HOW TO FIX A FRIENDSHIP
“Real friendship is a powerful presence in helping you to see the prisons within which you live.” – Eternal Echoes
When is friendship worth fighting for?
At some level, every relationship in our life involves an aspect of friendship. No matter who we interact with at work, school, or around our community, there’s always the potential to form a friendly bond. Perhaps we connect with our colleague who binges the same show as us. Or maybe we run into someone at a store with the same themed reusable bag and start up a casual conversation. We just never know who we’ll run into and what connections could be created. It’s when these common connections keep calling us together that a friendship starts to form.
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There’s a timeless saying that states how different people come into our life, “for a reason, a season, or a lifetime.” Of course the problem with this sentiment is that we can’t always know which one a person will be. Friends come in many shapes in sizes. There are the ones that we can call day or night, the ones that bring the party wherever they go, and the ones that push us out of our comfort zone. And then there are the ones that hog all of the attention, the ones that never keep their promises, and the ones who talk behind our back. But the types of friends we invite into our lives says more about us than them.
We often search for relationships to make up for what we lack –what we have to learn. Thus our friendships vary during each stage of life. When we’re children we look for friends that are similar to us, like us, and make us feel safe. Growing up is easier when you have someone you can count on and who shares similar experiences. Yet this desire doesn’t go away as we get older. We still search for people who have a similar state of mind and can make us feel better about ourselves. So what happens when we find our paths drifting apart? Is it worth holding onto something we’ve possibly outgrown?
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Breaking up with a friend can be more difficult than breaking up with a partner. It’s usually messier and more complicated because we’re essentially saying that they, as a person, are not useful to us. They are no longer needed in our life anymore. So when the first signs of a strained friendship arise, it can be hard to know how to handle the situation. Is this just a momentary disagreement and something that can be fixed? Or is this showing their true colors which no longer match with ours?
Whether it was a fight, an insult, or an avoidance, trust the gut feeling that comes first. Friends don’t, and shouldn’t, always see eye to eye. We need people in our lives to challenge us and help us grow. As long as it’s for the better. So when we assess a friendship, we should feel that the benefits outweigh the negatives. If not, then it might be time to let go. While it’s a difficult decision to make, it opens up new opportunities for the next phase in life. We can restart our search for people who will better align with who -and where- we want to be.
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Each friend unlocks a different side of us, so it’s selfish to expect that one person can be “everything” for us. We are wired to be social and need personal connections to flourish -to be the best we can be. So if someone isn’t bringing out our best, they might just be holding us back. Don’t wait to be emotionally drained. We can choose to see the “why” behind our reasoning and realize that every friend isn’t forever. But the memories and lessons they gave with us will last a lifetime.
