Thoughts on Friendships
Friendships can be funny things. Some people think they can be weighted, ranked, judged, and discarded, while others will disagree.
Why do we have friendships? It's written in human nature. We all need to love and be loved, and we all need companionship. Not only in the form of romantic love, as in finding a life partner to share your life with and get married - but we also need platonic relationships in our lives as well.
While we establish and grow friendships for a variety of reasons, we generally keep a handful of close friends who share some of the same interests as us. We keep these friendships because these people are the people we can share good times with, laugh, cry, fart in front of, have serious or stupid conversations, and whatever. These are the people we can stay up with until the sunrise the next morning talking about nonsense, or drive around pointlessly and just enjoy each other's company.
We have friendships on all these different levels, and thus friends that we can categorize into groups - "the group I go clubbing with", "the group I go hiking with", "the group I discuss the latest technology with", "the group I can tell anything to", and so forth. Some of these friendships are old, lasting for years - some of them since we were in our elementary school days, and others, only since last Tuesday.
As we grow older and our interests change, so do our friendships. Our guidelines for friendships change, our unwritten rules for friendships change, and logically, our friends will also change. That is the nature over the course of our lives; things change.
With these changes sometimes comes the need to re-evaluate friendships around you. Maybe you don't like surfing anymore, so you hang out with your surfer friends less - or not at all. Maybe you don't live in Hawaii anymore, so naturally you may tend to lose touch with your friends who are still there. Maybe you're no longer into binge drinking and going out on the weekends all the time, so you hang out with those friends who enjoy that, less.
So is it bad that you start to hang out less with a friend you've known for 10 years because you have different interests? I don't think so. Why do you hold on to a friendship with someone you no longer have anything in common with? When you have nothing to talk about? When you have nothing to say to each other and have no common ground to share? If this person doesn't inspire you in any way, or maybe offer the same kind of companionship in activities you used to both enjoy, is there a point in hanging on to a friendship?
I've been flamed for this before, but I will say it again - is it bad to want to "discard" a friendship that offers you nothing? By offering you something, I don't mean that a friend needs to be able to give you gifts, or money, or anything material. But shouldn't your friendship with that other person at least offer a shoulder to lean on, an ear to listen, or a mutual good time talking to each other or enjoying each others' company?
Why do people put up these facades and charades and hold on to "friendships" that don't really mean much to them? Why does the group of girls from high school still get together once a month for dinner even though after they all depart, all they do is talk badly about each other and hate each other? Why do people act nice to your face but only hate you behind your back? Just because you may have had this friend for 10 years - doesn't mean that you have to keep on hanging on if you two just don't get along anymore in any way, right?
I think we are old enough now to make these kinds of decisions. If we no longer want to continue with a friendship with someone because he is okay with cheating on his wife and you are not, I think that is perfectly fine. If you don't want to continue to be friends with someone after 10 years because she started doing drugs, I don't see anything wrong with that. If I choose not to be friends with a person because he has a yellow crayon and I don't, I think that's okay too. It's all about our personal preferences and the types of people we want to surround ourselves with, isn't it?
Yes, you could call me narrow-minded, judgemental, racist, sexist, whatever - I admit that I am sometimes, all of these things. But why is the act of filtering your friends, or being discriminatory of the kinds of friends you have - such a bad thing? Why is it such a bad thing that I want to sever the friendships of girls I was friends with in high school, now? Now that I've already been six years out of high school and I no longer find that I have the same types of interests that they do? Do we really have to hang on to friendships just for posterity's sake? I don't think so. Is it bad that I don't want to be friends with someone who snorts cocaine? I don't think so.
Should I feel guilty that I want to just seemingly toss away these friendships carelessly? I don't think so. I do feel guilty, but I know inside I really shouldn't. Shouldn't we want to work toward the betterment, the growth of our own lives and souls?
One of my goals on my 43 Things list is to surround myself with positive, inspiring, and motivating people. That's what I'm striving for. That's not a bad thing, is it? To eliminate those around me who don't necessarily offer me any of those positive, inspiring, and motivating things in life that I'm looking for?
Just some things that have just been turning over and over in my head the last few months...
Why do we have friendships? It's written in human nature. We all need to love and be loved, and we all need companionship. Not only in the form of romantic love, as in finding a life partner to share your life with and get married - but we also need platonic relationships in our lives as well.
While we establish and grow friendships for a variety of reasons, we generally keep a handful of close friends who share some of the same interests as us. We keep these friendships because these people are the people we can share good times with, laugh, cry, fart in front of, have serious or stupid conversations, and whatever. These are the people we can stay up with until the sunrise the next morning talking about nonsense, or drive around pointlessly and just enjoy each other's company.
We have friendships on all these different levels, and thus friends that we can categorize into groups - "the group I go clubbing with", "the group I go hiking with", "the group I discuss the latest technology with", "the group I can tell anything to", and so forth. Some of these friendships are old, lasting for years - some of them since we were in our elementary school days, and others, only since last Tuesday.
As we grow older and our interests change, so do our friendships. Our guidelines for friendships change, our unwritten rules for friendships change, and logically, our friends will also change. That is the nature over the course of our lives; things change.
With these changes sometimes comes the need to re-evaluate friendships around you. Maybe you don't like surfing anymore, so you hang out with your surfer friends less - or not at all. Maybe you don't live in Hawaii anymore, so naturally you may tend to lose touch with your friends who are still there. Maybe you're no longer into binge drinking and going out on the weekends all the time, so you hang out with those friends who enjoy that, less.
So is it bad that you start to hang out less with a friend you've known for 10 years because you have different interests? I don't think so. Why do you hold on to a friendship with someone you no longer have anything in common with? When you have nothing to talk about? When you have nothing to say to each other and have no common ground to share? If this person doesn't inspire you in any way, or maybe offer the same kind of companionship in activities you used to both enjoy, is there a point in hanging on to a friendship?
I've been flamed for this before, but I will say it again - is it bad to want to "discard" a friendship that offers you nothing? By offering you something, I don't mean that a friend needs to be able to give you gifts, or money, or anything material. But shouldn't your friendship with that other person at least offer a shoulder to lean on, an ear to listen, or a mutual good time talking to each other or enjoying each others' company?
Why do people put up these facades and charades and hold on to "friendships" that don't really mean much to them? Why does the group of girls from high school still get together once a month for dinner even though after they all depart, all they do is talk badly about each other and hate each other? Why do people act nice to your face but only hate you behind your back? Just because you may have had this friend for 10 years - doesn't mean that you have to keep on hanging on if you two just don't get along anymore in any way, right?
I think we are old enough now to make these kinds of decisions. If we no longer want to continue with a friendship with someone because he is okay with cheating on his wife and you are not, I think that is perfectly fine. If you don't want to continue to be friends with someone after 10 years because she started doing drugs, I don't see anything wrong with that. If I choose not to be friends with a person because he has a yellow crayon and I don't, I think that's okay too. It's all about our personal preferences and the types of people we want to surround ourselves with, isn't it?
Yes, you could call me narrow-minded, judgemental, racist, sexist, whatever - I admit that I am sometimes, all of these things. But why is the act of filtering your friends, or being discriminatory of the kinds of friends you have - such a bad thing? Why is it such a bad thing that I want to sever the friendships of girls I was friends with in high school, now? Now that I've already been six years out of high school and I no longer find that I have the same types of interests that they do? Do we really have to hang on to friendships just for posterity's sake? I don't think so. Is it bad that I don't want to be friends with someone who snorts cocaine? I don't think so.
Should I feel guilty that I want to just seemingly toss away these friendships carelessly? I don't think so. I do feel guilty, but I know inside I really shouldn't. Shouldn't we want to work toward the betterment, the growth of our own lives and souls?
One of my goals on my 43 Things list is to surround myself with positive, inspiring, and motivating people. That's what I'm striving for. That's not a bad thing, is it? To eliminate those around me who don't necessarily offer me any of those positive, inspiring, and motivating things in life that I'm looking for?
Just some things that have just been turning over and over in my head the last few months...