Friendship

In his amazing book 'The Prophet', Khalil Gibran says "Your friend is your needs answered.

He is your field which you sow with love and reap with thanksgiving." Indeed, friendship is the perhaps the biggest gift for humankind and the most important aspect of life beyond immediate family (parents and children). 

There are many things that are shared between close friends. Some thoughts and activities that even parents or spouses do not know are known to close friends. habits good & bad, opinions positive & negative, attitudes, viewpoints, strengths, weaknesses, feelings, mistakes, achievements and many other physical and non-physical aspects of life are shared to close friends. 

A close and true friendship is based not on position, power or personality but on a spiritual level where the attitudes, interests and opinions match or can accommodate each other. Friendship is not based on long calculation and contemplation but on an instinctive connection between the two persons that develops automatically after a few interactions. Some great friendships develop much more quickly than others but however they develop, these are long-lasting relationships that can overcome various travails and tests of life. 

Friendship is based on understanding and not on prejudice. Like true love, true friendship is also something that cannot happen between any two persons. It happens between only special pair of persons. However, it is not necessarily between persons of same gender. Inter-gender friendships are often expected to evolve into love relationships but not necessarily so. True friendship can easily evolve between persons of opposite gender. After all, gender is not a criteria for friendship. It is something else. 

Since true friendship is based on non-calculative, non-prejudiced, clear-spirited connection between persons, such relationship generally develop in early age - at childhood, school or college days. This is because in those times human minds are free of many stresses, challenges and complexities of an adult life. 

A true friendship is not just having a good, frank and close relationship. As the saying goes 'a friend in need is a friend indeed', true friendship is tested in difficult times. A true friend is the first person to empathize and come forward to help a friend in distress or difficulty. This is beyond superficial expression of compassion and sympathy but involves a heartfelt emotional connection and a readiness to do the needful to help the friend out. 

Friendship is an spiritual asset to make every person's life richer. The more true friend one has, the fuller one's life is. 

27 September 2018