Let me tell you a secret.

Friendship is a funny relationship. We think it is so important and maybe it is, we are social animals after all. Yes, we need constant social companionship, it is important for our survival. What I really like about this relationship is that can you really know who is your real friend and who is just pretending. Sometimes we can, sometimes we can’t. But with experience we eventually learn to differentiate. My very first best friend and the longest running one has a weird history. Not going to bore you all with that, not yet at least.

It is always to have quality than quantity when it comes to friends and you will have lot of issues in finding and keeping friends. Just like love, friendship is tricky business. Lots of hits and misses, more than that it’s hard to keep them.

I may not talk regularly to my best friends, but that is who they are. Similarly, just like love it can be one sided. Believe me it is coming from someone who isn’t friends with a lot of people but a lot of people confide in. When I tell people I have 4 best friends they get confused, are they really best friends if there are so many?

Yes

As I grow up, go through different phases of my life I find different people. Some stick, some pass on. But the ones who stick even after passing on to the new phase are my best friends. Again, I may not talk to them all the time, or even for months. But I know I love them and so do they. My first best friend when I was in second standard, now finishing his MBBS, went to a different city after school. I still love him and we still talk, very rarely, but we do.

Another I met through our artistic talents. But became really good friends and he followed me to university because we both love psychology. But then I moved to another country. Another whom I shared many classes with and we got hooked in a heated mythology discussion and a new friendship was born. We became close over time and still keep in touch.

Lastly one I met in university, it all started with talking about a boy she like who was toxic for her. A new phase of life brings a new friendship.

Of course, I have had “best friends” who are no more that. But that time we were necessary to each other to stay afloat. Whoever it was in whichever phase of life, we both needed each other to stay afloat. But neither were pulling each other up.

But what was the secret I wanted to tell you?

See, it’s this friendship that rules our lives. Subconsciously we try to do thing so we can impress or retain our friends, or you’re just scared that they’ll spill their guts because they’re not your friends anymore.

It is the right thing to worry about, except if they really were the friends you thought they were, they wouldn’t spill even after the friendship is no more. So, take that as a learning lesson for future friendships.

Real friends not only are each other’s buoys, but allow each other’s ladders. Take what you might from this but if your “friendship” neither keeps you afloat nor lifts you. It’s acquaintanceship.

Or you can say they are your friends not best friends.

Best friends are the best kind of families.

When my friends became my best friends, we both needed each other, but we knew it is true friendship when we stuck together even after not needing each other. That is when they became family.

This is for you my family: Sanil, Mohit, Shoubhik, Anwesha

Jahnvi