Role and Relationships with Friends

 In the last section, I shared my beliefs of the nature of relationships with friends, particularly when it comes to shared responsibility. However, I realized that interacting with friends emerges from a motivation that transcends responsibility, and in fact plays a role in fulfilling social needs for us humans. In this section, I’ll share the value of maintaining friends, and share my opinion of the nature of the relationship that should be maintained, while relating the discussion topics to my own life.

Like most people in the world, I suppose, I’ve had the opportunity to form and enjoy several friendships over the course of my life so far, beginning from my earliest recollections of my schooldays up till today. I feel friends are valuable to me because they are fun people I can interact with, and whose presence gives me joy. Around good friends, I can express myself freely, share stories, tell jokes, play games, and simply feel comfortable. I can also relate to them and their stories.

The nature of my relationship with my friends has been one typically characterized not by obligation or necessity, but rather a mutual friendly attraction and willingness to be around each other. Remembering my high school days, I feel that one aspect of the friendships that I formed was that their presence gave me comfort in places in which I otherwise often felt exposed or isolated, such as the school cafeteria during lunchtime.

Another positive impact of the friendships I’ve made is the opportunity to receive their help when I am in need, and to delight in the joy that comes from helping them in trying times. I’ve experienced such joys firsthand from both sides. I’ve often times asked for friends’ notes, and graciously been offered support or company by good friends. It feels especially nice to be approached by a friend when I am not in the highest of spirits and in need of cheering up.

It also serves as a boost in self-esteem to be asked by others for help. I’ve often been asked by others for help as well, such as in sending notes, explaining a concept, or showing my steps on a math problem. The nature of such an interaction strengthens the relationship with the friend, as gives me the feeling of compassion, which I realize is an important emotion for healthy mind.

I have a belief that friends and friendships are mostly, but not entirely full of joy, and that there is a small but nonneglegible aspect of them that can be problematic or troublesome at times. First is the feeling of envy, an emotion that I’ve especially experienced amidst changing relationships with friends. For example, having been nearly best of friends with a particular friend in 9th grade, I felt somewhat attacked and protective of our friendship after observing another friend seeming to become a closer friend.

Second is obsession, specifically asymmetric obsession, either one that I have with someone else, or that someone else has with me. I’ve encountered this both ways. The reason I was obsessed with someone asymmetrically (or at least I feel that way) was an attachment I had formed to the memories we had formed together earlier, while the friend did not regard them proportionally (now, it could very well be that I was the unreasonable one here). Being obviously obsessed over by a friend felt honestly quite uncomfortable, and the friend’s actions that he made while trying to get my attention felt uncomfortable.

Lastly is the aspect of unpredictability or manipulation. I have experienced these traits to a small in my friendships so far, but have gained novel experiences as a consequence of encountering them. One such instance when friendly behavior was unexpectedly met with a burst of anger, when my friend was provoked by the fact that I was bothering him while he was watching a video. I should have been a bit more respectful of his privacy, but I was considerably shocked to receive the anger-packed response that I did. The idea of manipulation has been a trait in barely one of my friendships, where I felt that my friend would disagree with me on several matters, sometimes merely for the sake of disagreement, and that when we encountered such situations, the friend did not share some of the values I did. I hesitate to call this outright manipulation, but can certainly claim that it helped me realize the importance of friends that share my values.

On the whole, I’m certainly grateful for the benefits that my friendships have brought about, and am eager to see how my friendships evolve into the future.