Modern technology allows for an unparalleled level of connectedness to friends in different cities and states. Some people might still insist that "people move and friendships fade", but friendships do not have to disintegrate or vanish because of mere geographical distance. It is not an inevitable necessity that friends drift apart. It is not as if even in past generations long-distance friends could not communicate at all. Mail, though much slower, still existed. But in the modern era friends certainly need not drift apart due to geographical distance between them. They can stay connected and maintain an intimate relationship far more easily than a pre-21st century society could.
We have more tools to preserve friendships than ever before--email, phone calls, social media, Skype, texting, and so forth. If a person truly loves someone then he or she can stay in contact with that other person. At the very least, someone can tell a friend if he or she will be in a communication drought for a while due to some upcoming busyness or need for isolation, but to simply leave the life of a close friend without any warning or explanation is a selfish, cold thing.
Genuine friendships are--to different degrees, as people have different social needs and different friendship intensities--empowering, energizing, and life-giving, and it can become increasingly difficult to find intimate friendships as one grows older. Holding on to friendships may be difficult in some cases, but it can enrich one's life emotionally and spiritually in ways that are difficult to articulate. At minimum, in most plausible scenarios there is no reason for someone in an intimate friendship to not tell the other party that it may be a while before communication resumes.
The alternative to remaining in contact with close friends over time is ghosting them or being ghosted by them, which comes about when one party simply drops communication with the other, unpredictably and without emotional closure, a thing that can be extremely painful. I think I have been ghosted by a recently-acquired close friend who moved away. I would prefer losing a limb to losing her. And yet, for reasons unknown to me, and despite having been assured by her beforehand that she would text and call me, my attempts to talk to her have been met almost entirely with communication silence. This has caused me a great deal of mental anguish, and I do not want anyone else to experience something like this.
Recent experiences motivated me to write this issue. Not all friendships will or even can last a lifetime, but there is no reason for a person to not do his or her best to ensure that the closest of his or her friendships remain active, thriving, and fulfilling. I know that when I search for or find new friendships, I generally am intentionally looking for relationships that will last, deepen, and mutually grow both me and the other person. Becoming emotionally attached to someone only for that person to leave my life is not something I am fond of. What I aim for, and what I have found in some cases, are friendships brimming with me and my friend sharing both a deep intellectual/spiritual connection and an emotional/social one.
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