I've been having a lot of thoughts on friendships and relationships in general lately. People are fascinating creatures... they're like puzzles. Except it's impossible to figure them out fully... there are always so many unknown variables. It's like trying to solve a multi-variable equation... If you were to compare life experiences to equations and the way humans act or think as variables.... then you can easily say that there are too many variables and too few equations... you just can't solve the equation, you can only hypothesize.
I think my biggest fear for coming out of college is realizing that I don't have friends. I don't want to come out of college and notice that I am friendless... that the people I thought were my best friends actually end up disappearing into the world and just become a faint memory. We all will go our separate ways, but will we keep in contact? Will we be intentional? Will I have the strength to continue being intentional or will I grow quickly tired of unintentional friends and just decide to drop it all and just live the way a lot of people live... married to work. I'm scared of losing my soul coming out of college. I'm scared to stop caring about things because I'm "too busy" or "too tired". I don't want to become a soulless man who does nothing but works and pays the bills on time. So most people would chime in that you can have relationships or marriage and get kids and whatnot. But as a Christian, I just can't drop the idea that Christ is supposed to be my fulfillment in life. So let's just say marriage isn't the end-goal in life. Let's just say that we don't see marriage as the ultimate form of intimate relationships... then what? We have nothing. We live pathetic lives. We build up an ego of nobility in our ability to perform well in this world (i.e. paying the bills on time, having a good credit score, having the latest of everything....). But it's all so fleeting. So some people rely on other things, like alcohol or drugs. And honestly, I can't deny that substances do provide that senseless pleasure. They give you a momentary relaxant to keep you just off the edge.
I wonder where I would end up after college. I want to stay home because then I can save so much money, but I don't want to end up in Staten Island again. I only like being here to get away from life... to be alone. But to socialize here... to meet people here. It feels like I'm choking. It's suffocating here. I hate it.
Part of me wants to leave college and cut all ties so I can start all over and hope that I won't make the same mistakes, but it's hard to just drop the friendships I built over the course of college. But I can't help but wonder... how close am I really to these people? Do they consider me their best friends? Is college just an illusion of a life that we all wish we had and then when we graduate, just forget and walk away? What exactly does being a friend entail? What do you do in situations where friendships are not reciprocated? Do you fight for them? Do you just drop it with the thought that you were just not meant to be friends?
Friendships are so complicated... if people thought less about themselves and more about the other person, then things would go so well. People would actually mutually love one another. But most friendships are so one-sided. People just receive and don't give back... and what's worse is that people just don't realize.
I mean... how blind could you be? It's not so hard to realize that you really suck at being a friend.
So I still wonder... what does it mean to be a good friend unto others? Are you really supposed to keep pushing even though it sucks and even though you feel tired and just can't seem to get yourself to care anymore? When things just suck that badly, don't most people just stop caring? That's what I do.
And why do we all try to teach each other how things are in life? Why can't we sometimes just listen for the sake of listening and take things for what they are? I feel like when people share, the listeners are trying more to change the mindset or way of thinking of the speaker because we feel like we know more than the other. But most people don't know crap about the other person... we can only trust what the other says. So why not be more intentional with your words. Say what you feel. Be real. Why try to be a certain way? Why say things you don't mean? It's just a waste of breathe.
I don't know... a lot of things running through my mind, so little time to figure things out before it's too late. What do I do? Where do I go? What am I supposed to believe?
