Defining Levels of Friendship

People are different, and there is nothing wrong with that; it just is.  Our needs are different, our desires are different, even how we define certain things are different, and one of those things is friendships. 

I have written before how there are different levels of friendships: acquaintances, good friends and best friends.  In that column I described these levels as a bulls eye with best friend in the center, and how people will flow through those levels because of the seasons in our life. 

For example, someone who was your best friend in college may only be a good friend or acquaintance today because they moved across the country and neither of you took the time or energy to stay connected. 

If you moved next door to each other next month it is possible that the relationship could move rather quickly from acquaintance to best friend.  It is also possible that you have taken such different paths in life that what you require for a best friend is impossible for them to meet. 

Another factor that is import to understand is how people define these levels of friendship differently and the factors that motivate how they come to those conclusions.

I require a lot out of my relationships.  For you to be included in best friend ring you have to have pretty consistent contact with me.  That contact can include me helping you with your problems, but it also has to include you being interested in hearing about my pain and help me with my issues. 

In today’s electronic world you could fall into my best friend ring if we get along and there has been a consistency in intimate contact.  By that I mean phone calls or face to face conversations.  These conversations have to go deeper than the weather, politics and other surface issues.  If you gauged the depth of relationship using the illustration of a swimming pool, I not only swim in the deep end; I know what the grate at the bottom of the deep end looks like!

Let’s say I have a friend named Mark.  Mark’s personality is different than mine.  He doesn’t enjoy people like I do.  Where I need to be around people, he enjoys people on occasion but can not have contact with them for periods of time and it not even cross his mind that he hasn’t heard from them.

Where I define a best friend by deep intimate conversations several times a week, Mark only requires a moderate level of intimacy two or three times a month for someone to fit into his best friend ring.  Marks “deep end” is what I consider the middle of the pool.

You might think because his requirements are so much easier to meet than mine that Mark would have a lot more best friends than me, but that isn’t the case.  Because he doesn’t require much contact from people, he doesn’t reach out to people that much.

What is even more interesting is that Mark might consider me a best friend if I call him and check on him twice a month.  However, Mark is only in my good friend ring as he only calls me once a month.

There is nothing wrong with Mark thinking I am one of his best friends, because according to his definitions I am.  There is also nothing wrong with me thinking he is only a good friend, as he only meets my requirements for that level of friendship.

This is important to understand because we often think if I am Mark’s best friend he has to be my best friend.  If Mark believed that then he would be spending a lot of time and energy doing things that drive him nuts!  He has no desire whatsoever to talk about deep and intimate things spiritually or otherwise.  He is a very private person and that makes him feel uncomfortable. 

Understanding that people will flow through the levels of friendship throughout the seasons our lives and that our personalities define those levels of differently enables us to enjoy each other without having unrealistic expectations of each other. 

If we don’t give others these freedoms we will find ourselves feeling rejected when we are not, requiring things out of friends that they don’t want to give, or running people off that we could have enjoyed a friendship with for many years to come.

                                                           

Johnny Walker is a Christian Counselor and can be contacted at www.FamilyWorks.net