What do I do when my love is away?
Does it worry you to be alone?
How do I feel by the end of the day?
Are you sad because you’re on your own?
No, I get by with a little help from my friends
(The Beatles – With a Little Help from My Friends)
Friends are a gift from God besides a family. Even though we are born and die alone, we still need a company to walk with in life’s journey. Especially when we are away from home, making friends is important so that we don’t have to have lunch alone and we have someone to call when we are in trouble.
In today’s society, we can easily spot a circle of friends. This term─circle─is lately used to define a group of friends usually on a specific occasion, for instance, a party circle, a study circle, or just a circle to eat together in a cafeteria. Being in more than one circle is not a problem, for we all have different friends for different matters in our life. As long as we can cope with the different characters in each circle, it’s fine. Having a circle also means that we have a group of supportive people, people that we can count on; and we have the assurance of not feeling ‘alone in a room full of people’.
Making friends is essential to expand our network. They can help us grow and experience a lot of new things. As we grow up, we have to make sure that we are surrounded by positive energy from people around us—since it also affects our mental health. We have the right to create a ‘standard’ for the type of people we want to hang out with and it’s not harmful to say ‘no’ to our friends. We can’t make them do what we expect or be what we want, but we must have self-control so that we know what is good or bad for us.
Friends come with different traits in different ways. Good or bad friends, we can’t tell it right away. I think one of the best ways to decide whether a person is bad or good, we can see through how their existence influences us. If a friend gives us a bad impact, makes us feel bad all the time, or simply just makes us uncomfortable around them, well, we can say that they are up to no good.
It is okay to be a little selective to choose who we want to be friends with since we know the best for ourselves. We know what we need and want, so we can design how our friendship will be. Selective doesn’t mean hanging out with only certain people and hating or avoiding the others. Instead, it’s about knowing who we want to take on our boat when we are sailing. We are the captain, so the control is in our hands. We know where the boat goes and we need people to help us reach the destination. Friends are supposed to flourish together with us, in a positive way of course.
Choosing friends that will stick with us for a long time is pretty much the same as choosing our spouse. We want them to be with us during our ups and downs. We might want them to have the same vibe as us so that we can converse a lot. We might also want them to be just mediocre and chill. But most importantly, we want a genuine and trustworthy person.
Relying on friends doesn’t mean we can’t be independent. It doesn’t mean we can’t do anything alone. We still can do everything alone. However, having with a little help from our friends, at least we know that we won’t be alone and we have someone to get our back at the end of the hard days.