Though youth gave love and rose, age still leaves us friends and wine – Thomas Moore.
We all need friends, or rather, most of us do, and while making friends is easy for some people, it’s an uphill task for others. Friendship takes some effort, but it doesn’t have to be. You can make friends simply by listening to people talk to you and responding with a smile. A friend is someone you can trust at all times, someone who loves you and supports you no matter what. Most of the time a friend is supposed to understand and not judge. Friends cry with you and laugh with you. Friendship is not based on what one can get out of it, it is not so superficial and selfish. True friendship runs deeper and is a relationship that has been nurtured for a long time.
There are different types of friends, some friendships last a short time and friends are only there for that season, but true friendship lasts. Most of us make friends when we are young and keep them throughout our lives. These are friends who have known you thoroughly since you were in kindergarten or those you bonded with when you were in high school and traded advice on how to rebel with your parents. But we also make some friends when we are adults, we grow up with children and even if they don’t know us for a long time, they are still special and important and we keep them.
Friendships actually last longer than most love relationships because they are built on honesty and no pretense is required to impress a friend. It is not necessary to wear makeup or cologne to go out with a friend, but friendship must be worked on as a love relationship. The relationship has to be nurtured and watered like a plant. Don’t sit back and take your friends for granted. We live in a really busy world right now and we hardly have any time for ourselves let alone friends and other commitments but you can sacrifice to get together with your friends from time to time. If that’s not possible on a regular basis, text, email (don’t forward), call them even for a minute or two, just to let them know you’re thinking of them and that you value them. Do you have a special friend you can call in the middle of the night when you’re in jail or something that important? Do you know those who do not ask questions, do not judge but listen and understand? If you expect your friends to be there for you, be the right friend too, and in return, be there for them, that’s what friendship is all about.
Be honest and encourage your friends when they succeed, don’t envy them or that wouldn’t constitute a true friendship. Forgive them when they hurt you; they are just human, they will make mistakes along the way and let you down sometimes. When your friend hurts you, don’t call a duet on the field to work things out, those things are just for the movies. When you offend, you expect to be forgiven, and in the same spirit you should forgive your friends. Be loyal, be honest, be dedicated. You can build bonds that will last forever and strike up a friendship that lasts forever and whose depth knows no measure.