The Friends We Keep...or Don't
I hear friendships are all the rage. Women going together on girls’ trips, celebrating milestone birthdays together, spending holidays together, meeting for regular lunch dates, and anything else you can think of that is better with a gaggle of girlfriends by your side seems to be happening all over the place.
Or maybe you’re one of those lucky women who are doing those things already. And to you I say “Brava and well done!” and all that. Then I must ask…how?
Truly. I need to know.
I seem to have more acquaintances and the occasional coffee date rather than who I would call “ride or die” friends. It’s my fault but I want things to change.
l know that creating lasting friendships takes a lot of time, trust, and vulnerability and that there is no “hack” to making these types of friends. So rather than waste any more time, I’ve decided to make this a priority this year.
As I reflect on why I’m lacking, I seemed to have spent a lot of my time either alone, within the boundaries of my nuclear family, or with women who my kids share activities with their kids. Rarely, and I mean rarely, have I spent a lengthy amount of time with anyone outside of that.
To me, women friends are like an elusive animal. I only see them in pictures on my phone and never out in the wild. The “we should get together” suggestions never materialize into actual plans. But then I think that maybe I am the elusive animal, that maybe I’m the one that refuses to come out of hiding?
I’m sure this is something that therapy could answer very easily for me but until then, I’m reading books about friendships and listening to podcasts on the subject. (A great place to go is the Dear Nina podcast — It’s ALL about friendship.)
Or maybe this is all natural at this time in my life. Maybe midlife is normally when women evaluate the status of our friendships. Kids are mostly grown or maybe off on their own and we find ourselves living life very differently than when they were little.
Our lives no longer revolve around their activities and our social circles are no longer determined by proximity or all the time spent around the parents of their friends, teammates, classmates, etc.
Maybe we’ve changed, maybe they have or maybe it’s just that what connected us is no longer the connector. So where do we go from here? Great question.
What I’m learning is that while we can have friends that don’t live near us and still maintain that friendship (texts, calls. planned visits., etc.) but we need to have people in our everyday lives that we can see, hug, talk and listen to. It just is what it is. And it can be hard when we’re in that transition phase of life and even harder when friends are in a different phase.
I have one friend who has one kiddo in college, two in different high schools, and a middle schooler all while running her own business. Getting together with her requires more than the Universe can handle.
I have another friend who is a single working mom and while days work better for me, weekends work better for her.
I have another friend who is just starting out her young life as a medical professional and business owner with a very booked social calendar. Her time is in high demand and I have felt almost guilty for asking for any from her. There’s also a big age difference between us but it’s as if our souls are the same age.
I don’t think finding friends is the hard part. It’s keeping them.
Friendships require trust, vulnerability, forgiveness, time, and proximity. And I’ve done my share of screwing a lot of that up.
For one, I’m not a great planner. Actually, I can plan fine it’s just that when I make plans in advance, it seems more often than not, something pops up and thwarts those plans. I find last-minute “hey, do you want to go to lunch or go for a walk tomorrow?” is more feasible. But it’s not great for relationship-building. If I always leave getting together to the last minute plans, there’s one thing that I’m sure is happening…my friends don’t think I make them a priority. So more time goes by and less time is spent developing my friendships to a deeper level.
There’s a lot of sadness around friendship for me. I’ve put myself in positions that ended up costing me one of some dear friends. Misunderstandings, assumptions, words received in ways I had never intended, actions never taken, and so on.
I recently had a conversation with an estranged friend about the origin of our dissolved friendship and it thrust me into a depth of despair, right back to that moment.
I went for a sunrise walk this morning and tried to process how I was feeling. I wanted to be upset that I was so easily thrown away. That my character and our history was so easily forgotten.
What I know now is that I allowed my own hurt to create a story that wasn’t true, yet I chose to believe it for years. Other friendships had faded over the years as well, providing proof of that the story I told myself was the truth.
I believed I was insignificant. I believed I was unloveable. I believed I was a horrible friend. I believed I wasn’t someone worth the effort of reconciling with or getting to know in the first place.. I believed I was misunderstood and always would be. I believed I would end up going through this life alone.
As the sun began to change the sky from indigo to an orange-streaked sky, I stopped and just watched. I stood there with all of those feelings swirling about and all I could do was be where my feet were in that exact moment. I can’t change the past and I can’t undo the things I’ve done that have led to where I am now.
All I can do is learn from it and love from afar. So the question I keep asking myself is "“Are friendships hard to keep or is it just me?” What makes me feel the most unsettled is that I’m 51 and still trying to find my people.
The answer is that it’s probably the latter. I know I’ve dropped the ball more times than I can count. I know that I hide away rather than risk rejection. But I also know that having close friends are worth the risk, worth the personal growth, and worth the work.
I’m not sure I have any answers here but I know that once you have “your people”, keeping them requires many things.
It requires honesty.
It requires vulnerability.
It requires forgiveness.
It requires time.
It requires needing others and expressing that need.
It requires letting go of the past.
And it requires an investment of time and shared experiences.
The thing I keep thinking about is that my soul is on this earth at this exact time as these other souls. This is like lightning in a bottle. We are all flashes in time and for us to be here in that same flash is not by accident.
So no more wasting time or energy wishing for friends to appear. They are already here and it requires me to do the work.
Put myself out there.
Have the conversations.
Make the plans.
Make the phone calls.
Handle the rejection and move on.
The friends I keep and who keep me are the ones will be with me the rest of my days. And they will feel like they’ve been with me the whole time. And it will be wonderful.
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Do you have a tight-knit friend group?
Please share in the comments the how, what, when and where these friendships formed and how you’ve kept it strong ever since!