On Maintaining Friendship

It’s been so long since the last time I had a meaningful conversation with my friends, especially the ones I used to be close with. I’m not gonna play victim and act as if they treated me so bad and left me behind. In fact, I’ve been acting distant lately, and perhaps so have they. It’s safe to say that I have no faintest idea of how they’re doing if it’s not with the help of Instagram and Twitter. Social media indeed has strange way of making us feel like we still know each other’s life when in reality we barely do anymore.

To begin with, in the past several months I haven’t reached out to some of my friends and haven’t replied to their messages to the point where they might assume I ignored them on purpose. Maybe in a way, I did, but not to all of them. I’m a horrible friend and seriously screwed up. I’m really sorry for that. I’m sorry that things haven’t been so great lately. I might come off as uncaring and selfish. I won’t be surprised if some of them no longer consider me as their friends. I get it. I can’t expect anyone to stick by me when I don’t do my best to keep in touch with them and give them the attention they deserve to get.

Friendships are fragile and require active maintenance, or they’ll die. I guess I’ve let it happen more than once. I started to read some articles about how to maintain a friendship so maybe I can still save the remaining friends that I think I still have. Keeping in touch is said to be the fundamental aspect of it, especially when it comes to maintaining a long lasting friendship. It sounds pretty doable though, but I don’t know how to do it. The people I’ve been best friends with until now are the kind of low maintenance friends, and I’m also a low maintenance friend. We don’t always talk to each other every day. We could go months without seeing each other. But we always give the reassurance that we still have each other.

As a trash texter with mild depression, it’s hard to imagine what I have to do to keep the friendship alive when the very basic thing like reaching out to friends, responding back to their messages, or making phone calls can feel so overwhelming sometimes. My close friends came from various background with various upbringing. Each of them carries different set of personality. I have friend whom I can do crazy things together, and I have friends whom I can sit for hours doing nothing but enjoying each other’s company while telling about our secrets. As much as they seem to be diametrically oppisosite, they’re very understanding towards my habit. They never call me out for being not fun when I’m not really up to do anything. That’s the kind of friends that I need in my 20s. I’m only two years away from quarter life crisis so I’m constantly trying to avoid the gravity to fall into it while preparing myself for the probability of experiencing it. No wonder I’m always exhausted.

Talking to my friends has tremendous benefits for my health and psychological well being, as well as broaden my knowledge and perspective. But the crux of the matter is, what kind of friends? Obviously not the ones who drain my energy, make me feel uncomfortable, guilty, insecure, and remind me of all the things I don’t want to be associated with anymore. Even though I’ve forgotten about why I stopped talking to certain people, not all of it was due to some major or minor problems. Sometimes it just happened. We lost the interest to continue the conversation, we started to reply a little longer than usual and finally we never heard anything from each other until our birthday –if we both happened to know each other’s birthday and remember it.

Humans are changing throughout life. The friends you used to do crazy things together apparently have changed and no longer into it. They friends you used to see eye to eye might no longer be on the same page as you about everything, or no longer share the same interest, value, and point of view, which later cause the friendship to be no longer enjoyable. The friends whom you used to stay up late with and talk about everything became person you no longer feel comfortable to spill your guts to.

After witnessing the end of my friendship with a few people, I came to realization that not all friendships are meant to last forever, no matter how good it used to be. Sometimes things are better left as mere memories. We aren’t meant to keep every friend we make, sometimes their chapter in your life is done because they only belong to certain version of yourself. Maybe someday they will end up showing up again in another chapters of your life.

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Things I Like and Dislike About Myself

Hey, I’m back to continue this challenge. I’m going to write down some of the things that I like and dislike about myself. I thought I’d do this challenge to help me appreciate the good things in me, not in an arrogant way but simply in a self respecting way, since it has been something that I’ve been struggling with my whole life. And I’m also going to write some of the things I dislike about myself, in the hope that in the near future I can do something to change that, or perhaps find a way to accept that. Knowing what you like and dislike about yourself is a very important basic key when it comes to improving yourself. Strengthen your strengths and change what needs to be changed. And in order to do that, you have to know what kind of person that you are.

Here are four things that I like about myself:

1. I’m generally a positive-thinking person, and I always try to see the good in every situation, especially in the most difficult one. It’s never that simple, but it doesn’t have to be all that complicated either. It can be started from trying to be the least judgemental that I can become and keep myself surrounded by people who believe in staying positive.
2. I forgive; always. I don’t hold on to grudges. I just want to live, learn, and move forward.
3. I’m a good listener and a good problem solver, at least that’s what my friends told me. Perhaps that’s what makes them come back to me when they’re facing a problem.
4. I’m quite independent and I can enjoy time by myself. I think I’ve mentioned a couple times about this in my older posts.

And now it’s time to write down what I dislike about myself, but i’ll try to include the positive things in them instead of merely mentioning them.

1. Sometimes I give up too easily. I don’t always finish the things that I start and it can be a problem. The main reason I said that is because I haven’t finished my law degree. But if I try to look at the bigger picture, there are many things that I finished and achieved, like finishing my animal science degree in 4 years and two months, so it’s not entirely true. Instead of letting it defines who I am, I’d like to call it as a process that I have to go through in order to know who I want to be and what I really love. But however, I still need to be more resposible whenever I choose to start something.
2. I’m sort of reluctant to ask for help even when I need it. I usually just accept the help when it’s offered. I like to help people but I don’t like to ask for one. Sorry if it doesn’t make sense. But fortunately, I’m SO blessed to have friends who care enough to offer help. Honestly, I don’t know whether it is something that I’m supposed to like or dislike, not sure if it’s shame, selfishness, or stupidity. But since some of my friends complained about it, I think it’s something that needs to be changed.
3. Sometimes I still unconsciously compare myself with others. I know it’s human nature to always compare yourself and to see that the grass is always greener on the other side, but it doesn’t make it okay to keep doing that. It’s toxic. That’s why I always keep telling myself to focus on improving myself rather than feeling sad due to my bad habit of comparing myself with others.
4. My commitment issue and how I always tend to push people away when they get too close with me. I’d like to think that it has something to do with my depression. Or maybe I’m such a shit person on the inside.

That’s that. I could write up to five or more things if I wanted to, but those things I wrote above are enough to represent me.