Wednesday, October 22, 2014
I thought it was interesting how we were comparing long distance friendships those that are more convenient. Do you think that it is necessary for whatever attribute formed the friend to be constant to maintain the friendship? For example, would you still have to see or maintain contact all the time with a good that you saw everyday at school in order to maintain that friendship. Or if one of your friends from a high school sport team you hadn't seen in a while stopped playing that sport, would you still be able to be friends. Are common values, activities, et cetera crucial to maintain a successful friendship?
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I think that common values are crucial to maintaining friendships. The reason you became friends with the person on the sports team or the person in your math class was because you were in that setting together and you had that in common. I played soccer my entire life and realized that it was easier to be friends with other people who played soccer because that was what we spent our time doing; it was more convenient for us to be friends than to be friends with people who participated in other activities. Common activities and values are crucial to maintaining a successful relationship because without them, the commonalities between the two people start to dwindle and there is nothing left to base the friendship off of. It is easier and more convenient to be friends with people who have things in common with one another as opposed to people who have opposite interests.
ReplyDeleteI believe that it is easier to be friends with people you see all the time because it is more convenient. However, I do not believe that these types of friendships should be looked down upon. As you continue to see that person, your friendship grows stronger because of the experiences you have with that person. I also believe that the reason we are friends with certain people is because we have certain values and interests in common and I do not believe that is a bad thing. I believe that is why we are friends with those types of people. If you didn't agree with a person
ReplyDeleteabout his or her viewpoints and didn't have anything in common with them would you really be friends with them? Yes, I do believe that people can be friends with people and not agree with them one hundred percent of the time, but I believe you need at least one thing in common, to bond over, to become friends.
-Amanda Alcamo
I think that having common values, activities and things of that sort are not necessary to maintain a successful relationship but they certainly help build a relationship and they can be beneficial to a relationship. For example if you meet someone through some common activity such a sport, and that person does stop playing the sport, it is possible that you have already formed a relationship strong enough to last even if that common activity is no longer relevant. I think this is something we have all learned by going away for college. The one main thing you had in common with your friends in high school was that you all went there together and suddenly you could be spread out across the country at various universities. What I have realized is that those relationships that were better formed (perhaps based off of more than just common activities, or were based off of multiple activities) tended to survive the distance and separation but those that were based solely off of common activities tended to falter. It seems to be relative to each different relationship.
ReplyDelete- April Currey
While long distance relationships certainly can be maintained for a while via similar personalities and activities, I do not necessarily think that they have the potential to work long term. With the friends that you see daily at school (and eat meals with, go out with, etc.), you are building your friendship stronger each and every time that you share an experience together. On the contrary, with long distance friendships, you might see this person only several times a year. Despite the fact that at one point in your life, you may have been best friends with this person, you are only sharing a small fraction of your life experiences with this person now; therefore, you have less to relate to and less to talk about. So, again, while this friendship certainly may be maintained, at the same time, it doesn’t really get the opportunity to grow. To answer Drake’s question, I think that the most crucial attribute of a friendship that must be kept constant in order for it to work would be a shared environment; without this, there would be no shared experiences, no matter how similar the personalities/activities are.
ReplyDelete-Maureen Paglia
I think that this is a tricky question. It is certainly possible to maintain long distance friendships and it is important to have relationships with those in your every day life. I think that there are different levels of friendships which require different things. And different people who view friendships differently.
ReplyDeleteWhile someone may need a best friend to talk to every night or only when life becomes difficult or noteworthy, others may need constant attention. What would be a good friend to the first person would not be someone attentive enough for the latter. I would argue that sometimes people need people, not hobbies. For example, someone going through depression or a hard time may create a friendship with someone soothing, a good listener, someone willing to offer kindness. This friendship won't derive from a shared sport or a shared club, but could just be people uniting because they simply need each other. This is the same thing as when someone is new to a school and they become friends with people who reach out to them, because he or she needs them.
I think this is an interesting question because there are so many factors which go into a relationship and so many different personalities which keep them. Perhaps the most crucial attribute of a friendship is an equal sense of necessity and trust, or perhaps it varies with each individual's state in life, mood and circumstance.
-Amanda Eliades
I agree with Maureen. Maintaining common environment is crucial for friendship to grow and succeed. It is proven that the environment in which you grow up in plays a huge role in determining your character. Friends become a major part in the environment we grow up, whether it is friends from home, camp friends, or people we see every couple of years. All the relationships you go on and form with these friends are dependent on your surrounding and the environment in which the friendship forms in. For example when I was younger around 3rd grade I was part of a friend group of about 10 kids. Then in 6th grade one of my best friends in this friend group moved away to Hong Kong. The remainder of us in the friend group continued being best friends and “grew up” together going to the same school and remaining very close throughout the years. We shared in so many experiences together and our friendships helped each other grow into the people we are today.
ReplyDeleteOver the past summer our friend who had lived in Hong Kong for the past 10 years moved back into our town and reentered our group of friends. While everyone tried to act like nothing had chanced it was evident that he had missed out on such a large portion of what we all had experienced together throughout the past years that our relationship with him had changed drastically. Even though we all tried to remain in contact with him, it was extremely different and he had an entirely different childhood and upbringing then us because he lived such a different life. That shows how maintaining the same environment is crucial for a relationship to succeed. He was no different than any of the other people I remained close with, it just was the fact that he did not grow up with us and share in all the same experiences we did and therefore our friendship never fully grew.
I think that a friendship that is able to last after the discontinuation of a shared activity it is more likely to be a complete friendship. Also, if people can go a long time without seeing each other and manage to keep up the relationship it is most likely a complete friendship. A friendship does not necessarily have to end when two people no longer have that same shared experience because if a friendship basis is already established, then the two can make new plans and create new shared experiences and shared memories. This might actually strengthen the friendship because it allows the two people to have their prior shared experience as well as the new ones they will create in an effort to see each other. Also, it is possible to stay friends with someone when you dont see them for a long period of time as long as the two share the same values and typically if they enjoy the same things. If they are only friends by necessity then the friendship will most likely not continue but I believe that many complete friendships have the strength to be able to pick up where they left off after a period of separation. So i do believe that values must be shared, but I think that friendships can go without shared experiences on a regular basis.
ReplyDeleteI think that all friendships take work. Even the people you see every day require you to put work into your friendships. If you have a connection with someone, and you choose to put in the effort, you will stay friends with them. I don’t think that distance necessarily determines the fate of a friendship. I have many friendships that have withstood distance, and some have not. But some friendships have also fizzled with people I see constantly. I think it depends on how deep your connection is with the other person. Sometimes friendships that span across distances are stronger than those that are closer. The effort that you choose to put in determines how well a friendship will work, not the distance. And the effort has to be mutual, or the friendship also will not work.
ReplyDeleteI think that for a true friendship to form, what is necessary is for the two people to have similar personalities and to have activity in common, such as a sports team, class, or dorm. They don't have to have the same interests or attitudes toward certain things, but just a similar general outlook at the world. I think it is for this reason that it is so easy to fall back into friendships with good friends who we haven't seen in a long time, because things like personalities don't change very often. I think this ease of friendship is more common in friends made in high school and college, rather than childhood friends, because it is much more likely that childhood friends will outgrow each others personalities than friends made later on.
ReplyDeleteAs a couple of people have mentioned above, I think that common values are curial to a friendship. Everyone lives by a code- a set of values that they think are most important. For example, truth, justice, courage, family oriented, kindness, etc. This code is the foundation that people base their lives off of. It is the boundaries we create or the lines that we will not cross. It almost impossible to be true friends with someone if they do not share at least one of your code values. This is the common ground in which you share and stand upon. More often than not you can find people who share some values with you when you share an activity. This is because like-minded people tend to migrate toward like-minded people. As an example, people who are on a sport team such as soccer, then, probably share the same value or values of teamwork, an active lifestyle, perseverance, etc. You can still have people and friends, though, that are not on your soccer team that possesses those values.
ReplyDeleteAs Maureen brought up, it is sharing of life’s experiences or shared environment that is most crucial to a friendship. I agree her statement up to a point. I think friendships are based on shared life experiences. You need to share your life experiences with your friends and become an active part of their environment. However, I think that you can do that from a distance. Not all shared experiences have to be by physical presence. You can have a friend who you go to a lot of parties with and hang out with and have a good time and see all the time and you tell your friend from back home about these times. You can be closer to that friend back at home, I think, if you tell her how you really liked the parties, what you were really thinking. Maybe you really hate all the parties or were feeling left out. You could spend all your time with your friend from school, but not be as close to her because you do not share with her how you were really feeling. I think it’s more about the quality of the shared experiences than the quantity. You can see and hang out with someone all the time, but feel like they do not really know you, while having someone who you rarely hang out with and see, but feel like they understand you.