A New Criteria For Friendship
Illustration by, James Graham
It’s been an intense week for me, so while this post won’t be long, I hope it is complete. (The time is 10:25pm on Friday night, and I’m just beginning to write what you are now reading.)
I don’t typically take stock of the people around me, but in the last few weeks, as I’ve needed more support from my community, I’ve noticed that some people aren’t showing up for me in the ways I expected they would have in a moment like this. I hate to say it, but that realization is making me examine those relationships more closely, and forcing me to rethink my criteria for friendship. (Frankly, if you’re reading this, I’m almost certainly not talking about you! And, as always, thank you for reading. I’m very grateful and feel very supported.)
To date, aside from basic decency and ethics, I have only had one fundamental rule for relationships: to be in my life, you must be able to hang out with the other people in my life without me there. This sieve has served me exceedingly well. But now, as I move toward a different phase, I find that my single filter is insufficient.
For the past few weeks, I’ve been considering the concept of generosity. I’ve typically understood generosity to describe something related to being superficially nice, like the feeling you get when someone is surprisingly chivalrous. But as my life has twisted, dipped, flipped, imploded, resurrected, sailed, and scaled, I’ve reframed my relationship to the word, and to how I incorporate it into my life.
Over the past few weeks, I have seen generosity manifested in many ways: A gentle ear, an unexpected check-in, a non-judgemental follow up, a (truly) friendly reminder, or an empathetic response to a social media troll. This makes me feel nice. (For the record, the absence of these things from others does not make me feel badly.)
Even though I hadn’t intended it, I couldn’t help but to think about what was common among those who went the extra mile, held that extra space, or who were able to recognize the subtle cues of someone in need. When I thought of each of them individually, I couldn’t identify any compelling common traits; but when I thought of them as a group, the word that immediately came to mind, was generous. And in fact, when I went back and viewed each person through that lens, I could quickly see dozens of examples of where they were each generous all over the place!
As I continue to grow, support others, and be supported I am valuing generosity more and more in my relationships. Why? Because generosity uplifts, it is a demonstration of care, and at its core, an expression of love.
Los Angeles, CA, USA
November 2019