Neither too shallow, nor too deep: the Middle Path of human relationships

There is a Japanese saying about human relationships: "asakarazu, fukakarazu" (浅からず、深からず). Go too deep and you risk hitting the dregs of the human psyche you would not want to deal with, go too shallow and you will skip on the surface without developing anything meaningful. Staying in the middle is hard work, because it is not a simple middle ground or compromise.