minnesota friends. I will continue to do what I did last winter in Florida when I skyped my book club meetings and scheduled phone chats with a dear friend. I already have my plane ticket for a girlfriend trip in October and friends are making plans to visit me in Florida. All of these activities will help me to stay connected.

WHAT WE KNOW

Social relationships/connections is an important component of healthspan. Research demonstrating the importance of positive social relationships in our lives continues to grow. Having strong friendships can affect mental and physical health, increase longevity, improve immune functioning, as well as make life more meaningful and enjoyable. Numerous studies show that not having social connections can lead to premature death.

Gallup organization director Tom Rath's book Vital Friends: The People You Can't Live Without reports some revealing statistics from a massive study of friendship: Our healthy future depends on having a strong network of friends, people with whom we can share our life. More time for friendships is one of the gifts of the second half of life because we no longer are busy building careers, raising children and getting established. We have time to reconnect with old friends, strengthen existing friendships and build new ones.

However, at the same time that we have more time for friendships, we may have lost our "automatic relationship generator." In What Color is Your Parachute for Retirement, Richard Bolles and John Nelson point out that the world of education and the world of work are prime relationship generators. We may no longer be in those worlds in the second half of life and need to be more intentional about where we meet new friends. Our health depends on it.

WHAT WE CAN DO

Answer the following questions to help assess your current social connections. After thinking about the importance of friendships and answering the questions above, what would you like to do? What is one step you could take in the next week to improve your social network? At the end of the first week, review what you did and set a goal for the next week. Do this for six weeks and at the end of that time, compare how you feel about your social connections now with how you felt when you started.