Within the last few days, I've been thinking back to when I was little, and the fact that I told a lot of people that we would be "best friends forever!"
I've exchanged friendship bracelets with many people who are only still in my life through Facebook. Now I just can't help but think that if things had worked out differently… where would I be?
I know I can't dwell on the "what ifs" of life, but for a second I have to let myself think. What if we never moved to Perrysburg? Would I still be friends with my best friend from fourth grade? Would I have ended up going to my career school? If I didn't, then I would have never met Tyler.
The biggest one on my mind is the most recent one, what if things had gone differently? Miscommunication ends a lot of relationships, and friendships and I learned that over the past week.
I had a best friend… for as long as I can remember. She was everything I looked up to, she was my best friend, never my worst enemy, someone I could always trust, ask stupid questions, do crazy things together. We rarely fought and even when we had not seen each other for months, we would start talking as if yesterday was the last time we had talked.
But as everyone knows, life gets in the way, things happen and the people you trust the most fade out of your life. Miscommunication happens and someone you thought was your best friend, stops talking to you.
I guess what I am getting at is that recently I realized that the term, "best friends forever!" is irrelevant. Although you will always have the great times to remember, the photos, the stories, nothing in this life truly lasts forever. It all comes to an end sometimes.
Most times it is not in the way we expect. The end may start with tears and end with a smile and a goodbye text, knowing that you will see them again, but things will never be the same. It may end with a goodbye hug as you switch schools in fourth grade. It may end graduation day… The point is, you never know when it will end. So do me a favor and cherish every moment you have with the person you swear is going to be your "bff" because in reality, only a few will stick around that long.
Your boyfriend/future husband, your college gymnastics buddy, or a selective three best friends from high school. Sometimes even family does not stick around, So take pictures, you will only regret the ones you don't take. Laugh, a lot! Apologize even if you don't think you did anything wrong. Communicate effectively.
So maybe one day, when you are old and looking back on your life, you don't have to wonder, "what would have happened if I had apologized or communicated more effectively?" You can say, "yeah, we said goodbye. No our friendship did not last, but while it did… it was amazing and I don't regret one single thing about it."
The bottom line is that people change and come and go that is simply a part of life. You can either embrace it and move on, cherishing the time you did have together, or you can sit there and wonder what would have happened.
My friendship with Stephanie, it may be over and we may never go back to what we were, but I don't regret any part of our friendship. It's a shame that what happened, happened the way it did, but I have a lot of great memories to look back on. I apologized and we cleared things up… now it's time to move on and continue with this chapter of our lives. We may not be living up to the "best friends forever" motto or "riding our bikes down the middle of the street and at the top of our lungs screaming, 'friends forever till the end on this my friend you can depend!'" (Geoff Moore song from our childhood) But in the end it was a decent "goodbye and good luck in the future…"
I've exchanged friendship bracelets with many people who are only still in my life through Facebook. Now I just can't help but think that if things had worked out differently… where would I be?
I know I can't dwell on the "what ifs" of life, but for a second I have to let myself think. What if we never moved to Perrysburg? Would I still be friends with my best friend from fourth grade? Would I have ended up going to my career school? If I didn't, then I would have never met Tyler.
The biggest one on my mind is the most recent one, what if things had gone differently? Miscommunication ends a lot of relationships, and friendships and I learned that over the past week.
I had a best friend… for as long as I can remember. She was everything I looked up to, she was my best friend, never my worst enemy, someone I could always trust, ask stupid questions, do crazy things together. We rarely fought and even when we had not seen each other for months, we would start talking as if yesterday was the last time we had talked.
But as everyone knows, life gets in the way, things happen and the people you trust the most fade out of your life. Miscommunication happens and someone you thought was your best friend, stops talking to you.
I guess what I am getting at is that recently I realized that the term, "best friends forever!" is irrelevant. Although you will always have the great times to remember, the photos, the stories, nothing in this life truly lasts forever. It all comes to an end sometimes.
Most times it is not in the way we expect. The end may start with tears and end with a smile and a goodbye text, knowing that you will see them again, but things will never be the same. It may end with a goodbye hug as you switch schools in fourth grade. It may end graduation day… The point is, you never know when it will end. So do me a favor and cherish every moment you have with the person you swear is going to be your "bff" because in reality, only a few will stick around that long.
Your boyfriend/future husband, your college gymnastics buddy, or a selective three best friends from high school. Sometimes even family does not stick around, So take pictures, you will only regret the ones you don't take. Laugh, a lot! Apologize even if you don't think you did anything wrong. Communicate effectively.
So maybe one day, when you are old and looking back on your life, you don't have to wonder, "what would have happened if I had apologized or communicated more effectively?" You can say, "yeah, we said goodbye. No our friendship did not last, but while it did… it was amazing and I don't regret one single thing about it."
The bottom line is that people change and come and go that is simply a part of life. You can either embrace it and move on, cherishing the time you did have together, or you can sit there and wonder what would have happened.
My friendship with Stephanie, it may be over and we may never go back to what we were, but I don't regret any part of our friendship. It's a shame that what happened, happened the way it did, but I have a lot of great memories to look back on. I apologized and we cleared things up… now it's time to move on and continue with this chapter of our lives. We may not be living up to the "best friends forever" motto or "riding our bikes down the middle of the street and at the top of our lungs screaming, 'friends forever till the end on this my friend you can depend!'" (Geoff Moore song from our childhood) But in the end it was a decent "goodbye and good luck in the future…"
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