Friendship is a relationship of mutual affection between people, a stronger form of interpersonal bond than a mere association.
A true friendship, has characteristics which include many naturally good qualitie, such as affection; kindness; love; virtue; sympathy; empathy; honesty; altruism; mutual understanding and compassion; enjoyment of each other's company; trust; and the ability to be oneself, express one's feelings, and make mistakes without fear of judgment from the friend. In the past all these were inculcated in families which cherished religious values, but today somehow or other, it is presumed to be out of fashion, to the detriment5 of those who believe it it.
It is a typical sequence of an individual's emotional development, friendships are formed after parental bonding and before pair bonding.
As children mature, they become less individualistic and are more aware of others. They begin to see their friends' points of view, and enjoy playing in groups. They also experience peer rejection as they move through the middle childhood years.
High-quality friendships have often been assumed to have positive effects on many aspects of children's social development. Coaching from parents can be useful in helping children to make friends. While a parent may try to protect its own, the other party, who has no support and is misled, should be taken care of by people who have time to tackle this problem.
Life events such as changes in marital status, changes in parenthood, residential moves and career changes to name a few of the life events, can impact the quality of friendships. . And many adults feel that forming new friendships as an adult is difficult for all of these reasons too. After marriage, both women and men report having fewer friends of the opposite sex.
In social activies, like in the Church, or School, or in music and arts, people tend to find each other with common interests and become friends, but equally, these fall apart when these projects get over, and then the flock goes to another set up. These are unreliable friendships, or motivated ones, to take the benefit of the occasion and one should be prepared to forego such situations.
Old age
As family responsibilities become less, friendships become more important. Among the elderly, friendships can provide links to the larger community; especially for people who cannot go out as often. Additionally, older adults in declining health who remain in contact with friends show improved psychological well-being. They may tend to devote more time to use their life's experience to help others. They tend to choose friends whose age, sex, race, ethnicity, and values are like their own.
Problem Children
Parents of children with ADHD worry about their children's ability to form long-lasting friendships Children with autism spectrum disorders usually have some difficulty forming friendships. Children with Down syndrome have a difficult time forming friendships.
Loneliness
Conventional wisdom suggests that good friendships enhance an individual's sense of happiness and overall well-being. Conversely, loneliness and a lack of social supports have been linked to an increased risk of sickness.
Ancient Wisdom
Friendship was a topic of moral philosophy greatly discussed by Plato, Aristotle, and Stoics.
Modern Solutions
Pen pals are people who have a relationship primarily through mail correspondence. They may or may not have met each other in person.
When motives are not good, people may likely use friendhips to get undue attention and one should be able to develop a sense of judgement when a so called friend makes a move. The negative qualities found in human beings who succumb to these pressures, due to lack of support in their homes, can develop situations, which can put innocent gullible, people into difficulty. Generally, they develop these tendencies where there is disharmony in the families, constant fights and the childrfen are confused between right and wrong. This can led to fatal consequences, if two people of the opposite sex intermingle, and for peer pressure yield, and the loser is alway a woman. Here the male friend is not properly brought up and the end result becomes painful, and lead to depression, and even suicide. That is why a good parent, keeps a watch over his adolescent children, and tries to keep abreast by reading on the subject and not leaving lives to fate - Families with a good religious formation, may have recourse to the morals taught in it. It is there, were religion has been relegated to the back burner, many of the problems can crop up, and that too has been a social pressure point, encouraged delibertely by interested parties, through making movies, pornography, etc. Both parents and children should be formed to discern betwen what is good and what is evil and dangerous for the harmony of their families.
Uneven Social Developement
In the pursuit of weath acqusition in a highly propagandised society, rual people come to the cities and are confused between what they see as a sign of modernity, and often make the mistake of thinking women are easy prey. This is the reason the spate of rapes and molestation could have increased. It could as well be a game of politics to show certain people in bad light, and goad these elements to do the thing so that they can blame the gullible ones in TV shows. You never saw these, before the globalization started, and this is not unique to developing countries, even the advanced countries who have jettisoned their values for wealth acquisition, have catered and pandered to these unstable forces for their own wealth acquisiton !
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