Alive and ‘friending’
In popular movies, we are often witnesses of stereotypical, romantic, or familial versions of loving one another. Typically, a man and a woman, after a period of denial, passionately poor out their hearts, they finally found each other’s safe haven and…will live happily ever after. Or, more nuanced, we see a conflicted version of love, of attachment. Families in which close connections become gordian knots suffocating individuality. The unconditional surrender to caretaking, the insurmountable impact of the loss of a child, the joy of family traditions in a Universe too big to wrap our mind around: we are quite familiar with these images of deep affection.
Friendship is a special form of love. Culturally, friendship is less often depicted as a form of deep love. Or, in real life, we don’t see friends easily expressing their love directly, passionately. With which I mean, we don’t often hear friends sharing the famous phrase: I love you.
We do recognize this profound friendship-love when we behold boundaryless laughter, a magical friendship bubble or retained tears that communicate a betrayal of trust. There are a thousand ways we recognize the magic and subtle vulnerability of friendships.
Lately, I find myself expressing ‘I love you’ more often - also thanks to my inspiring friends. Freedom of feeling can be found in these expressions. Friendship has its own wonderful quality. Particularly when there actually does not seem to be anything between you two (or more) that necessarily connects your lives. Friendship is the romantic version of free will. You consciously chose to spend your time with this person, to acknowledge their existence as deeply valuable, while you (unconsciously, or not) know that there is nothing holding you back from fully taking your personal space, to live ‘your own life’. Friendship is also about staying present and holding space ‘from afar’. Friends travel around the world with us, the joy of the friendship lies in the spontaneous desire to share your intense experience with this particular friend, to invite them to join and to enjoy the anticipation. And every friendship has its own flavor, its own integrity, and sometimes bumpy development.
We can offer each other a deep feeling of belonging when we express our gratitude straight forwardly.
My dear friend, I love you. I love the human, the being, in you. I love you means ‘I love us’.
You connect and respect whatever bumpy roads you may cross side by side. Your love is both deep and high, joyous, and healingly calm. As a clear and focused inner voice telling the other person: what a blessing that exactly you are here, alive and ‘friending’.