Not everyone has an understanding of how to be friends correctly. Some people are destined to come and go from our lives, remaining in it for a short period of time. But others have the potential to become your best friends for a long time and grow with you throughout your life. One way to maintain and improve friendships of any level is to actively nurture them. Follow these 5 tips to keep your friendship strong and long lasting.
Extroverts and introverts
All people are divided into two types: extroverts and introverts.
If extroverts are open to the world, they are ready to share their thoughts, emotions, experiences, it costs them nothing to approach any person and start a conversation with him, then an introvert is a closed person who prefers to be alone with himself, trusting mainly only himself.
It is not common to find pure types that have the behavioral characteristics of only one type. More often than not, two opposites coexist in one person in unequal proportions.
Each type has its own problems. For example, extroverts may suffer reputational consequences for being extremely open or trusting the wrong person. Extroverts also expect a lot from people and from life, so there is a risk of being disappointed at some point.
Introverts are often compared to a snail and a turtle - creatures that, in case of danger, hide in their own home in the hope of isolating themselves from the entire hostile world. Hiddenness, isolation, being outside of society are some of the biggest problems of introverts.
But there is also that trouble that any person can have, regardless of his psychological type. This is the problem associated with not having friends.
What types of friendship are there?
Friendship implies a type of relationship between people, characterized by interest in each other, joint leisure and mutual support.
Friendship plays an important role in the life of any person and has a great impact on his well-being and health. The very realization that there is someone in your life who will always help with practical advice or warn against a fatal mistake instills in you a feeling of being in demand and needed. Even if you haven't started your family yet, having a trusted friend will ensure that you don't feel alone.
Surprisingly, friendship is a multifaceted phenomenon and is divided into several types:
- Partnership. This type of friendship is most often found between colleagues within the work environment. Colleagues united by one idea or a common goal can find a common language and begin to communicate more closely. True, all their conversations will most often revolve around the work sphere. If one of the friends changes jobs, then such a friendship is more likely to fade over time.
- Friendship relationships are built under the influence of long periods of time together. A striking example of this type of friendship can be considered the relationship between fellow students or neighbors. Friendship can also be called superficial friendship. People seem to communicate, share news on topics that interest them, but they don’t delve into each other’s problems and don’t plan to get even closer.
- Unequal friendship. You have all at least once seen an example of such friendship: a beautiful friend and a not so beautiful one, a successful leader and his wingman friend. Some people with low self-esteem often make friends with more successful and attractive people, hoping to increase their popularity. Unfortunately, time shows that in such relationships, the more prominent person uses the unequal friend to his advantage.
- Children's friendship. One of the most common types of friendships that can begin at a very early age. Children grow up together, learn new things, and if they find the strength to pass all the tests life has in store, they have every chance of maintaining their friendship for many years.
- Family friendship. This is also a very common type of friendship. Families can be friends with each other, sometimes even for generations. They go on vacation to the seaside together, meet on weekends at the dacha and often dream of becoming related through marriage between children.
- Spiritual intimacy. The most desirable type of friendship. People can meet and from the first minutes of conversation understand that they are kindred spirits. They don’t even have to finish the sentence to the end; they will already understand each other. Such friendship does not depend on external factors, habits or distance. Even if friends are separated by thousands of kilometers, they will still invisibly feel each other’s support.
Important
Friendship can also be classified as male and female, but the only difference is that representatives of the fair sex are used to sharing their experiences, complaining about life and asking for advice.
Why are friends needed?
It seems clear why a person needs friends, but it is worth recalling once again the benefits of true friendship.
With a close person - a friend - it is pleasant to spend the happy hours of your life and it is not so scary to experience unpleasant moments in life;
A friend is a person with whom you can be yourself. Even if everyone else thinks you're weird, you still don't step out of your comfort zone. Sometimes the friends remind one of the strange possums Eddie and Crash from Ice Age, but while they are together there is no strangeness, a certain friendly atmosphere;
You can share almost everything with a friend: your favorite activity, a good movie, pizza, joy and much more.
Friendship is about small pleasant moments, for example, as the group “Alai Oli” sings, “if you run out of food, your friends will not leave you.” Close people often make each other happy for no reason.
Friends support you in difficult moments and help you with things you can’t handle on your own.
You can trust a friend and tell about your most secret things.
