I’ve been trying to write this blog post for 2 weeks now and the words keep escaping me. Literally, I’ll be in my car driving to the store and all the words will flood my mind, but the second I go to jot them down or type them out in my notes they’re gone again. Today is the day though. Today, the words are here and I’m going to type them for you. 😊
The time in our lives when we leave school and officially enter the workforce, in whatever capacity, is the first time that we are not “with our friends” on a daily or somewhat daily basis. From elementary school until graduation we are surrounded by friends and people our age every day or several times a week. Besides making work friends and seeing them every day, work is the first time where our daily routine doesn’t include seeing friends who used to be just in the next room, a few streets away, in our MWF class, in our clubs, or on our sports teams.
Managing this change can be challenging and it definitely was and still sometimes is for me even 3 years post-graduation. Lately, my time has been so swept up by work, house projects, wedding planning, and just a slew of other life-happens to-do’s, that I haven’t been my best at reaching out or hanging out. I often beat myself up for not “doing enough”. I spiral into feeling like I should FaceTime everyone more, hang out with everyone more, text more, send more memes, leave more voicemails.
My closest friendships are with people who I met years ago in school, but then a year or two or three later didn’t go to school with them anymore. We learned together years ago, how to schedule time for each other, how to catch up when life had done its crazy thing to both of us and we hadn’t seen each other or talked for months. We learned how to be there for each other from afar. Those friendships are my best friendships; the pick-up-where-you-left-off, pick-you-up-when-you’re-down, I’ll-pick-you-up-if-you-need-me-to, pick-up the-phone-and-call-with-a-fake-emergency-this-date-is-a-nightmare, help-me-pick-the-pieces-of-my-life-up, pick-any-time-and-come-over friends. That might sound cheesy, but it’s true.
I heard someone on a podcast the other day call their low-maintenance friendships like this their Succulent friendships and their high-maintenance friendships their Fiddle Leaf Fig friendships and I love that. I love that for several reasons, one being that I love plants, but the biggest reason is that I have killed many succulents. MANY. I have a bunch of different house plants and have kept them alive and thriving, but I can’t get the hang of succulents. They require a lot less attention than I am used to my plants needing and I worry constantly that I am neglecting them. I end up watering them or sunning them too much and they die. I love that even more (not the succulent murdering, but the friendship analogy) because I have had several friendships end because one person tried to water the friendship more than it needed. I’ve also had a handful of Fiddle Leaf friendships that needed more water than I could supply.
My favorite friendships are friendships that don’t need constant watering. Friendships where both of us are confident in the friendship and its roots that we know it can survive a few weeks or months of neglect without withering.
I think it’s really important to have friendships like that. It is really important to have constants because life happens. Life gets in the way. Jobs, families, relationships, vacations, mental health, self-care, & appointments all get their hands on our calendars and leave us booked and overwhelmed. Suddenly the “I’ll call you right back” turns to 4 weeks later and you’re wondering if you’re a bad friend. I want to remind you that you. are. not. a. bad. friend. You might be a busy friend, an overworked friend, or a friend who’s terrible at replying, but if you’re in a season of busyness or struggle, your friendships (the really good ones) will understand.
There’s a lot of verbiage floating around the internet saying in a variety of ways that “people will make time for you if you’re important to them” and why yes I 100% believe that to be true, I also believe that people are allowed to have shit going on in their lives. You shouldn’t have to hear from your friend twice a day or twice a week or twice a month to be reminded that they love you and are still your friend.
Friendships are allowed to change over time. A friend that used to be an everyday friend might turn to a once-a-month friend or a twice-a-year friend, it’s okay for that to happen. I am not saying chase friends who never match the level of effort that you put into the friendship. Please don’t keep friends that treat you poorly or cause unnecessary drama in your life. I am saying your unproblematic friends will love you if 3 weeks or 3 months go by. I am saying sometimes friendships have uneven seasons, where one person puts in a little more effort than the other, but that effort is always later returned when the season changes. I am saying friendships that don’t need constant watering are the ones that will leave you feeling full and loved not exhausted and depleted. I am saying let your friendships be succulents.
Always,
