Thoughts on Friendship, Part 2

A few days ago, I sat down and started to write out this blog, and got several paragraphs into it. "Why do we want friendship?" I was looking at it, analyzing it, trying to explore it, but I simply couldn't seem to make much headway with it. So I left it alone for several days.

During those few days, with it percolating in the back of my mind, I realized several things. First off, the ins and outs of friendship, as a subject, have most likely been explored since people were first capable of making friends. So anything I can say will most likely be a rehash of everything ever thought of. No surprise there, but it's fun to discover things for yourself, right? Secondly, I realized I was over-thinking this entire thing. Sure, there are bits and pieces of the topic of friendship that I really want to dive into and explore, if only for myself, but this part, the why we want friends, seems really simple now.

In essence, as I see it, we want friends because we want to know we matter to someone else. We want someone to talk with, to play with, to share secrets with, to make discoveries with. We want someone to pull us up when we're down, who can see through our outer shell and know what we are really thinking. We want someone there who will call us on the carpet when we won't be honest with ourselves. We want someone to stand up for us when others try to put us down. We want to matter.

What more is there to say about it? Wanting to know that someone cares about us is a part of being human. It doesn't have to be a lot of people. But knowing that at least one person is there for us, whenever we need them, can be the best feeling in the world.