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The strong bond of friendship is not always a balanced equation; friendship is not always about giving and taking in equal shares. Instead, friendship is grounded in a feeling that you know exactly who will be there for you when you need something, no matter what or when. — Simon Sinek
Friendship As children, we made friends almost as easily as we breathed. Especially in kindergarten and first grade, we found friends easily and were willing to befriend even the most different among us.
As we grow older, the parameters for who could become our friend began to be run through a variety of filters. Race, religion, class, popularity, intelligence and where we once made friend easily, we started differentiating and friendships became harder to make and more easily broken.
Once we begin to work and have families, friendships tend to be the things which were held over from school, from college, from first jobs; our entertainments fall by the wayside and soon work may be our only source of friend-like individuals, people we are familiar with and are familiar with us. And if we stay in a job long enough, maybe they become friends or maybe they remain people we know at work.
By the time we are sending our kids off to college, we have only the few friends our lives allow us to maintain; church, work, a sport shared, a passion that has lasted the years. Instead of tens of friends, we are down to counting them on two hands. And then one hand.
And soon, unless we make a concerted effort, we realize we are alone. It is not surprising to find Americans reaching their fifties and discovering their surprising lack of close confidants, people who share their history, people who know them and accept them for what they are.
Studies are showing people are lonely. More lonely than they realized. A degree of loneliness which is starting to take its toll on the mental health of a nation. Despite the social media tools sweeping the planet and making connectivity as easy as turning on a computer, face to face friendships are suffering. And the lack is beginning to wear on the psychologies of people who have moved away from family for the sake of opportunity, moved away from their homes of their childhood and the networks of friends they grew up with.
Now with the expectations of working 40+ hours a week, kids, housework, two or three job households, the part of our lives that pay the price is time for ourselves and friendships. If the modern workforce doesn’t begin to realize people need time to have relationships outside of work, the psychological health of their workers will continue to suffer, reducing the quality and creativity of their workers.
This news, coupled with the recent information on “elder orphans”—adults who have divorced or never married and have little in the way of social interactions—means there is an entire generation of citizens who are alone, lonely and in need of a change of lifestyle to prepare for growing old, alone.
Friendship is more than a word. Humans are social animals, without regular opportunities to bond, share time and stories, interact and commiserate, we die. Science is proving this. We are dying of loneliness. We live longer, more solitary lives, dying by measures, in quiet desperation.
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What do you think?
Now that science has revealed this truth what do you think you need to do to make more time for friendship and outside interactions?
Will you change your lifestyle to bring more opportunities for friendship? Have you realized this on your own and made changes?
How have these changes improved your psychological health?
Do you have any strategies or techniques for making friends after 30, after 40, after 50?
When you’re ready to submit, click the red box, below.
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