2006 Reflections: Friends

Warning! Melancholic posting ahead. Proceed at your own peril!

In the past year, I moved back to my hometown, leaving many good friends cum colleagues behind. Seriously, I had many doubts if I would make any new friends back in Seremban; after all, I was born here and I was just going back to the same place. I had no expectations in developing new friendships back here.

But God, in his strange mercy, has given me a new set of friends; in church, in my workplace, through existing friends and from an unexpected angle: blogging. For that, I am very grateful. And to think that at one point, I wanted to give up on friendship completely.

Developing friendships is a hard process; breaking down misconceptions, overcoming confict after conflict, overcoming unreasonable exceptions, learning to give and take, learning to forgive but in the end, I'd say, it is worth it. Friends will smoothen our rough edges and give us insights and maturity to step outside our narrow mindedness. As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

What are the key ingredients in nurturing friendships. If I had to narrow it down to three, I would say, sincerity, humility and a good sense of humour.

Sincerity:
For me, sincerity represents openness, honesty and the desire to make that friendship work. Pretenses, hypocrisy, falsehood and selfish motives slowly surface and drive a wedge into the relationship over time.

Humility:
Friendships is not about having your own way. It is not necessary to have other people to accept your point of view all the time. Relationships are not won based on winning arguments but on mutual respect and learning to see the other's point of view. And most important of all, without humility, there can be no forgiveness. Pride is the wall that stands between broken relationships.

Humour:
I think humour is an important element but it needs to be exercised in moderation. Isn't it nice to be able to see humour in a tense situation. To learn to laugh at ourselves and make fun of our silly human ways. Without humour, a relationship becomes very dry, like the desert without rain. No life.

Heh, the one thing harder than making friendships is maintaining it. Out of sight, out of mind, or so they say. People say; life is like that, people change and move on. How I wish it were not so. Oh for a memory that never forgets and treasures friendships and the resources to meet up whenever we can. Well, we have to accept our limitations.

To honor our friendships, I guess we shouldn't mope over the past but appreciate the fact that we have had the opportunity to establish those friendships. After all, who's to say, if God is willing, we shall meet again and pick up where we left off.