SISTA CHAT: Friendships

It's a new week, time to flourish!

This week we're talking about friendships! Friendships as adults are very difficult to come by and to keep. Women especially have a more difficult time than men, because we are more judgmental and find it more difficult to be nice to each other. Now, imagine attending an all women’s college and trying to make friends. Seems pretty insane right? Fortunately, I have made great friends and established deep connections with a few women, whom I am still in contact with today.

I think the misconception about friends is that we need A TON of friends in our circle. Not necessarily. Not everyone belongs in your “friend category.” There could be people in your life who are simply just acquaintances, a follower on Instagram, or they don’t have a category and they’re just someone you know.

I hear a lot of people misuse the term friend, and honestly, it’s not cool. It’s not cool to give someone friend benefits when they aren’t a good person, they aren’t someone you trust, you don’t value their opinion, or you just don’t know anything about them. Friends are like transactions—there’s a give and receive. If you’re constantly pouring into the friendship and the other person is not giving anything in return, then you’ll be left empty and dry. Those types of friendships can be exhausting!

Friendships require equal amounts of work. Meaning, there’s a shared bond and there’s an understanding of what values the friendship is founded on. If you became friends with someone solely for the purpose of wanting to be invited to their high-end functions, that’s a fake friendship. If someone only became friends with you because you give discounts to all of your friends, that person never wanted to get to know you and they just wanted what you could do for them. Let that sink in sis!

.

.

.

The reflection for this week is to evaluate your friendships. Are you being a fake friend to someone? Is someone being fake towards you? Why are you and a certain person no longer friends? Are your friendships genuine? Do you find yourself constantly losing friends? You will start to see patterns and start to see where the root of the problem is steaming from. You will be amazed at what you find.

Take time to self-reflect and do some analyzing about yourself and those you call your friends. I encourage you to pray about this and ask God to reveal how genuine, or how hardened, your heart is when it comes to friendships. He will speak to you, you just have to listen.