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More handpicked essays just for you.
The nature of friendship
The nature of friendship
The nature of friendship
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As I reach the seemingly boring age of 19, I am able to look back and reflect on how my choices in the past have gotten me to where I am today. One of the most significant decisions I have made in my life was to minimize my friend group. Now, losing friends is something you hear about before you even hit junior high. The common phrase is repeated over and over again, when referring to high school, “You find out who your real friends are.” As a scrawny little freshman, with no sense of reality, I refused to believe that that phrase would ever apply to my life. The end of my sophomore year is when my then, sixteen-year-old self, realized that that overused phrase was more relevant to my life than I wanted it to be. So I did something about it. The end of my second year of high school was an extremely significant moment in my life. I had realized that some of the girls that I swore were going to be my bridesmaids one day, were never actually there when I needed them to be. It became more evident as the years went on, who was there when it was convenient and who was there when I was not as …show more content…
I took a long, hard look at the people around me and figured out what their good attributes were and why they were significant in my life. When I figured out who they were as people and what they could give as a friend, versus what I needed as a friend, I made my decision. It wasn’t a decision that was said out loud or one that was publicized. I just directed my energy towards the people who needed my friendship in return for the friendship they had shown me. When I realized who was a true friend and who was not, it hurt. There was a lot of pain, knowing somebody didn’t care as much about me and my well=being as I had wanted them to. It wasn’t until later, that I realized they could still be in my life, just not as much involved it as they once
Many people think it is vital to surround yourself with a group of friends and to belong, especially when you are in high school. After watching the pilot episode of Freaks and Geeks, it is evident there are several great examples of interpersonal communication, as well as numerous types of friendships. These varying relationship examples will be discussed.
Identification with a peer group is a critical part of growing up because even though there is a mix between valuable and invaluable points, no one wants to be left with nobody to help them figure out how they fit in the world and get pass tough times. Peer pressure can have positive impacts and not so good but the postive are too valuable to overpass, leaning us over to conclude that classifying with a circle of close friends are a key factor when going into the real
At the beginning of the year the people I was hanging out with are amazing people, but they didn't make me feel welcome at the table. So in the first month of school, I had already switched tables. The friends that I migrated to are good people, who make terrible decisions. They made me feel pressured to hate certain people and act a certain way. I didn't realized how much this had affected my life until recently. Those friends made me feel like I had to have something wrong with me to be different, or fit in with them. When I finally realized what they were doing to me, I left. I moved to another table, these people are the best people ever. They reminded me that I don't have to have something wrong with me to be their friend. This point in my life was just a few weeks ago, and I already feel better than I have in a long time.
From a young age most people have gone through many relationships with other people who were not their family. Thus, we often acknowledge these relationships as friendships. But the word friend is too broad, so people categorize their friends to several types. In her book “Necessary Losses: The Lovers, Illusions, Dependencies and Impossible Expectations That All of Us Have to Give Up in Order to Grow”, Judith Viorst divided friendships to six types. Those are convenience friends, special Interest friends, historical friends, crossroad friends, cross-generation friends and close friends. In my life, I have been friend with many people since I was little. Although I have met all six kinds of friend of Viorst, convenience friends and close friends are two important kinds of friends in my life.
Naturally, human beings are social beings and cannot live without friends. Friendship is an essential part of the structure of human existence. Today’s people are seeking and participating in relationships because they believe that it is good to have friends so as to experience pleasure, to be honored, to be healthy, and to prosper in life. Even in the inferior kind of friendships, people cooperate for the common advantage or pleasure. Irrespective of qualifications, career, personal perspectives, cultural differences, and interests, all people seek for love and acknowledgement from others (Curzer, 2012). This means that at a particular time, every individual will seek for a friendship, whether based on utility, pleasure, or even virtuous
Before my years in high school, I rarely put time and effort into studying and constantly associated with my friends at school; that is until I entered high school. The different competitive atmosphere at high school caused me to suddenly prioritize my studies ahead of everything else and my ambition became greater than ever. I began to interact less with my old friends and become less sociable with those around me. My parents also began to notice this drastic change and encouraged me to once in a while contact my old friends. During the beginning, I contacted my friends about two or three times a week, but the phone calls began to gradually diminish. I began to abandon my previous cheerful, ebullient nature in order to conform to the competitive, tense study environment at high school. As long as I successfully accomplished my goals and was accepted by others, I was willing to alter myself in order to assimilate into the mainstream environment. Through my hard work and perseverance, I was able to reach my goal and receive the acknowledgement of others; however, despite fulfilling all my ambitions, I did not feel any joy or satisfaction within myself. Even though I successfully accomplished my objectives in school, I realized that in return I completely sacrificed my social life. Despite being accepted by others, I began to feel a sense of loneliness and longed to
Hanging with friends were always different because I only saw them on the weekends, but as a senior, I’m almost with tthem 24/7. Giving up these things were significant because working at a job, school work, and sports were always hard to balance around. But I guess it me a better person and more humble (Cliche). “He was fine during the ascent , but as soon as he started down he lost it mentally and physically. He turned into a real zombie, like he’d used up everything.” (Krakauer 254). This quote stood out to me because with all the “responsibilities” I had were all just so tiring and made me feel like
The issue that many adolescents face is the amount of time to spend with each person and when to spend that time with them. Many times, seeing friends outside of school can also be an issue for adolescents due to strict and overprotective parents, so for many, lunch time at school was the only opportunity that they could get. However, free time is limited in an institutional setting, forcing students to go through the pressure of having to choose between managing old friendships or spending time with new ones. As seen in the students at Raven Haven, this choice was one that required much thought as it could disrupt existing friendships. For example, Marina rarely socialized with her friends outside of school, knowingly angering Isabelle, while the other three would make an effort to do so (Amit-Talai, 244). As found throughout, Amit-Talai’s study, the organizational structure has the most impact on a friendship during the adolescent
This longitudinal perspective opens up the possibility that the peer social environment is one that is dynamic. Friendships can be added and terminated resulting in the number of friends reported changes from childhood into and through adolescence. Children moving from intimate elementary classroom settings into a broader age range of adolescents in junior high and high school increases the potential for developing friendships with older adolescents. At the same time, the quality of the relationships with these friends may also be changing. Adolescent relationships are becoming more intimate than those of childhood with the sharing of intimate feelings and being aware of the needs of others becoming a prominent feature of friendship during adolescence.
One of my most memorable event that took place while I was at High Point was during my junior year. I remember that I was going through a phase in my life. I was changing into someone who is stronger, ambitious, and more determine in life. This event occur over a period of several months. It involve some of my closest and best friends that I will ever have. This little incident had particularly changed the course of my life and would forever leave a mark in my life.
One of the greatest aspects of one’s life is the friendships made throughout the years. Friends are there to help comfort, laugh with, ward off loneliness, and to build up connections between other people. Amongst these attributes, friends at a young age help children to “build trust in people outside their families and consequently help lay the groundwork for healthy adult relationships (Stout, 2013, para. 14).” However, with the introduction of technology brings along social medi...
On that dreaded Saturday morning when my family and I were standing in a line that seemed at least a mile long, to get an elevator up to my room. I was certain that I would hate living in the dorm. All I could see was a billion and one girls in bitchy moods because it was taking forever to move stuff in. No one seemed friendly and I could just imagine all the girls with terrible attitudes, myself included, that day having to live together and never really getting a break from each other. I was ready to turn around and go home at any second. All I would have had to hear was "let's go" and I would have been out of there. After many trips to and from the car and countless m...
Growing up in school you have your friends in 1st, then in Jr. High, and then when you get to high school you might not even know or see your friends from 1st grade anymore. For the few people who’s had a friend from 1st grade till college I think that someone they need to hold on to because if they stuck with you through all them year I know they’re there for the right reason and there not just there for a season. As Elizabeth Dunphy says, “It’s the little things that matter, that add up in the end, with the priceless thrilling magic found only in a friend.”
Firstly, I now know that it’s okay to be interested in different things and to want to venture down a new path. There is nothing wrong with being alone in something because if it’s something you enjoy then it shouldn’t matter whatsoever. If I had followed my friend into things she enjoyed instead of things I was interested in, I wouldn’t have grown into who I am now. My empowerment in student council allowed me to receive multiple scholarships and gain the leadership experience that I travel with today. I feel that this was a personal challenge which allowed me to see my own potential. Secondly, I learned that it is okay for change to occur. Once I had created an attachment to my best friend, it was hard for me to understand the small-scale change we were undergoing. This lesson allowed me to make a connection with an article we read called How Friendships Change in Adulthood, written by Julie Beck. Beck discusses the hierarchy of relationships as peoples ages increase, and unfortunately friendships falls towards the bottom. She explains that during adolescence, there’s a lot more self-disclosure and support between friends, but they’re still trying to discover their personal identity. William Rawlins states that the unfortunate part of this is, “In adolescence, people have a really retractable self. They’ll change,” (Beck, 2016). Although Beck also notes that young adults have time to devote to their friends, they’re constantly changing. By growing up and moving onto bigger things, such as grade school to high school, our networks are also growing. This allows for them to experience new things and get to know new people (Beck, 2016). I feel that this is exactly what happened between Makayla and I. Thankfully, now I know that without change, there is no room for new knowledge or adventure. I believe that this allowed my attitude and behaviour to take on a more positive and confident role in
When I was in high school there was a mess up and I was not about to graduate. I found out at the end of my senior year that I was one class short of graduating. My junior year, I went to another school, then the beginning of my senior year I went back to the original school I grew up at. Come to find out, the other school