Friendship

 

Nietzsche once wrote:

 "We were friends and have become estranged. But this was right, and we do not want to conceal and obscure it from ourselves as if we had reason to feel ashamed. We are two ships each of which has its goal and course; our paths may cross and we may celebrate a feast together, as we did—and then the good ships rested so quietly in one harbor and one sunshine that it may have looked as if they had reached their goal and as if they had one goal. But then the almighty force of our tasks drove us apart again into different seas and sunny zones, and perhaps we shall never see one another again,—perhaps we shall meet again but fail to recognize each other: our exposure to different seas and suns has changed us! That we have to become estranged is the law above us: by the same token we should also become more venerable for each other! And thus the memory of our former friendship should become more sacred! There is probably a tremendous but invisible stellar orbit in which our very different ways and goals may be included as small parts of this path,—let us rise up to this thought! But our life is too short and our power of vision too small for us to be more than friends in the sense of this sublime possibility.— Let us then believe in our star friendship even if we should be compelled to be earth enemies.”

Today's text will be devoted to friendship.

Sometimes I wonder what makes us choose people whom we trust in the most important matters. Probably psychologists would have prepared answers based on research. I am not a psychologist and I have no education in this field, nevertheless, as I am curious about the world around me, I sometimes wonder about various issues.

The first and fundamental question we should ask ourselves is who we call a friend. It seems to me that it will be up to us. This term will have a different meaning for each of us. Either way, you can probably assume that this is a person who can be trusted and entrusted with some secrets about our lives. Are they all? Probably not, because really the only person who should be our best friend and who knows everything about us is ourselves.

Friendship is built through a combination of a person, a situation and a need. When we are in the right situation with the right person and we need to trust, friendship can emerge. An example may be a situation when we go through a difficult period in life and we feel the need to be able to talk about our emotions with another person, and we consider a person who will be close to someone who can be trusted. 

Perhaps most friendships are made in youth. I believe it is dictated by the fact that at the moment of shaping our personality we feel a strong need to self-define and emphasize our existence. It is at this time that the storm of emotions occurs and we feel the need to verify these emotions, or at least to share them. This is how friendship is born.

Is friendship for life? I do not know. Perhaps. Nevertheless, as we develop in life and our existence plunges forward, a process takes place that changes us as human beings. It means we are different. We change over time. Friends can develop in two completely opposite directions. And this is what Nietzsche refers to in the quote I quoted at thevery beginning.

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