Friendship

What are your thoughts on friendship?
How does friendship apply to your life today?



I know it may seem like I'm asking a lot of questions lately but it's because i'm trying to appear less ignorant.

mannequin wrote:

What are your thoughts on friendship?
How does friendship apply to your life today?



I know it may seem like I'm asking a lot of questions lately but it's because i'm trying to appear less ignorant.

To be brutally honest, I have no friends in real life, literally no friends.

It's not because I'm some awkward social-loser, though; it's just that I have a hard time relating to most people. Many of my peers only talk about football, petty drama between other friends, and so on. When I do have to talk to such people, the conversations are very forced and rigid, because I have to feign interest in what they are saying haha. I hate having to be fake; I'd rather be alone, focus on myself, than be around other babbling morons.

You guys are the closest things I have to friends haha! It's all good, though; I'm not like most people, who can't stand the solitude. Solitude is conducive to my endeavors, anyhow.

A verse for our 37th wedding anniversary,

"Some people do it for the least,

Some people do it for the greatest,

You do it for me, Thank you."

Friendship is a continuum, from vague acquaintances to good friends. I have several friends on the internet whom I have never met. I have people that I have interacted with for some time face to face, but don't count as good friends. Friends are those who you trust, sometimes getting to know someone destroys that trust. The people you trust are the ones you should get close to and let them get close. I also have relatives, some friends, some not, again trust is part of the equation. Who would you trust to tell the most embarrassing things about your life. For me, it is only a few of those face to face, and a few on the net.

I think the biggest fear is that those you don't trust will use it against you, justified or not.

Been there, done that.

BardoXV wrote:

Been there, done that.  

Oh really, care to share that story with us sometime?

Erik wrote:

To be brutally honest, I have no friends in real life, literally no friends.

The truth mixed with humour.

We have reached a time where it isn't even embarrassing any more to have no friends. Anybody who values substance exchange of communication will usually end up not communicating at all generally. A type of defence protection and preservation to one's growth. They will usually seek out a more concentrated area to find meaning with others, away from the mundane masses.

I only have two friends and I wouldn't even really call them friends, more like people I just occasionally interact with. I think friendship is a concept for the young, especially when you are in some form of schooling, it's kind of necessary at that point to get by. After schooling though I think it becomes less significant. Relationships or work takes its place, and previous friendships are heavily trivialised, and reduced to less regular interactions or non activity casual small talk on the weekends.

Things change a lot when you get older too. People all of sudden become extremely judgemental. Everything becomes about putting into practice all that shit you were talking in school. Everything becomes about proving yourself and what you have to offer, and of course, if you refuse to conform to the status quo then you will be banished out of any social circle, not that it's a bad thing though, an effective filtration if you ask me.

If you crave meaning and substance then you will just be disliked, no matter if you're a male or female, if you're intelligent and wish to dig a little deeper, you will realize that you will have to spend most of your life on your own, just comes with the territory.

Most people are miserable over here. As I just came back from the local shops to pick up my coffee, I walked by the rush hour morning pedestrian traffic and they all have that pissed off look on their face.

Which kind of looks like this:



Which is somewhat understandable having to wake up super early everyday and work 8 hours, five days a week. People are kind of getting tired of it all now. I don't think anybody wants to do it any more..

but any ways i digress..

One of those two "friends" still lives at home at the age of 28 and just works all the time with fuck all to show for it because he can't see the fact that the system is raping him. The other one is clinically depressed and he's taking prozac. Gets drunk most weekends and calls me while crying down the phone.

He's 24 and comes from a shitty background, his mother fucked her sister's husband and ran off with him and the family house was in her name, she just gave it up and abandoned her family, husband, kids and siblings, for that new life! you know how they are ..the new guy must of been alpha but anyways, the friend became homeless and troubled, he's in supportive housing at the moment dealing with the reality, he'll probably be dead before 27.

mannequin wrote:

BardoXV wrote:

Been there, done that.  

Oh really, care to share that story with us sometime?

Maybe, someday. But only in a PM.

Sharing is caring, dude...

In my neck of the woods, people are in a constant state of fear of not having any friends. Not having any friends will lead to silence and isolation, therefore a state of being very aware of one's own mortality; silence speaks the loudest.

Not to mention, people judge each other harshly over here; if you aren't in the right social-circle, you are seen as sub-human, or non-existent. If you are on the outside, and try to approach someone who is in a popular circle, they will become very angry and then paranoid, looking around to make sure nobody saw you talking to them --- a fear that others will judge them for speaking to someone of a lower social status.

People are very concerned about their reputations here.

Erik wrote:

In my neck of the woods, people are in a constant state of fear of not having any friends. Not having any friends will lead to silence and isolation, therefore a state of being very aware of one's own mortality; silence speaks the loudest.

Not to mention, people judge each other harshly over here; if you aren't in the right social-circle, you are seen as sub-human, or non-existent. If you are on the outside, and try to approach someone who is in a popular circle, they will become very angry and then paranoid, looking around to make sure nobody saw you talking to them --- a fear that others will judge them for speaking to someone of a lower social status.

People are very concerned about their reputations here.

It is like that here as well, but only to a degree, no where near the same level as it is there though. US has always had this popularity thing which is very crucial to one's contentment in life. This especially rings true for US schools where popularity is a must if not more significant than the education itself ha!

They even have some weird shit like "best dressed" competitions where somebody is selected and praised for dressing in a specific style and is awarded with a lot of attention, other things... which just encourages separation and division making it even more difficult to learn in such an environment by adding all these others pointless pressures...

At one point in the past, my younger self regularly had a short stylish hair cut with a little bit of stubble, and my dress sense was of the modern metrosexual style. It really wasn't me but I was just going along with the times. I remember women use stare at me or check me out  a lot when I was walking down the street, if I was in some kind employment or college environment they would make it obvious they were interested. I got off with some of them here and there, and funnily enough, never seen it as a big deal. It was something I was always use to from my first school up until adulthood, always had positive attention from women.

Then I reached 20 and started to cultivate my identity a lot more, who I wanted to be or who I really was. I started to grow my beard and hair out (this was long before the whole hipster thing took off) I liked it, it was me. I shaved and cut my hair a few times, but each time I felt uncomfortable and it didn't feel right, so stay with the beard and hair. I also started to explore different styles of clothing to see where i fit in in terms of comfort. I found that I liked baggy clothes, leather jackets, cargo pants, boots you get the idea. I don't really think it's something you choose but rather it chooses you.

Any ways, I stuck with it and have ever since. As soon as I changed my appearance and grew into somebody far different to what I was, i realized all that attention disappeared, I became invisible ha...In fact, i would even get hostile stares because of the beard and hair. I use to do the whole internet dating thing, before my transformation, i would send like ten messages and get around seven responses, fairly standard. Now if I send like 100 messages I get almost none!..it's actually quite laughable.

Now this all makes sense when we live in such a feminized culture where women prefer men to look like little boys before they are acceptable enough to date. On one hand it's just power, they want all the authority and to customise him to their liking and on the other hand it's social image.

At first, i was like damn.. really?..yeah really... it was bothering at first, in fact i would even shave and cut it all once or twice, you know, give in! you know how they do that thing, sexual restriction until you comply, and of course, the women would return right on cue. I think they call it being a simp or something, which over 8 years ago was unheard of.

Then, of course, I was like fuck this! I aint conforming to shit. fuck yoooou!!...and you know the rest is history. You end up standing your ground and doing whatever you like, which is a good thing because you learn so much about yourself and become self focused as opposed to pleasing others, which is the start to real freedom.

Solitude is my dearest friend. We get along wonderfully.