Friends: Are you there?

Reading my favorite blogs is my daily activity to do either during my work hours that I don’t have things to do or after work and gym that I just lay on my couch. Each time, I have to say that I am inspired by those blogging people’s writing, and it prompts me to write something on my own blog. It also provokes my mind to respond to the subject that they are talking about and apply it to my personal life experience.

One of the comments said “Friends are people who care about you, worry about you and are there when you need them and you are there when they need you.” This comment was like hitting me in the face. I was born in a family of four sisters and me the only one boy and the youngest one. Part of me growing up, I did many things alone. I had friends but never became close with them. I would say they are good friends that I can talk to but just not close enough to share every detail about my personal life. It is not that I have a trust issue, but I tend to learn how to keep things to myself and draw a distance line between myself and others. Being in the United States alone, I have become even more independent than I would have imagined and done. I feel that as time goes by, I am allowing people to walk away from my life. There are those friends who care about me, worry about me and there for me when I need them, but why I keep pushing myself away from them? Is it an issue of losing common interests? Or something else?

I always want to help other people, and I want to be there when they need me, especially friends and family. I feel good when I am needed, but I don’t want to make this sound rigid that I have to do that because in life there are still a few exceptions. There are times that I want to be alone, and there are also times that I prefer to be alone.

However, I want to open myself more to friends. I also want to create more opportunities to make new friends. The beginning step of that is to be friendlier and more open-minded. You won’t realize how much a friend means to you when you do or see something that reminds you of that friend, and what you have done. Remember though that friendship is just like a relationship that involves giving and taking. If you only take, then the friendship is doomed to fail sooner or later. I say this heartfelt.