Oh, So They Come and Go?

It’s often hard to say your friendships are coming to an end. But how do we know friendships have officially been severed? Is it when you stop telling each other important life events? Stop inviting each other to birthdays, weddings, baby showers? Or when we don’t even think about them throughout the day? Or feel the need to share good news? Not that you're hiding the good news, but they’re just not the first person that comes to your mind like they used to.

As I type these questions another BIG question comes to mind: what actually makes a good friendship?

Many of my friendships I thought would be for life are coming to an end. I have tugged with the feelings of simply letting them go and wanting to reach out just one more time just in case it is not the end. However I can’t help but to acknowledge the feeling of “final-ness” that these series of events leading to this ending have created. It came suddenly. One misunderstanding that exposed all of our true colors. No one was wrong in the situation. In fact I can say all of us think we have done nothing wrong. There was no rip at the seams that kept inching towards a tear. Just one misunderstanding that made the friendships kind of ugly and uncomfortable for me. Like a dress you love that came from a fast fashion store and you wash it a couple of times and the dress comes out just fine during those few washes. You wash it another time expecting it to come out and fit perfectly but, this time it no longer fits you right. You keep trying to adjust it and make it work but it just won’t perform like it used to. The dress no longer hugs your curves just right, it kind of just sits on your body. It has started to accumulate small lint balls that won't come off no matter how often you pick at them or use a lint roller. You finally decide to do away with the dress you once loved, you even think about sending it to the second hand thrift store, but you decide to just throw the dress out because no one should have to struggle with something that once fit perfectly on you but can no longer holds a shape. You can’t even recycle it into a DIY workout headband. The dress is done. And there is nothing you can do about it. And since the dress was from a fast fashion store, they are no longer making the style of the dress any more. Now you (I) have a couple of options. Search for a dress similar at another store or revamp your (my) style and search for better quality clothing that won’t do me in after a couple of washes. A dress that is sustainable and meant last.

Now if you followed along with my analogy, you realize that the dress is the friend or friends. Friendships often start off GREAT. With no hiccups, you may go through a couple of rough patches where it is no big deal, you move on and forgive. But that one wash, just that one changes everything. I honestly have no solution for this besides doing a deep clean and simply being okay with letting go. But that’s hard especially when the friendships are some of my favorites and I don’t really want to end. However, life goes on. Clothes come and go. Friends come and go. It’s just the way life tends to unfold. But after those old friends come and go, new ones come in and much like shopping for a new dress you do a better job of evaluating and selecting new friends. Or in my case you listen to what God is saying and you let him hand pick each person coming into your life.

So as the twenty second chapter of my life comes to the final page in about a week (honestly one of my favorite chapters in my life book), I can with a very humbled heart say that friendship breakups heart and they are no easy relationship to navigate, although they should be. I am still learning how to be a good friend and how good friendships function. Some, you won’t know exactly why they’ve become the way they’ve become, whether good or bad. And like most of the themes of my posts, you have to be okay with that and accept God’s will for whatever he has in store for you. I have to be okay with that and accept God’s will for my life. My prayer lately has been, “let your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Let that be your prayer too and take an interest in what God’s will for your life, relationships, friendships, career etc, may be. I am for certain His will is way better than what I could ever come up with.

Be blessed,

Alyssa