Friendship

I believe in friendship.

To me friendship is sustaining power.  Not for what can be taken, but for what can be given.  My sister, in jest, once said of relationships, “Don’t ask what you can give, ask what you can take.”  It was funny because it was such a silly notion, but was said with such seriousness.  We laughed and shrugged it off as a joke, but perhaps at some level we believed it at the time.

True friendship often comes when it is least expected and least looked for.  It will sometimes catch us off guard and one day we will realize that a friendship has blossomed where we scarce knew a seed had been planted.  We might find ourselves thinking of doing things for people because we know that they will appreciate it.  The feeling is not of what will be earned in terms of future favors, not about the image that is being created, and not even about the feelings that come by doing something nice.  True friendship is knowing that a friend will appreciate what you have done because it helps them progress and become better.  And while the friendship isn’t about what we gain it is often the case that the result of a true friendship is a benefit to us, because friendship is mutual.  It grows as it reciprocates.  As you seek their interest and they yours you both are made better off.

I remember feeling alone and isolated.  I thought that there was no one like me, no one that thought and felt like me, no one that could understand me.  But then out of the normal and mundane there appeared a friend, then I found another.  Others soon followed.  In striving to love and serve them I have found I have been loved and served back. I trust my friends and sacrifice for them.  I want them to be happy.

I am who I am because of the friends that have come into my life.  Some of them I rarely or never see again.  But while their presence is not a part of my life, the impact they made will always be a part of me.  It is through friendship that I have become better and happier and helped others to enjoy the same.

No one is an island and nobody can be truly happy without friends. I believe in the power of friendship and that is why I try to be a friend to those I know.

(I wrote this in May of last year.  It was at the invitation of a friend to write an I Believe piece.  I just came across it and decided to post it.)