“Sometimes you put up walls not to keep people out, but to see who cares enough to break them down”
Friendship. It is a word that gets casually thrown around, misused, and misinterpreted all the time. How many times do we find ourselves saying, “And I thought she was my friend. How could she do that to me?” The answer is more times than we would care to admit. But I believe the real question is how do we actually define the halmarks of true friendship? Is it measured in longevity? Is it measured on what we “get” out of it? Or is it measured by pure emotion?
As a child, I moved around a lot, so I found it very difficult to allow myself to make friends because I knew that we would evetually move, and I would have no way of maintaining contact. So I put up walls; lots and lots of walls. It wasn’t until I became an adult and was rooted in a particular area that I allowed myself to really open up to other people. So while I don’t have those friends from childhood, I do have friends, good friends, that I have made as an adult. And believe me, while it is easy for me to make friends (I am that girl – you know, the one that people approach wherever they are and strike up a conversation with me even though they don’t know me from Adam? Yep, That’s me.), I have only a small circle that I know for sure I can depend on.
For instance, I had a friend once – let’s call her “Jane” – that I poured my heart and soul into. I loved her, and I believe she loved me. I helped her raise her two daughters, I helped her through many middle-of-the-night crisises, and I even nursed her through a divorce. I supported her completely, because that is what friends do. Period. Yet when my time came around, when I finally needed her, she ran. She exited my life more quickly than a Volkswagon full of clowns in a chinese fire drill. And you know what I realized after all the hurt subsided? She was my friend simply because I was strong, I was faithful, and I wasn’t needy. The moment I became the one who needed her, she could not live up to her end of the bargain. These are the “friends” who are a dime a dozen; I know this because my friend list is filled with them, but now I can see them for what they are in the very beginning, and I do keep up my wall.
Now I have other friends who have become close to me in a variety of different ways that have gotten past that wall. They have gotten to see the core essence of who I am because they have cared enough to tunnel under, climb over, or break through that wall of self-protection I have placed around my heart. Some of these people I have known for many years, and others I have only known for months; longevity is not the issue when it comes to friendship. Friendship is about making and maintaining a deep connection that you are willing to work on and allow to deepen over time. It is about courtesy. It is about honesty. It is about respect. And it is about knowing, no matter what, that there is someone else in the world who will always have your back.
Almost everyone has heard this verse: “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends” John 15:13. In the greater context of things, I believe this is about more than simply risking your physical life to save your friend’s life. I believe it is about laying aside your personal wants, interests, and needs –in essence, laying aside your life, if you will – to come to the aid of a friend, who at that point, needs you more. This is real friendship. And believe me; if you have one of those, you are blessed. If you have two, you are blessed beyond measure. And if you have three… well, then, my friend, that is truly a reflection of your character.
Go forth! Be fruitful, and break down some walls today. You’ll be glad you did!
Catch you on the flip side!
Ang
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So true, I understand this, it has happen to me to many of times, it’s not a good feeling. Sometime’s you feel like your the only one who cares. You feel all alone at time’s. But I have to keep the faith, that one day, I will meet a true friend, someone who will treat me the way I want to be treated. But when it happens that the person you thought were a friend,and they turn you away in your time of need of a true friend. It makes you want to put back up them walls. We have to stay in prayer’s in trust in our true friend, God,and know that there is nothing wrong and God is working something out for you and I. We must believe and trust in his will for our life.
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