Let's Talk About: Adult Friendships

Photo by Antonino Visalli on Unsplash

 

Adult Friendships.

The word 'adult' denotes an expected maturity on the topic of 'friendships'. 

But the truth is. 

Everyone is still figuring things out. 

Especially on an abstract yet wide topic such as 'friendship'.

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There is no rulebook on what friendship is and supposed to be. 

Britannica defines friendship as:

friendship, a state of enduring affection, esteem, intimacy, and trust between two people.

Do your friendships fulfil that definition? 

Do you have friendships that fulfil that definition?

In all honesty, I don't think that there is a universal standard on what a meaningful and fulfilling friendship is.

What makes a friendship a meaningful one?

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I was sent this Reel by a friend recently, which linked to this article  on the topic of:

What Adults Forget About Friendship

Some key takeaways : - 

The situation

How most adults do friendship is: play catch up over a meal, most commonly.

Eat, catch-up over major milestones, have dessert maybe, have some small talk, and then part ways. 

Which is great. 

Until we become trapped in this idea that we need to make our time 'worth it'.

That everything needs to be driven on productivity and efficiency. Including our social calendar. The number of friends that we meet. The number of social gatherings that we can squeeze into our calendar. 

The presenting issue (?)

Viewing our friendships through a lens of efficiency makes our friendships feel transactional.

We are trading our time, effort and money for a semblance of a feeling that we are still connected to our friends, by this social thread called friendship. 

Not because we want to, but due to the scarcity of resources such as time and money.

As we try to juggle between work / studies, family, friends, time for ourselves and our hobbies - to a degree of what we deem to be acceptable / successful.

The issue of how 'many adults do away with the unhurried hangouts and imaginative play that make youthful friendships so vibrant'.

How many of us can say that we have vibrant friendships ... as we grow older year after year?

The antidote?

'Keep one another company for large stretches of time without a preset agenda'.

To re-introduce the concept of 'childhood whimsy' and 'magic' that we had as children.

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My thoughts

Personally, I admit I fall into this category.

Having everything in my life driven by my need for efficiency. 

Spontaneity is pretty rare for me.

Especially when I'm trying to juggle all my responsibilities and fit everything that I want to do in my schedule, planning is crucial and even necessary.  

To me, organization is key. 

Being efficient is required in order for us to be able to juggle everything we need well.

However.

I do think that there is something there to be learnt here. 

Why are children so happy? and so easily fulfilled?

Barring the fact that they have all their needs taken care of by their parents and not needing to work for hours in a day.

All they have and want is unhurried play time. Basically all they have to do in their day - is to play. Parents are also happy when their children are off playing by themselves, or with friends. 

I think, borrowing that concept from children, and applying that to adulting, is taking the attitude that everything doesn't have to be planned down to the smallest detail.

Spontaneity is alright, and welcomed. 

Perhaps there could be more room for that despite our busy lives.

Even to take a walk in the park or even to make a grocery run. 

To grab a friend to indulge in some unscheduled social time while running errands or to get our weekly grocery. 

To borrow aspects of our childhood, like spontaneity and childhood whimsy. 

To be open to new experiences. 

To be open to invitations. 

To indulge in leisure activities that may not necessarily be equated to being productive, i.e. doing a puzzle, playing a video game, playing a card game etc.

To buy that plushie that you've been eyeing, all because it's cute.

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Maybe we need to be childlike again.

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Resources

1.  https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2023/08/childhood-friendship-benefits-play/675158/ (you can read it here: https://archive.li/0GYrI)

2. https://www.instagram.com/reel/CxHj8Bws1BN/?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

3. https://www.britannica.com/topic/friendship#:~:text=friendship%2C%20a%20state%20of%20enduring,throughout%20a%20person's%20life%20span.