People tend to throw the word ‘friend’ around a lot especially when you may be desperate or wanting to have a new ‘friend’ come into your life. It is natural to want to build rapport with someone and to do so quickly. It is good to have someone want to spend time with you and get to know you are. When you are short on friends or when friends you know have moved on to a different town, city, or country, you want to work on replacing those lost or far away friendships that you used to have.
Especially as you get older, friends move away, get married, have children, and it can be hard to keep those friendships the same or keep them alive in a meaningful away. Having a true friend is hard to come by and it’s important to get better at distinguish who is a ‘true’ or ‘real’ friend and who should deserve that kind of title in your mind.
Unless the bonds you have are broken or ruptured due to any kind of factor, which does happen in life, you will still have your friends to pick up the connection again despite factor of distance or life circumstances. A friendship that has been established for years or decades doesn’t ever fully go away but you both must work to keep in touch to keep the flame alive into the future. Friendships do fade away, and you or the other person may not be getting what you need to keep it going. It can be sad to let go of a friendship especially when you invest the time, the emotions, and the money spent to keep it alive, but that is just part of life.
We have a tendency in American culture to form friendships at a dizzying pace or want to have someone as a friend quickly to ensure our own need for popularity or for social status. Other cultures tend to be slower in establishing those tight social connections or friendships, but once you do, you have a friend for life, or you have a true friend under a separate kind of category that should be reserved for a few friends and not for many connections or acquaintances.
Yes, we do throw around the word ‘friend’ a lot and too quickly. However, you should be wary of entrusting people who you consider ‘friends’ without feeling out how much that friendship entails. When I think of the meaning of a ‘true friend’, it is deeper than getting drinks every now and then or meeting up to play a sport or do an activity, it is someone who you can share both the good and the bad in your life and they can do the same with you. You don’t have to reveal your whole life story or be exhaustive about it, but a true friend is someone for whom you can be vulnerable with. A true friend won’t judge you for looking for their help, advice, or let you vent to them every now and then.
There are also several kind and thoughtful gestures a friend would do for you whereas an acquaintance or social connection would not. When you need to move and you’re free to lend a helping hand with the furniture, that is a true friend in action. If you need a ride to and from the airport and they don’t mind it even when it’s a little out of the way, that is a true friend. If you need a place to sleep or ‘crash’, and you would rather not splurge for a hotel room, a true friend will offer you their coach or a spare bedroom.
Now, there are two sides to any friendship so keep in mind that if they are willing to do that for you, you should try to do the same for them if the need arises. It is not being transactional but it’s remembering that any true friendship needs effort from both people, and it is good to look out for another especially in an increasingly isolated and technologically driven world. Our phone or our computer or our AI chat tool will never be a replacement for a true friend who is a real person, one whom you can share stories with, help each other with advice, and lend a hand to you when you are in need. Now, you can still drink, eat, play sports, or hang out with a ‘friend’, but if that friend isn’t someone who you can confide in, discuss life and its happenings, or be there for each other, it’s not a deep friendship or can be a bit shallow.
True friendships in my view take years or even decades to foster so while it’s good to try to make new friends, don’t neglect the older friendships you have that can be revived or don’t be too quick to trust someone without giving the friendship time to bloom and see if you both are compatible in the long-run. I would rather have five ‘true friends’ than a hundred or more ‘friends’ who don’t really know me, care about me, or for whom we are close enough to help each other out or just look out for each other.
Friendships are like relationships, though platonic in nature, they are just as important to foster in a healthy manner and that both people are contributing to it. You can start off just as acquaintances but if you’re putting in the time, trying on each side, and growing deeper as friends over the months and years, instead of staying in the shallow subjects, you really are building the ‘true friendships’ that survive time, distance, and other challenges.
Even if you’re married, or have children, or are busy at work, you also need friends and healthy friendships so keep trying to create them, build them, and be a good friend to others in your life. Remember to have quality friendships over the quantity of them as having a few friends for life is much better than have 100 friends who will drop you in a few months because you couldn’t keep up with their lifestyle or their demands or their ‘image.’ True friendship is missing someone when they’re gone and looking forward to the day when you can rekindle the friendship anew.
