Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Friendship

"Who is my best friend?", I ask myself. Right now I don't have one. I've friends, I've good friends and I've acquaintances. I really don't have a close friend or a best friend. What happened?

"When was the last time I had a best friend?", I ask myself. The answer is... when I was 14. Immediately before I met the "bag guy", my favorite molester in the whole damn world! Since then, I had no friends in high school, 2 very good friends during my undergrad and 1 good friend during my masters. During my PhD, I've made 2 good friends who moved out of town. Another good friend has been downgraded to "just a friend". I'm in the process of making another good friend. But in all, since 14, I've not made any best friends.

"What happened?", I ask myself in vain. Have I lost something here? May be the ability to trust? Perhaps the naivety to allow someone to get close? How do I find out? Does it matter to find out? Does it need to change? Did I try to make א into my best friend? Why does any of this matter?

1 comment:

Karma said...

I've been thinking a lot about these issues myself. I also currently lack a best friend, but really long for one. I definitely think that trust is a big issue, and also the more that I have all of these issues, the more that I NEED someone, the more that I become too needy to let someone in. Personally, I also have a co-dependent tendency which also strangles a lot of friendships.

I think it matters a lot because friends are a support network. Friends are very important, especially best friends, especially when you don't have a very supportive family.

I'm trying to break it down into a spiritual practice of building friendships in little pieces/steps, trying to practice being a good friend and taking in feeling friendship or friendliness from others.