@muzammilgooljar

Painkillers

I have visited family in Severy, Kansas on several occasions over the years, but only recently saw it for the first time. Entering the tiny town with a population of about 250 people, roosters are crowing, and dogs are barking.

In reality finding a true friend and even trying to figure out what makes a true friend, is undeniably hard. In life many people struggle to keep a friend and even meet new friends, not realising that there are a few characteristics that needs to be visible to you, in people to know they or that one person is the definition of a true friend. However, this is not just some random person who is just writing this piece for the fun of it, i'm someone writing this piece who had to deal with this kind of thing in the past, I had to deal with meeting friends that I though were my absolute true friend and finding out the hard way that you can't just call someone your 'true' friend without really getting to know them, because I realised that the word 'friend' gets thrown around a whole lot, not even realising that, that one simple, yet dangerous word can bring you loneliness and hurt, and honestly that's how I felt when I lost my so called friends that I treasured so much, not realising that I've been looking at it all wrong it's not what you see in a person that makes them a true friend it's what is buried deep within themselves and their characteristics that makes that one person a true friend. And because of what has happened to me in the past I have written this piece for people to understand what it is that makes a true friend, a true friend.

“You still care about him? After everything?”

It has been a long time coming for me to finally find my community.

Here’s the thing. It isn’t a question of if we are friends or not. It’s whether you are ready to take responsibility and acknowledge what happened. I am and I have accepted what happened and healed. But, the thing is that if you want to be in my life you can’t pretend like nothing happened acting like we are all good. Like you didn’t hurt me and like it was all my fault because it wasn't and I think you know that deep down. It doesn’t work like that. I refuse to let it. I would love to be friends. But, I’m not willing to be friends or let you back into my life in any real sense until this happens. My life is here and my friends are here. I don’t need you. I can’t respect or have someone in my life who has wronged me and hurt me who can’t be mature and self aware enough to see their own faults and not to just disappear when things get hard or uncomfortable or they disagree. I've grown past the time in my life when I would accept that. I want more for myself and I owe it to myself to accept only what I deserve. For me, friendship is far more than that and my loyalty has always been there even when yours faltered.

It is estimated that most Americans are going to have around three good friends in life. These are people who hang out with each other and share experiences, but this relationship can be put in jeopardy if you move out of state. The following are a few tips to help keep your friendship intact.

People do care about you. They genuinely think about you. Those were my thoughts until recently. I really thought that people genuinely cared about. And when I say people, I mean people other than my parents. They have been with me no matter what and I believe that they always will be. ITs the other I am talking about. The ones we pick and choose to be part of our world. The ones we open up to at one am In the morning talking about our deepest desires and wishes mixed in with our secret fears that are stirred into our night mares. You know, the usual. However, as much as I thought this was something I wanted to believe, the more I realized that we cannot put so much faith into developing movie like relationships with the people in our lives. The media portrays relationships as cute, lively, lovely, rainbow and cupcakes and you know all that fluff. And then when all of a sudden, our best friend doesn’t rush over to our house in the middle of the night to uplift and eat icing with us, we get devastated. We think that people must care about us so much and even if they look away for even a second, we feel betrayed and as if no one understands us. We feel as outcasts. We feel ended. Which I have to be honest, I have very much felt. I always felt like I was constantly being let down by the people in my life and I was angry that they weren’t meeting my expectations. I didn’t understand why. All they had to be was good friends to me. However, I felt as if they never were. I was so self absorbed about how I felt that somewhere along the way I forgot that they were also humans that need space and attention. They were also people who craved being craved. They were us. We were them. We all wanted the same thing. We all wanted someone to care about us so much that they would drop everything and be with us. And this also goes for relationships. We all want that perfect, cute adorable relationship where you sit on each others’ lap, smile, do cute things in public and share the intimacy of a couple in the movies. Everyone wants those things. However, when everyone wants all the same thins, we forget about each other. We forget that the other exist and instead we just get mad at each other for not fulfilling each others fantasies. It is an insane cycle. Which can be indeed broken, with a single action. Let go of your expectations. They aren’t as great as you thought they were. You don’t need something in the movies, you just need real and raw. As soon as you lower your expectations for someone, you no longer hold a bar above their head for which they have to meet in order to be your friend. Just let it go and be a kinder human. Buy some food and give it to them. Make them some jewelry. Invite them over to your house. Do something nice. Lower your expectations. And maybe, just maybe, you’ll find yourself happier with all that weight off your shoulders.

Easier sang than done, learning to “let it go” is something that many people never completely figure out. The burden of holding on is almost as painful as the emotions that undoubtedly come with the release; and even if you end up liberated, the freedom is bittersweet. The truth is this: the more you invest of yourself into something that doesn’t serve you, whether that is a friendship, a partnership, relationship, or occupation, the more you weigh yourself down. You worry about the impact letting go will have on your life and theirs, along with the influence the decision will have on everyone and everything around you.

This is a break up letter to every best friend I’ve ever had, who is no longer part of my life.