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not really a friend question, more of a reflection question
Wyoming, 18
Lately I have been issues with friends. I seem to constantly put myself in groups of friends with 3's. What usually happens is I'll be best friends with a girl, then another girl will come along, and then its a tug-a-war! For example, my best friend Alyssa is now living with a recent ex-best friend of mine - but since I have made it clear that i am not a fan of my ex- best friend, Alyssa has been not inviting me places, and becoming such great friends with my old one. Another example is I became friends with Callie who had a good friend - i wouldn't call them best friends - Sam. Callie was friends with Sam, but I started to get closer with Sam but still maintaining a best friend relationship with Callie. Then Callie and I got into a huge fight and yet again I was in the same situation fighting over Sam. Sam is stuck in the middle all the time, but she manages it well, unlike Alyssa. What am I doing wrong? I dont want to be exclusively friends with one girl and tell everyone else they can't be friends with us - and I do want to open the friendship up to other people but I'm still afraid people will steal them away. I mean - why do people steal friends? Is it a hobby? Do they see it as fun? Like wth? I dont know what to do. I like to learn from my mistakes and am obviously not getting the picture in this instance since its happening over and over again.
Please help. thanks alot!
- Holly
P.S. i have a reputation of being sincere. Like, I am a firm believer in not being fake, I am not going to act like I like you if I dont. That just doesn't fly with me.
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The only problem here is that you aren’t coping well with something that is normal. You are clinging to the Best Friend idea and the stealing people myth.
You are getting to a point in life where you are going to have let go of those ideas, and accept a bit more ambiguous and loose definition.
The best friend idea isn't necessarily a bad one, but it's also not very practical to put too much stock into it after your done high school. My best friends from High school and from University and I now don't talk too terribly often. We live in different cities, one of them has a child, and it’s tough to do what 'best friends' used to do when our lives are so different and far apart. But I don't love them any less. Now I have many friends, from work and classes I’ve taken and hobbies I’ve got, old roommates and new ones... I don’t feel I need to determine or find a ‘best friend’ among them. They are all great people who I have different kinds of connections with at different times.
People come and go out of lives for reasons we often can't control: New jobs, new apartments, new partners, new schools, even new values or new ideas! Some of the changes will mean a friend shifts or falls away. Some of these changes will bring friends closer! Some of them will be more serious breaches that end friendships in unpleasant ways, but it DOESN'T mean the friendship wasn't there to begin with. And it certainly doesn’t mean someone got stolen.
People don’t get stolen. (Well, except for the odd kidnapping case).
They change, evolve and move on. And if a person doesn’t want to change, evolve or move on, then they DON’T. If someone is no longer in your life, it’s because they made that choice. Just the same way if you are no longer in someone’s life, you made that choice.
So don’t beat yourself up if other people choose not to be as close to you anymore, or if you choose not to be as close to some other people as before. It’s a normal part of life. It’s especially normal in your late teens and early twenties, when everyone’s life is changing so fast and people are figuring out how they want to live, and who they want to live with.
Stop worrying, stop fighting and perhaps, stop calling people your ‘best friend’. Cultivate many friendships and let the chips fall where they may without taking it personally. Go many places and do many things with different people. If someone else feels torn between you and another person, don’t feed into that silliness. Just say “Look, I like you and want to hang out with you. Let’s just do that as much as we are able to and like too.”
That is all a friendship is, even a best friendship. So don’t layer a whole bunch more expectations on top of it. Let it be people who enjoy one another’s company seeking one another’s company, and avoiding the company of those they do not enjoy.
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