Sharing in Friendships

Few relationships can transcend the intimate and powerful ones that we often have with family members. But a true friendship is one such relationship that can not only wonderfully supplement us with a great deal of love and companionship, but also serve as an extension of family relations. Keeping a good friendship alive and well is certainly no easy task. It requires an emotional investment, an opening up of the heart, respect, care, and very importantly, communication. Many people underestimate the importance of sharing in a friendship. Whether it is exchanging ideas, speaking about intimate stories or experiences that may cause you both to cry and laugh together, sharing is a vital aspect to friendships because that act of trust helps to unite two people together.

One only has to imagine where all friendships begin. Two people start off as strangers. What eventually forms a bond of friendship is a willingness by both parties to drop their defenses and share a little about themselves or their experiences. Through this act of vulnerability, a mutual respect and common bond is formed. Sharing something private and personal with another person demonstrates probably the greatest show of faith and trust. It is what distinguishes a "friend" from a mere "acquaintance" you only speak casually and formally to. The deep friendship between a husband and wife can only survive if communication is open. But only between friends can wives intimately discuss their different marital experiences and pose solutions to problems in their relationships with their husbands. Sometimes it is only a good friend you can confide in after you have just experienced your awkward or magical first kiss. Around friends, you should ideally be able to be yourself and reveal even some of the more embarrassing tidbits about your life that you may not want even a family member to know. Good friends are the ones we go to when we have grievances with the very family members we love. They are the ones who give us advice on what to say or do when we can find no other path.

However, in the same way that the act of sharing can form relationships and maintain them, not sharing with your friend can damage or destroy a relationship. Somewhere along the line, trust diminished. Somewhere along the line, a person started keeping all their problems inside rather than confiding in a friend. Inevitably, putting up such a wall will not only hurt your friend, but also hurt you in the end if you wind up losing a valuable friendship. Good, long-term, faithful friends are hard to come by. Too often, people allow friends to slip away from them, whether it is from growing guarded or distant, or simply by not keeping in contact enough. There will always be misunderstandings and arguments between friends, and in order to keep the peace, each person has to communicate what they are feeling. In a true friendship, one where you can let your hair down and be yourself no matter what, and where you can say how you feel without being judged, communication is often times the very glue that holds together that strong bond.

One must also be careful to avoid one-sided friendships. Sometimes a person will be more forthcoming and honest about their life, but the other more guarded and unwilling to reciprocate any intimate information. Not only does this lack of trust create problems in a good friendship, it shows an unwillingness in the withholding party to tame their insecurities and fears around this person they have chosen to call "friend."

Maintaining any sort of relationship can be a daunting task. But in order to find a real, precious gem, we must sift through the fake ones. In order to keep it shining once we have found it, we must work to keep it polished and clean. The bond that holds relationships together in general is communication. Communication amounts to sharing what you are truly feeling inside. A willingness to communicate amounts to having faith and trust in the other person. Indeed, good friendships are much too hard to come by, but unfortunately far too easy for some people to let go of.