Answering the Question: That's What Friends Are For
Trying to identify the four pillars of healthy friendship, and sharing some excerpts from Gina Chung's debut novel.
This week saw a change to my journaling practice (maybe you saw my Note about it) brought about due to the gifting of a branded journal from my friend, Piera.
Lately my routine had been to journal in the mornings, anchored by the fact that I’ll usually prepare these newsletters on Sunday and Friday mornings, so the space is already in my schedule. But this journal landed in my lap at a time when I’ve been reevaluating my routine for two reasons: 1) my sleep schedule has been off so I’m trying to develop a new evening ritual and 2) my journaling has become skewed towards personal probing and reflection, leaving out a bit of the historical elements that are more common of a diary.
Receiving this gift felt like a good opportunity to pause and try something different. While I continue my deeper morning journaling, I now use this journal as a way to unwind in the evenings and reflect on my day. What I did, what it felt like, who I was with. I’m keeping a diary. I’m glad to be able to have this as a ledger of what my life looks like. Plus I now have two distinct spaces in which to process: a morning routine that is meant for deeper exploration, and a lighter, evening one for gratitude and appreciation.
All this thanks to a friend.
Speaking of friends…(what a transition, right?)
Let’s take a dive into this week’s prompt.
What do you think a healthy friendship looks like?
Answering the Question: 4 Pillars of Friendship
Not sure what’s going on in the universe, but recently the artwork I’ve been consuming on a weekly basis has had oddly direct correlations to that week’s journaling prompt.
This week I finished reading Gina Chung’s debut novel Sea Change (consider reading it for sure). In it, the protagonist, Ro, shares a close relationship with her cousin, Rachel. Here’s a snippet that stuck with me.
This passage smacked me. Why? Firstly, because I’ve been Tae before. I’ve tried to make things better, tried to solve the problem, rather than hold the emotional space for what someone is experiencing (and I’ve seen a number of articles that describe this as being very common among men). In hindsight, I see why that’s wrong. Solutions aren’t always what we need. Moving directly to a solution avoids confronting someone’s response to the situation, something that indirectly invalidates it. It’s as if to say “How could you be upset? This problem is so easily fixable. See? I fixed it already!”
That may be true, but it’s also true that someone expressed pain at the incident in the first place, and that deserves to be honored. Then you can fix the problem. There’s likely some correlation between the desire to move to solutions and a discomfort with confronting emotions, but I’ll leave that to be explored in another post.
The main reason I underlined this passage is for the way that Rachel does not assume what Ro needs but, rather, asks. In an effort to eliminate a response that may be a projection of her own needs, I appreciate that Rachel gives Ro the chance to express her wishes in that moment. That’s a good friend (well, family member in this case).
In journaling this week I tried to identify what I think are the hallmarks of good friendship, and then to go on my own journey to identify when I have (and haven’t) lived up to that, who shows up in these ways for me, how I acknowledge them, etc.
Today, I’ll share what I think these pillars are. I wrote down many characteristics, but most could be grouped together, and ultimately four things rose to the top.
#1: Reliability
“You can count on me.”
It’s as simple as that. A good friend should be someone you can turn to in a moment of need and know they’ll catch you. It is not predictive. Like Rachel, a good friend will ask what you need and find a way to deliver on it. They may stumble and tumble in their effort to fulfill, you may have to learn what that looks like together, but they will always be by your side in the pursuit of that.
#2: Mutuality
I’m not sharing a major insight when I say that no relationship is always 50/50. But a relationship should never be perennially one-sided, always 80/20 or 90/10. While imbalances can exist at any point in time around who is giving and who is receiving, they are elastic. These differences are the aberrations that then revert to the norm, or balance out when the roles are in reverse.
#3: Feedback
Feedback in friendship takes many forms, and a lot of what I consolidated when free writing falls into this category.
Friendship needs to be a safe space to share criticism, concern, feelings, etc. without it taking a long-term toll on the strength of the bond. Certainly there are boundaries and other considerations in how this is delivered, but friendship without feedback is friendship without growth. And friendship should never keep us in one place, it should lift us up.
Friendship also requires honesty, which is inherent in feedback. You must be able to share your needs, express your discomfort, and tell the truth, even when it might be painful.
Think about the story I shared earlier this week. When my friend did a poor job checking in with me while my father was in the hospital, I let him know that it hurt me. He appreciated my honesty and adjusted his behavior accordingly. The strength of our friendship meant that neither of us allowed this to take a toll on our bond. For him it was a data point on my needs, and for me it was a growth opportunity to express those needs. Our friendship remains as strong as ever.
#4: Love
Could this be feedback? Yes. But it’s too important to collapse into something else.
Good, healthy friendship means regularly expressing your feelings to one another, and reminding each other of them, unprompted. My younger friends often tell me my content sharing (yes, sharing of memes is a love language) gives cringe-y aunt energy, but I don’t really care. If it’s cringe to tell you often and unsolicited that you, my friend, are amazing, and I love you, then give me cringe or give me death.
So, what say you. Think these are critical parts of friendship? Did I miss anything? What does healthy friendship look like to you? Drop me a note, or hop into the comments and let’s discuss.
Something for the Weekend
Again, let me endorse Gina Chung’s book, Sea Change. There’s one other passage (well, there are a lot of passages I loved, but this is of those applicable for this community) I want to share with y’all.
Sharing this because I think it’s something we all need to be reminded of.
I know this resonates with me. I’ve been on sabbatical for about ten months now and I often kick myself for taking this time. But then I’m reminded of why I didn’t just hop right into the next thing: I needed time to recover. The whiplash of the way in which my last endeavor ended, the emotional toll of 2020-2022 (COVID, losing a parent, moving across the country, ending a long-term relationship) left me spent, and it’s okay that I’m not ready for anything else right now.
Hope this is a helpful reminder for one of you out there.
See you Sunday friends!
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