On friendship

Friendship is knowing that you’re sharing the world with somebody else.

I am extremely lucky to have friends. I never, ever take that fact for granted, and am fully aware of how insanely blessed I am to be to be able to say that about my life.

I wrote an article today trying to justify a recent academic/career choice I’d made. In the end I concluded that while you should try to find a job that makes you happy, perhaps there wasn’t such a thing as a ‘calling’; that concept seemed to echo deterministic, religious ideas about fate and destiny, ideas I don’t believe in. I wrote ‘we shouldn’t feel like our life can only have meaning or value when we work out what our ‘calling’ is.’ If we reject these ideas entirely though, how do we make sense of our lives? How do we give them any meaning? What does my life mean, if I concede that my choices have been thoroughly contingent and that almost any career I choose will be as morally insignificant as any other?

The answer lies in human relationships. The paradox of human existence is that we are constantly surrounded by other people and are unable to escape from them, but at the same time we are also trapped in our own heads. I am an extremely manic, driven, over-ambitious, anxious person. I also study philosophy. I therefore spend most of my time so consumed by my own thoughts that I almost forget the world actually exists independently of my mind.

Except my friends stop that from happening.

Friendship does not mean loving everything about someone. No one is perfect, and while you shouldn’t let people treat you badly, you shouldn’t pass on friendship opportunities simply because there are elements of someone’s personality that annoy you. You shouldn’t hold out for a friend who is just like you, either. Friendship is not about finding your doppelgänger; someone does not have to be similar to you in any shape or form to be your friend.

Friendship is not about spending all of your time with somebody, living in each others’ homes, eating all your meals together, or being physically affectionate with each other. Nor is it constant communication, be it face to face, on the internet or through the phone. Friendship isn’t remembering birthdays, or holding someone’s hair while they’re sick, or supporting them through personal crises. Friendship is not the knowledge that you’ll attend each other’s weddings, have dinner parties, cheer each other on when you succeed in your careers and introduce your children to each other. These are all common, beautiful elements of friendship, but they do not define it.

I can’t ever disappear completely into my own thoughts, because I’ve let other people in, and they’re sharing a tiny part of my experience with me. Having a friend is the equivalent of opening a window in your life, letting someone in, letting thoughts and attitudes and memories and dispositions mingle. Friendship is being comfortable and vulnerable at the same time.

Friendship is knowing that you’re sharing the world with somebody else. It’s being able to sit in an empty building, in an empty town, and to have not spoken to anyone for days, yet be quietly reassured by the knowledge that someone else is in the world with you. Not another physical human being, but another mind, a confluent stream of consciousness whirring away.

Friendship offers you escape. Having a friend means you’re not confined to your own mind. You know that if you did want to share your thoughts, they’d get them. Even when your experiences don’t overlap directly, they’re connected. Friendship is about joining forces and facing the world together, be it laughing at private jokes, exchanging knowing looks across a room or just being quietly comforted by their proximity.

At the same time, friendship is also an anchor. We are constantly juggling just trying to survive with finding or imposing a meaning on our lives, and at times this is pretty overwhelming. Friendship is something solid, it’s a source of reassurance and rootedness. It’s something to cling on to, and a reminder that life has significance outside of you.

I love my friends from the bottom of my heart. Some I’ve known for a couple of years, others for over a decade, others for my entire life (ie my family) and I am extremely grateful every single day for knowing them, and for their kindness, openness, warmth and honesty.

Sometimes the bonds of friendship stretch, and sometimes they break. A friendship does not have to be permanent, and can still be of profound value no matter how shortlived. There is also a level of friendship that, however much it stretches, however much it seems like it’s broken, will last forever. I have friendships that I know are completely and utterly permanent, and I could not fathom these friends not being a part of my life. A friend can become a part of your own identity.

Friendship is the most powerful and significant aspect of the human experience. Woodrow Wilson said it’s ‘the only cement that will ever hold the world together’. It’s a gift, and it’s something we should treasure every single second of our lives.