friendship in life essay

Essay on Friendship for Students and Children

500+ words essay on friendship.

Friendship is one of the greatest bonds anyone can ever wish for. Lucky are those who have friends they can trust. Friendship is a devoted relationship between two individuals. They both feel immense care and love for each other. Usually, a friendship is shared by two people who have similar interests and feelings.

You meet many along the way of life but only some stay with you forever. Those are your real friends who stay by your side through thick and thin. Friendship is the most beautiful gift you can present to anyone. It is one which stays with a person forever.

True Friendship

A person is acquainted with many persons in their life. However, the closest ones become our friends. You may have a large friend circle in school or college , but you know you can only count on one or two people with whom you share true friendship.

There are essentially two types of friends, one is good friends the other are true friends or best friends. They’re the ones with whom we have a special bond of love and affection. In other words, having a true friend makes our lives easier and full of happiness.

Most importantly, true friendship stands for a relationship free of any judgments. In a true friendship, a person can be themselves completely without the fear of being judged. It makes you feel loved and accepted. This kind of freedom is what every human strives to have in their lives.

In short, true friendship is what gives us reason to stay strong in life. Having a loving family and all is okay but you also need true friendship to be completely happy. Some people don’t even have families but they have friends who’re like their family only. Thus, we see having true friends means a lot to everyone.

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Importance of Friendship

Friendship is important in life because it teaches us a great deal about life. We learn so many lessons from friendship which we won’t find anywhere else. You learn to love someone other than your family. You know how to be yourself in front of friends.

Friendship never leaves us in bad times. You learn how to understand people and trust others. Your real friends will always motivate you and cheer for you. They will take you on the right path and save you from any evil.

Similarly, friendship also teaches you a lot about loyalty. It helps us to become loyal and get loyalty in return. There is no greater feeling in the world than having a friend who is loyal to you.

Moreover, friendship makes us stronger. It tests us and helps us grow. For instance, we see how we fight with our friends yet come back together after setting aside our differences. This is what makes us strong and teaches us patience.

Therefore, there is no doubt that best friends help us in our difficulties and bad times of life. They always try to save us in our dangers as well as offer timely advice. True friends are like the best assets of our life because they share our sorrow, sooth our pain and make us feel happy.

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Greater Good Science Center • Magazine • In Action • In Education

Why Your Friends Are More Important Than You Think

Researchers and philosophers have explored in great detail the emotional dramas of love and family. But they’ve spent much less time pondering the deep satisfaction of a good friend.

A similar thing happens in our own lives, writes science journalist Lydia Denworth. When something’s gotta give, it’s often our friendships, which take a backseat to our family and work obligations—or our latest fling.

But that’s a mistake, she argues in her new book, Friendship: The Evolution, Biology, and Extraordinary Power of Life’s Fundamental Bond . In fact, research suggests that friendships can help us find purpose and meaning, stay healthy, and live longer. The intimacy, support, equality, and emotional bonds we have in our friendships are unique.

Her book honors the relationships forged through slumber parties, shoulders cried upon, and kindnesses that don’t need to be repaid. “The science of friendship gives you permission to hang out with your friends and call it healthy,” she says. “You’re not being indulgent.” In a conversation with Greater Good , Denworth explains why we need our friends and how to keep those connections strong—even in a pandemic.

Kira Newman: How does friendship change for people across their lifespan?  


Lydia Denworth:  When you’re very young, of course, your primary social relationship is with your parents or caregivers. But when kids go to school, they start to have deeper friendships that involve, first, doing things together, and then a deeper, shared emotional element. Then in adolescence, it becomes even more abstract and relational.

All the way through high school and college, friendships can feel easy because you are thrown into an environment where you have lots of same-age peers and the pool of potential friends is big. Also, when you’re an adolescent, your brain is as attuned to social signals and connection as it will ever be. You are really hyper-interested in social activity.


Then in adulthood, as people start to have jobs and maybe get married or have a family, it can become harder to spend time with your friends. Toward the end of life, we tend to come back around to having a little bit more time once kids are grown and careers and jobs are less demanding.


There are these transition points in life when it’s easier or harder to spend time with friends, but what is important for people to know is that friendship is a lifelong endeavor and that it is something that people should be paying attention to at all points in life. I think that people sometimes think (especially in their 30s and 40s), “I just don’t have time for friends right now,” and that’s a mistake.

If you get to be 65 and then now you’re ready to start paying attention to friends, well, it’s a little bit like stopping smoking when you’re 65. If you go from 15 to 65 and you smoke the whole time, it’s still better to stop than not, but some damage will have been done. And if you don’t pay attention to friends all the way along, the same thing is true. 

KN: You observe in your book that we tend to neglect our friendships when we get busy, more so than other relationships. Can you say more about that?

LD:  The reason we do that is that we feel more beholden to our family that we’re related to, and that makes plenty of sense—we’re legally and biologically connected to our family members. So, I’m not saying that we should be spending a lot less time with family. But we also feel that spending time with friends, instead of working, is indulgent.

My message is that it is not necessarily indulgent because having good, strong friendships is as important for yourself as diet and exercise, and so it’s something you need to prioritize. If you are forever canceling on your friends or failing to make a point of seeing them or talking to them or interacting with them, then you are not being a good friend and you are not maintaining a strong relationship. You need your friends to be there down the road. But you have to do the work along the way, or they won’t be there. Friendship does take some time, but that’s kind of good news because (mostly) hanging out with your friends is fun.

The second half of the story, though, is that it’s quite normal for there to be change in our friendships over the course of a lifetime, and that’s OK. Friendship does need to be a relationship that’s longstanding, but you can cycle through several longstanding friendships in the course of your life. So, it isn’t that you can only stay friends with the people you knew when you were young, of course, because plenty of people do make friends in adulthood and those can become closer friends.

If a relationship is not healthy or even if it’s just not serving you well—if it’s not positive, if it’s really draining, or if it’s lopsided and one of you is always helping the other but not vice versa—that’s not so great. I think people need to realize that it is OK to walk away from friendships that aren’t good ones.  
 KN: That seems like the flipside of all the amazing benefits that we get when we have strong friendships: There’s a lot of potential for pain when we have difficult, conflict-ridden relationships. 


LD:  Just like a strong relationship is good for you, a negative relationship is bad for you. Even an ambivalent relationship is bad for you, it turns out, biologically. 

An ambivalent relationship is a relationship where you have positive feelings and negative feelings about the person or about your interactions with them. And that’s true of a lot of our relationships—almost half. 


Researchers had a scale of one to five: How positive does this relationship make you feel, and how negative does this relationship make you feel? Anybody who was two or above on both things counted as ambivalent, which is really broad. You could be five on the good and two on the bad. What was interesting was that any relationship that was categorized as ambivalent seemed to generate cardiovascular issues and other kinds of health problems. 


It’s not as surprising that a toxic relationship would be bad for your health. But I think that the problem with ambivalent relationships, which a lot of us have many of, is more surprising. I think most people suspect that the good outweighs the bad, and so far (it’s early days in that research) it doesn’t look that way. 

I think that all this is a reminder of the importance of working on relationships—all of them, but including your friendships. There’s real value in a positive friendship.

If it isn’t positive, then you can do a couple of things. One is you can try to make it better, work on it, have a hard conversation, perhaps. Two is you quit and you say, “I’m not going to have this person in my life,” but that can be very dramatic. And three would be that you shuffle that friend to the outer circles of your social life. Maybe it’s not someone you can easily stop seeing, but if you don’t rely on them emotionally anymore, then that’s better for you. 


KN: Are there some practices you would suggest or steps that you take in your own life to put more time and energy into friendship?  


LD:  It really does just begin as simply as paying attention and prioritizing. I try regularly to plan to get together with my close friends and the people I care about seeing a lot. We all have relatively busy lives, but I, first of all, make an effort to make the plan, and then I make an effort to get there—to show up. I think showing up is a really critical piece of friendship, in every sense of the phrase. 


It could just be that you don’t have time to get together with someone for dinner for weeks, so you have a phone call and you catch up that way. Taking time to catch up on somebody’s life and hear what’s going on with them is an important indicator of it’s worth my time to know what’s going on in your life .


In addition, I think it’s useful to remember that science has clarified the definition of a quality relationship. It has to have these minimum three things: It’s a stable, longstanding bond; it’s positive; and it’s cooperative—it’s helpful, reciprocal, I’m there for you, you’re there for me . 


When you’re interacting with your friends, you should be thinking about your side of it. Am I contributing to that? Have I been helpful lately? When was the last time I said something nice or told somebody why I appreciated them or did something nice for someone? Am I a reliable presence in that person’s life? You can think about the way you interact with your friends as needing to fall into those buckets, at a minimum. 

The same thing goes for the online, as well: being positive, being helpful, showing up from a distance, whether that’s just checking in by text or sending a funny joke or forwarding an article or calling—making time. People have been stressed and anxious lately, so we need to be there and provide an ear to listen, a shoulder to cry on, even virtually. 


KN: Right now, people in many places haven’t seen their friends for months. What do we miss out on when we can’t be around our friends in person?  


LD:  There’s a richness to being with your friends in person, and it hits all your senses. So, we’re not getting any of the tactile sense of being with our friends, and there’s a difference when you see them on a screen vs. when you see them in person, although we don’t entirely know in neuroscientific terms what those differences are yet. 


One of the things our brains do automatically when we’re having a conversation with someone in person is this natural sense of “call and response,” that I’m talking, and then you respond, and then you talk and I respond. We are reading each other’s cues in a way that makes it easier to do that.

When you’re online, sometimes not only is there a little bit of an artificialness to the interaction but there’s literally a lag that’s built in from the technology, and that is quite off-putting for our brains. Our brains recognize that as a different kind of interaction, and they don’t like it very much. I think that’s one reason why some people are being driven crazy by Zoom. And if you have a group on Zoom, it’s very hard figuring out who’s going to speak next. There’s a way that we handle that with nonverbal cues in person that is harder to pull off virtually. 


When you’re in person, you can have a much more natural conversation. There’s an ease and a warmth and a naturalness that we get when we’re with our friends, and I think we really are missing the ability to hug them and high five—that’s big stuff that matters a lot. So, it’s a loss. 

That said, people are reporting a lot of positive experiences, even remotely. We’re being forced to interact virtually, but we’re getting a lot of benefits out of it. It’s not the same, but it’s a whole lot better than nothing. Limited though it is, technology has been a lifesaver in this moment. I can’t imagine what this would have been like if we didn’t have it. 


KN: What do you most hope people will take away from the book?  

LD:  That they will make friendship a priority, that they will call a friend and work harder on thinking about the importance of being a good friend, that parents will think about talking to kids about the importance of friendship and modeling being a good friend and prioritizing it. Parents are full of messages about achievement, and not as many messages about what it means to be a good friend, but I think it’s one of the most important skills that a child can develop. Through all our lives, the importance of friendship has been hiding in plain sight.

About the Author

Kira M. Newman

Kira M. Newman is the managing editor of Greater Good . Her work has been published in outlets including the Washington Post , Mindful magazine, Social Media Monthly , and Tech.co, and she is the co-editor of The Gratitude Project . Follow her on Twitter!

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A friendship essay is precisely what it sounds like: a paper that students write to describe their relationships with their mates.  It is among the many assignments that students are given in their college institutions.  Writing essays about friendship is a great way to analyze what the connection means to you and reflect on some of your encounters. It can also be used as a tool to improve your closeness and affection. This blog post offers tips you may consider while writing your paper and its outline. It features friendship essay examples that help generate ideas that form the primary focus of your paper.  If you are not ready to waste your time on essay writing, StudyCrumb is here to offer affordable prices and professional writers.

What Is a Friendship Essay?

The definition of friendship essay is quite clear and straightforward. A paper about friends can be described as a write-up on a relationship between two or more people. This interpretation makes it easier to obtain the meaning of friendship essay.  Writing such thematic essay will help you communicate your feelings as well as your thoughts. It allows you to recollect your memories about different encounters you have had in life. It will also help you evaluate qualities of your connection.  While writing, you may have a sequence of events starting from your meet-up, activities you have done together, and how you have sustained the connection. Preparing an essay about friendship can evoke memories from your past that may have been long forgotten.

Purpose of an Essay on Friendship

This kind of essay aims to help you explore its nature and form, its pros and cons, and its role in your life. The importance of friendship essay is that it acts as a reflective tool. It helps you realize the significance of creating and maintaining good relationships with friends. It also explains how these connections contribute to your overall wellness. In addition, an article about friendship may teach you to understand that true friendship is priceless and should stand the test of time.

Ideas to Write a Friendship Essay on

Writing essays about friendship is a more manageable task than drafting a paper about a topic that may require more detailed research. Any excellent essay about true friendship starts with an idea that you can examine.  Below are some unique ideas you can explore:

• What is friendship?
• What does friendship mean to me?
• The value of friendship you cherish in your life.
• Cross-cultural friendships.
• The role of friendship in mental health maintenance.

As you reflect on your relationship with your friend, see if you can write a paper incorporating these themes. Remember to choose an idea that interests you and is relevant to your personal experiences or research. Be sure to support your arguments with evidence and examples from real-life situations, literature, or academic research. Look through our definition essay topics or persuasive essay ideas to find a theme that suits your task best.

Friendship Essay Outline

An essay outline about friendship is a summary of what your write-up will contain but in a less detailed format. You use it to organize and structure your content logically and effectively. It presents the main topics and subtopics hierarchically, allowing writers to see the connection between different parts of the material. The importance of an outline lies in its ability to help writers plan, organize, as well as clarify their ideas. This makes the writing of an essay about friends more efficient, and the final product is more coherent and effective. Here is an example of an outline for a friendship essay.

• Briefly introduce the topic of friendship
• Provide a thesis statement that summarizes the main points of the essay
• Topic sentence
• Your main argument
• Real-life examples that support your key idea
• Supporting evidence
• 3rd Body Paragraph
• Examples or recommendations
• Summarize the main points
• Provide some food for thought

Note that this is a general outline. The exact structure and content of your essay will depend on the specific requirements of your assignment and your personal interests.

Structure of a Friendship Essay

The structure of an essay on friendship typically includes the following three parts.

• Introduction An introduction should grab the reader's attention and provide background information. It should also include a clear thesis statement that sets a path and direction of the friendship essays.
• Body The essay's body is where you will provide evidence and details to underpin your thesis statement. It should consist of several paragraphs supporting and developing a statement of purpose. Each paragraph should focus on a specific aspect of your friendliness, such as its importance, benefits, or challenges.
• Conclusion Briefly summarize the essay's main points and reinforce your principal argument. The conclusion should leave a lasting impression on readers and emphasize your topic's significance. Overall, the structure should be clear and well-organized, allowing the audience to follow your argument and understand the topic's significance.

Friendship Essay Introduction

A good introduction about friendship essay should grab the reader's attention and encourage them to continue reading. This can be achieved through a " hook ," a quote, an interesting fact, or a thought-provoking question. Background information can then be provided to give context to the discussed topic.  The introduction to an essay about friendship should also clearly state your main point or argument of the piece, known as thesis statement. This sets pace for the rest of the paper and gives readers a clear view of what to expect. A friendship essay introduction should be concise, engaging, and provide context for the audience to understand the content fully.

Read more: How to Start off an Essay

Friendship Essay Introduction Example

Here is an example of a friendship essay introduction that sets the stage for a reflective and thought-provoking exploration of the most precious gift in life.

Friendship is a special bond that unites two individuals with common interests, experiences, and emotions. It makes life easier and contributes to our happiness. It is a relationship that transcends race, religion, and socio-economic status and has power to sustain and uplift the spirit of humans. In this essay, I will explore its benefits and how it can contribute to a better world. Through personal anecdotes, I will illustrate the bond's depth and role in our day-to-day lives.

Friendship Essay Thesis Statement

The friendship thesis statement aims to provide a summary of the essay's main point. It can be one or two sentences which you develop as you research. The statement of purpose should focus on the central argument and be supported by evidence presented in the body. The thesis statement about friendship should guide the essay's structure. Its main objective is to provide your reader with a roadmap to follow. It should be specific, concise, and accurately reflect the content in your paper. Understanding what constitutes a strong thesis is crucial for writers as it is integral to every essay writing process.

Friendship Thesis Statement Example

The thesis statement must be clear to readers so that they may quickly recognize it and comprehend the paper's significance. It should act as a blueprint of what to expect. A friendship thesis statement sample could be:

In this essay, I will explore friendship's meaning, its importance, benefits, drawbacks, and how it can contribute to a better world. Through a series of personal anecdotes, I will illustrate the bond's depth and its key role in our lives.

Friendship Essay Body

The body part should include five or more paragraphs. Students will use body paragraphs to elaborate on the key factors that make their connection special.

• Definition and explanation. This friendship body paragraph should start with a definition and a brief explanation of its characteristics and qualities.
• Importance of friends. Discuss why it is vital in your life and how it contributes to personal growth and welfare.
• Types of friendships. A paragraph about friendship should discuss different types of friend's relationships that exist.
• Qualities of a good friend. Discuss standards a great confidant should possess.
• Challenges. Discuss the common problems that friends face.
• Ways to strengthen friendship. Provide tips on reinforcing and maintaining good relationships.
• Conclusion. Sum up the key points made in your essay and reiterate the importance of genuine bonds in life.

Friendship Body Paragraph Example

Below is a friendship body paragraph sample.

How to Spend Free Time with Friends • Outdoor Activities. Spending time in nature is a great way to bond with friends. You can meet, then go for a hike, take a walk, or go to a picnic in a park. This allows you to connect and enjoy the beautiful world around you. • Movie Night. Watching a movie is another fun activity you can do with friends. You can share popcorn, grab snacks, and enjoy a movie together. This is a great way to relax and unwind. • Board Games. Playing board games with friends is a fun and interactive way to spend free time. You can play classic games like Monopoly. This is a great way to challenge each other and have a good time.

Friendship Essay Conclusion

Any conclusion on a friendship essay should sum up the main ideas discussed in your essay and restate the thesis statement. It should leave a lasting impression and provide a closure to your topic. To start writing a conclusion about a friendship essay, commence by rephrasing the thesis statement in different words. Summarize the points discussed in your essay by connecting them back to your statement of purpose. End conclusion with a final thought or call to action that leaves a lasting impression on your reader.  It is vital to keep it concise yet impactful. Avoid introducing new information or arguments, as it can confuse readers. Instead, focus on tying up loose ends and emphasizing main ideas discussed in your essay.

Read more: How to Conclude an Essay

Friendship Essay Conclusion Sample

Here is an example of a friendship essay conclusion:

In conclusion, friendship is an essential aspect of our lives that brings joy, support, and companionship. It is a relationship built on mutual trust, understanding, and love. A true friend will always be there for you, no matter what. As humans, we need sincere friends to help us navigate life's ups and downs and provide emotional support. An understanding friend can withstand any obstacle and bring happiness to our lives. The connection is meant to last a lifetime, whether through shared experiences, interests, or simply a common bond. Ultimately, having a close group of loyal friends who truly care for us is one of the greatest gifts we can receive in life.

How to Write an Essay on Friendship?

To write an essay about friendship, start by brainstorming ideas about what friends mean to you and the benefits of such kinds of relationships. Knowing how to write a good essay about friendship involves selecting a great topic and arranging your content in a manner that has logical flow.

1. Come Up With a Topic About Friendship

To brainstorm essay topics on friendship, consider the following.

• Reflect on your own experiences. Think about your own bonds and encounters you have had with allies. Avoid bad occurrences. This can inspire topics to explore in your essay. To find a subject that interests you, you can also look through internet examples of friend essays.
• Ask questions related to friends, such as "What makes a meaningful connection?" or "How does the quality of your bond change over time?"
• Talk to others. Ask friends, family, or classmates about their experiences. They may have interesting insights that can inspire new topics for your essay.

Ensure that topic you select is appropriate for your report style. For example: 

The Day my Best Friend Changed My Life.

You can start this topic by how you met, narrate your story, and then pick out some attributes of a good friend and the advantages of the relationship. Remember to choose a topic on friendship essay that you feel passionate about and can explore in depth in your essay.

2. Do Research

To research and collect information for the friend essay, follow these steps.

• Start with a general search. Use search engines like Google to find articles, books, and other resources on affection.
• Identify keywords. Determine the most relevant keywords for your essay, such as "essay about a friend." Use them in your search to narrow down results to the most pertinent information.
• Evaluate sources. When you have a list of potential sources, evaluate each to determine their credibility and relevance. Look for sources that are written by experts in the field and that have been peer-reviewed or published in reputable journals.
• Take notes. As you read, take notes on the most important and relevant information.

3. Develop a Friendship Essay Outline

An outline is a useful tool for organizing ideas in an essay and it ensures that your essay has a structure. Before outlining you need to have a clear vision of what your essay will focus on. Then analyze every piece of information that you have and categorize it into headings. An outline of an essay about friendships will comprise a list which consists of each paragraph’s topic sentence . By going through the outline, you are able to examine what purpose each paragraph serves. If you need assistance on how to create an outline for a college essay about friendship use the outline example shown below.

4. Write an Essay on Friendship

Writing an essay about friendship is an exciting task. Below is a sample of how you can write your friendship essay. Friendship is the bond between two or more individuals based on mutual trust, support, and understanding. This connection can develop at any stage of life and even last a lifetime. It is a bond that fills our lives with comfort, laughter, and advice during a hard period. Many different factors can contribute to its formation and success. Having similar needs, mutual interests, and social activities can help sustain the relationship. Another crucial aspect is being ready to support each other through happy and difficult times unconditionally. Trust is also an essential component in the longevity of this connection. In conclusion, friendship is an invaluable treasure that brings joy, comfort, and support to our lives. It provides a safe place in a world that can be harsh and unforgiving. It reminds us that we should always stay true to each other.

5. Proofread Your Friendship Essay

When writing a friendship essay, consider the following for an effective introduction.

• Grab your reader's attention. A good introduction makes them want to continue reading your friendship essay.
• Provide context. Give an overview of the friendship essay and its purpose. This will make readers interested in your work.
• Establish your purpose. Clearly state the main idea or thesis.
• Preview the main points. Briefly summarize key points that will be covered.
• Be concise. An introduction should be short and on point, generally no more than one or two paragraphs.

Remember, your introduction will set tone for the rest of your piece and should encourage your readers to continue reading.

Read more: Essay About Happiness : Tips & Examples

Friendship Essay Examples

A sample essay about friendship can be critical to students, especially when they are researching and collecting information. Free friendship essays help you get ideas on how to write and structure your essay. Below are essay examples about friendship that you can go through to help with your writing and draw inspiration from. Friendship essay example 1

Friendship essay example 2

Essay about friendship sample 3

Example of essay on friendship 4

Friendship Essay Writing Tips

Here are some extra tips you need to know that will motivate you to write a friendship short essay.

• You could start with a quote, an anecdote, or a surprising fact.
• Use examples from your own life to illustrate your points in your school college essay about friendship, as this will make your essay more relatable and interesting to read.
• Friendship titles for essays should be clear and straightforward. They should also reflect your main points.
• Describe the aspect of the bond that, in your opinion, is most crucial. It is possible to personalize something that means an entirely different thing to various individuals.

Bottom Line on Friendship Essay Writing

Your central task is to understand what is a friendship essay even before you start writing. Friendship essays explore the nature of our relationships and their various aspects. They can take various forms, from short reflective essays to longer, more analytical pieces. These papers can discuss qualities that make a good friend, the benefits of your relationship, or challenges of maintaining close relationships. Examples of short essays about friendship could be a personal reflection, exploring the unique bond between the writer and their friend and what they hope to continue gaining from each other when they cross paths in future. If you struggle with other papers, feel free to check out our writing guides. From an essay about bullying to a world peace essay , we’ve got you covered.

FAQ About Friendship Essay

1. may i use friendship quotes for the essay.

Yes, it is always a winning step. You can write an essay on friendship with quotes either as the title of your essay or as an introductory phrase. You can also include it in the body of your work while narrating your story.

2. How to write a hook for an essay of friendship?

An essay should hook your reader's attention and make them want to read your story. When writing essays about friendship, you can describe a unique situation in which your friends helped you. You can also end your introduction with a catchy quote, such as Squad goals! Some other quotes that you can use include:

• A road to a friend's house is never long.
• Count your age with friends and years.
• True friend is seen through the heart, not through the eyes.

3. Explain the importance of friendship essay.

The importance of friendship essay is that it teaches students to express their thoughts and feelings about confidants and benefits they obtain from this connection. It also acts as a reflective tool. Friend essays also help students realize advantages of creating and maintaining good relationships with friends and how these linkages contribute to your overall wellness and welfare.

Daniel Howard is an Essay Writing guru. He helps students create essays that will strike a chord with the readers.

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Friendship as a Personal Relationship Essay

In the society it is very common to see that people interact well with some society members and not all. It is therefore, not a miracle to see people always walking and enjoying in groups and chatting while laughing their lungs out. Every person in the world has someone with whom he or she is close to and will be ready to talk his or her mind without fear when they are together.

At institutions of learning or places of work, there are people who are seen always together and closely monitoring each other’s moves. Friendship is more than just being close to one another and entails among other qualities devotion, care, emotional attachment and above all, honesty.

Friendship is an in depth personal interrelationship that is more intimate than an association and in many cases involves emotional attachment. Friends will always desire the best for each other and are ready to take care of each other under any circumstances. A good friend is not just somebody with whom one shares happy moments but also the person who in case of crisis will be the first one to render a helping hand.

Additionally, friends should be ready to share whatever they have with each other and have as minimal secrets as possible that are kept from each other. Though one may have various weaknesses, a good friend points them out honestly and if possible tries to find ways of rectifying them. Friendship does not mean covering up of one’s mistakes and irresponsible behavior; instead it requires direct tackling of any vice that may be present for the benefit of both parties.

A person who is ready to take advantage of any opportunity that may arise as a result of friendship for his or her own selfish motives is not a good friend, because the person is an opportunist and that is a vice as far as friendship is concerned.

Trust is another vital quality of friendship and friend will want to be assured that in case of anything their friends will be able to act on their behalf. It is said that a friend in need is a friend indeed and many people tend to put it that a friend is only that person who can help in times of financial problems, therefore they select their friends based on their social status.

On the contrary, true friendship has been known to be one that is not based on some social issues such as castes and family relationships. As a matter of fact, some of the problems people faces are complicated and financial support is not a solution. In conjunction with that, a person who remembers friendship only when he or she is in need is not a good friend and should be avoided.

Furthermore, friends are concerned about the welfare of one another and will stand by each other during the most difficult times. Friends should be people who are sources of happiness to one another and will not forsake each other even when everybody around is against them. Though friendship can be demanding at times, true friends stick together through thin and thick and they do not keep record of the number of times they have been unhappy for the sake of friendship.

In a nutshell therefore, friends should be a source of security and provide a shoulder to crying on when times are hard. Besides, friends should be ready to share the good fortunes with one another and give one another advice that can make them succeed in life. Friends should also be a source of emotional comfort not trauma to one another, have sympathy for each other and should always be ready to protect their friendship for a good reason.

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Essay on Friendship

List of essays on friendship, essay on friendship – short essay for kids (essay 1 – 150 words), essay on friendship – 10 lines on friendship written in english (essay 2 – 250 words), essay on friendship – for school students (class 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7) (essay 3 – 300 words), essay on friendship – for students (essay 4 – 400 words), essay on friendship (essay 5 – 500 words), essay on friendship – introduction, benefits and qualities (essay 6 – 600 words), essay on friendship – essay on true friendship (essay 7 – 750 words), essay on friendship – importance, types, examples and conclusion (essay 8 – 1000 words).

Friendship is a divine relationship, which is defined by neither blood nor any other similarity. Who is in this world does not have a friend?

A friend, with whom you just love to spend your time, can share your joys and sorrows. Most importantly you need not fake yourself and just be what you are. That is what friendship is all about. It is one of the most beautiful of the relations in the world. Students of today need to understand the values of friendship and therefore we have composed different long essays for students as well as short essays.

Audience: The below given essays are exclusively written for school students (Class 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 Standard).

Introduction:

Friendship is considered as one of the treasures that anyone can possess. God has given us the liberty to choose friends because they are for our lifetime. It is quite normal for our parents and siblings to love us because they are our own blood but a friend is someone who is initially a stranger and then takes his/her place above all the other relations. Friendship is nothing but pure love without any expectations.

Role of a Friend:

True friends share and support each other even during the toughest of times. A true friend is one who feels happy for our success, who feel sad for our failures, fight with us for silly things and hugs us the next second, gets angry on us when we do any mistakes. Friendship is all about having true friends who can understand us without the need for us to speak.

Conclusion:

Friendship is very essential for a happy life. Even a two-minute chat with a friend will make us forget our worries. That is the strength of friendship.

Friendship is a divine relationship, which is defined by neither blood nor any other similarity. Friends are those you can choose for yourself in spite of the difference you both have from each other. A good friend in need will do wonders in your life, whenever you are in need of self-realization, upbringing your confidence and more.

Friendship serves you best not only in your happiest moments but also when you feel low in emotions. A life without a good friend is not at all complete and an emptiness will be felt all the time you think of sharing your emotion that can’t be told to anyone else.

Honesty and Patience in Friendship:

To maintain and keep going with a good deep friendship, honesty is the most important factor. You should choose a person who can be cent percent honest with you in all perspective like emotions, decision making, etc. Trustworthy friendship will help you to take better decisions and choose a better path for your future well-being.

Tolerance and patience with each other are another important characteristics of long-lasting friendship. Accepting the differences, friends should be able to be with each other in all situations. As a friend, the person should lead the other to success by being a motivation and criticize the person if they choose the wrong path.

Friendship will give you sweet and happy memories that can be cherished for a lifetime and if you succeed in maintaining that precious relation, then you are the luckiest person in this world. Love and care for each other will cherish the relationship and helps the person to appreciate each thing done without any fail.

Of all the different relations which we indulge in, friendship is considered to be the purest of them all. Friendship is the true confluence of souls with like minded attitude that aids in seamless conversation and the best of times. It is believed that a person who doesn’t have any friend lives one of the toughest lives.

The Desire to Belong:

Each one of us have been so programmed that we need a companion even if it’s not romantic, someone just to tag along. There are several definitions of friendship and it is upon you as to how you believe your relation to be. Friendship can happen when you are simply sharing a bowl of food with a person day after day. It can be expressed in the way you silently care for someone even when they may not be aware of your existence.

The Little Moments that Matter:

It is giving up the little things you love dearly for the sake of someone you cherish a great deal. Friendship often refers to the little moments of senseless laugh you two share when the rest of the world starts to look bleak. It is to know what your friend needs and being there for them even when the rest of the world has turned their back towards them.

Friendship is the kind of relation which sometimes even exceeds the realms of love because it is all about giving without even once bothering to sense what you shall get back. Every time spent is special because when you are with friends, you don’t feel the blues!

The Bottom-Line:

Of course the definition of friendship is going to vary a great deal from one person to another. But, remember one thing, when you are friends with someone, be prepared to put your heart on the line for their happiness because friendship often manifests into love, even if it is not romantic, it always is true!

Friendship is the most valuable as well as precious gifts of life. Friendship is one of the most valued relationship. People who have good friends enjoy the most in their live. True friendship is based on loyalty & support. A good friend is a person who will stand with you when times are tough. A friend is someone special on whom you can rely on to celebrate a special moment. Friendship is like a life asset and it can lead us to success. It all depends on our choice how we choose our friends.

The quality of friendship is essential for happiness. The benefits of healthy friendship remains long-life. In addition, having a strong friend circle also improves our self-confidence. Due to the strong relationship, we get much emotional support during our bad times. True friendship is a feeling of love & care.

Real friendship cannot be built within limited boundaries like caste or creed. It gives us a feeling that someone really needs us & we are not alone. This is true that man cannot live alone. True friends are needed in every stage of life to survive. A true friend can be an old person or a child. But it is generally believed that we make friend with people who are of the same age as ours. Same age group can give you the freedom to share anything.

The selection of a true friend is also a challenging task. We have to carefully make our friend selection. Friends might come & go. They will make you laugh & cry. Wrong selection can create various problems for you. In the modern world, many youngsters become a social nuisance. The reason behind it is wrong & bad friendships.

But if we successfully choose the right person as a friend then our life becomes easier. It doesn’t matter who you are, what type of clothes you wear. The most important thing is trust because the relation of friendship stands on the pillars of trust.

Friendship is a relation which can make or break us in every stage of life. But in other words, friendship is an asset which is really precious. Obviously, it is also not so easy to maintain friendships. It demands your time as well as efforts. Last but not the least, it is hard to find true friendship but once you succeed in this task you will have a wonderful time. In exchange for that a friend will only need your valuable time and trust.

The idea of friendship is either heartwarming or gives cold feet depending on individuals and the types of friendships. In the current world, friendships have had different definitions based on the morality and civilization of the society. Ideally, friendship is defined as the state of mutual trust between individuals or parties. Trust is an important component of friendship because it determines the reliability and longevity of the friendship. Trust is built through honest communications between the individuals and interested parties.

Once trust has been established, mutual understanding and support being to form the resulting in a friendship. This friendship can be broken through lack of trust. Trust can be breached through deceit and/ or some people, it differs with the frequencies. There are people who will break friendships after only one episode of dishonesty whereas some people give second chances and even more chances. Friendship types determine the longevity and the causes of breakups. The importance of friendship in the lives of individuals is the reason why friendships are formed in the first place.

Types of Friendships:

According to Aristotle’s Nichomachean ethics, there are three types of friendships. The friendships are based on three factors i.e. utility, pleasure and goodness. The first type of friendship is based on utility and has been described as a friendship whereby both parties gain from each other.

This type of friendship is dependent on the benefits and that is what keeps the friendship going. This type of friendships do not last long because it dissolves as soon as the benefits are outsourced or when other sources are found outside the friendship. The friendship was invented for trade purposes because when two people with opposite things that depend on each other re put together, trade is maximized.

The second type of friendship is based on pleasure. This is described as friendship in which two individuals are drawn to each other based on desires of pleasure and is characterized by passionate feelings and feelings of belonging. This type of friendship can ether last long or is short-lived depending on the presence of the attraction between the two parties.

The third type of friendship is based on goodness. In this friendship, the goodness of people draw them to each other and they usually have the same virtues. The friendship involves loving each other and expecting goodness. It takes long to develop this kind of friendship but it usually lasts longest and is actually the best kind of friendship to be in. the importance of such a friendship is the social support and love.

In conclusion, friendships are important in the lives of individuals. Trust builds and sustains friendships. The different types of friendships are important because they provide benefits and social support. Friendships provide a feeling of belonging and dependence. The durability of friendships is dependent on the basis of its formation and the intention during the formation. Friendships that last long are not based on materialistic gain, instead, they are based on pure emotion.

Friendship is an emotion of care, mutual trust, and fondness among two persons. A friend might be a work-mate, buddy, fellow student or any individual with whom we feel an attachment.

In friendship, people have a mutual exchange of sentiments and faith too. Usually, the friendship nurtures more amongst those people who belong to a similar age as they possess the same passions, interests, sentiments, and opinions. During the school days, kids who belong to the similar age group have a common dream about their future and this makes them all of them get closer in friendship.

In the same way, employees working in business organizations also make friends as they are working together for attaining the organizational objectives. It does not matter that to which age group you belong, friendship can happen at any time of your life.

Benefits of Friendship:

Sometimes friendship is essential in our life. Below are a few benefits of friendship.

1. It’s impossible to live your life alone always but friendship fills that gap quickly with the friend’s company.

2. You can easily pass the rigidities of life with the friendship as in your distress period your friends are always there to help you.

3. Friendship teaches you how to remain happy in life.

4. In case of any confusion or problem, your friendship will always benefit you with good opinions.

True and Dishonest Friendship:

True friendship is very rare in today’s times. There are so many persons who support only those people who are in power so that they can fulfil their selfish motives below the name of friendship. They stay with friends till the time their selfish requirements are achieved. Dishonest friends leave people as soon as their power gets vanished. You can find these types of self-seeking friends all around the world who are quite hurtful than enemies.

Finding a true friendship is very difficult. A true friend helps the other friend who is in need. It does not matter to him that his friend is right or wrong but he will always support his friend at the time of his difficulty.

Carefulness in the Selection of Friendship:

You must be very careful while choosing friends. You should nurture your friendship with that person who does not leave you in your bad times easily. Once you get emotionally attached to the wrong person you cannot finish your friendship so soon. True friendship continues till the time of your last breaths and does not change with the passing time.

Friendship with a bad person also affects your own thoughts and habits. Therefore, a bad person should not be chosen in any type of circumstances. We must do friendship with full attention and carefulness.

Best Qualities of Good Friendship:

Good friendship provides people an enormous love to each other.

The below are the important qualities of good friendship:

1. Good friendship is always faithful, honest, and truthful.

2. People pay attention and take note of others thoughts in good friendship.

3. Persons quickly forget and let off the mistakes of the other friend. In fact, they accept their friend in the way they are actually.

4. You are not judged on the basis of your success, money or power in it.

5. Friends do not feel shy to provide us with valuable opinions for our welfare.

6. People always share their joyful times with their good friends and also stay ready to help their friends in the time of need.

7. True friends also support others in their professional as well as personal life. They encourage their friends in the area of their interest.

Friendship is established over the sacrifice, love, faith, and concern of mutual benefit. True Friendship is a support and a blessing for everybody. All those males and females who have true and genuine friends are very lucky really.

Friendship can simply be defined as a form of mutual relationship or understanding between two people or more who interact and are attached to one another in a manner that is friendly. A friendship is a serious relationship of devotion between two or more people where people involved have a true and sincere feeling of affection, care and love towards each other devoid of any misunderstanding and without demands.

Primarily friendship happens between people that have the same sentiments, feelings and tastes. It is believed that there is no limit or criteria for friendship. All of the different creed, religion, caste, position, sex and age do not matter when it comes to friendship even though friendships can sometimes be damaged by economic disparity and other forms of differentiation. From all of these, it can be concluded that real and true friendship is very possible between people that have a uniform status and are like-minded.

A lot of friends we have in the world today only remain together in times of prosperity and absence of problems but only the faithful, sincere and true friends remain all through the troubles, times of hardships and our bad times. We only discover who our bad and good friends are in the times where we don’t have things going our way.

Most people want to be friends with people with money and we can’t really know if our friends are true when we have money and do not need their help, we only discover our true friends when we need their help in terms of money or any other form of support. A lot of friendships have been jeopardised because of money and the absence or presence of it.

Sometimes, we might face difficulty or crises in our friendships because of self-respect and ego. Friendships can be affected by us or others and we need to try to strike a balance in our friendships. For our friendship to prosper and be true, we need satisfaction, proper understanding and a trustworthy nature. As true friends, we should never exploit our friends but instead do our utmost best to motivate and support them in doing and attaining the very best things in life.

The true meaning of friendship is sometimes lost because of encounters with fake friends who have used and exploited us for their own personal benefits. People like this tend to end the friendship once they get what they want or stab their supposed friends in the back just to get what they think is best for them. Friendship is a very good thing that can help meet our need for companionship and other emotional needs.

In the world we live in today, it is extremely difficult to come across good and loyal friends and this daunting task isn’t made any easier by the lie and deceit of a lot of people in this generation. So, when one finds a very good and loyal important, it is like finding gold and one should do everything to keep friends like that.

The pursuit of true friendship Is not limited to humans, we can as well find good friends in animals; for example, it is a popular belief that dogs make the best friends. It is very important to have good friends as they help us in times and situations where we are down and facing difficulties. Our true friends always do their best to save us when we are in danger and also provide us with timely and good advice. True friends are priceless assets in our lives, they share our pains and sorrow, help provide relief to us in terrible situations and do their best to make us happy.

Friends can both be the good or the bad types. Good friends help push us on the right path in life while on the other hand, bad friends don’t care about us but only care about themselves and can lead us into the wrong path; because of this, we have to be absolutely careful when choosing our friends in this life.

Bad friends can ruin our lives completely so we have to be weary of them and do our best to avoid bag friends totally. We need friends in our life that will be there for us at every point in time and will share all of our feeling with us, both the good and bad. We need friends we can talk to anytime we are feeling lonely, friends that will make us laugh and smile anytime we are feeling sad.

What is friendship? It is the purest form of relationship between two individual with no hidden agenda. As per the dictionary, it is the mutual affection between people. But, is it just a mutual affection? Not always, as in the case of best friends, it is far beyond that. Great friends share each other’s feelings or notions which bring a feeling of prosperity and mental fulfillment.

A friend is a person whom one can know deeply, as and trust for eternity. Rather than having some likeness in the idea of two people associated with the friendship, they have some extraordinary qualities yet they want to be with each other without changing their uniqueness. By and large, friends spur each other without censuring, however at times great friends scrutinize do affect you in a positive manner.

Importance of Friendship:

It is very important to have a friend in life. Each friend is vital and their significance in known to us when certain circumstances emerge which must be supported by our friends. One can never feel lonely in this world on the off chance that he or she is embraced by true friends. Then again, depression wins in the lives of the individuals who don’t have friends regardless of billions of individuals present on the planet. Friends are particularly vital amid times of emergency and hardships. On the off chance that you wind up experiencing a hard time, having a friend to help you through can make the change simpler.

Having friends you can depend on can help your confidence. Then again, an absence of friends can make you feel lonely and without help, which makes you powerless for different issues, for example, sadness and drug abuse. Having no less than one individual you can depend on will formulate your confidence.

Choosing Your Friends Wisely:

Not all friends can instill the positivity in your life. There can be negative effects as well. It is very important to choose your friends with utmost wisdom. Picking the right friend is somewhat troublesome task however it is extremely important. In the event that for instance a couple of our dear friends are engaged with negative behaviour patterns, for example, smoking, drinking and taking drugs, at some point or another we will be attracted to their bad habits as well. This is the reason behind why it is appropriate to settle on an appropriate decision with regards to making friends.

Genuine friendship is truly a gift delighted in by a couple. The individuals who have it ought to express gratitude toward God for having genuine pearls in their lives and the individuals who don’t have a couple of good friends ought to always take a stab at better approaches to anchor great friends. No organization is superior to having a friend close by in the midst of need. You will stay cheerful in your one-room flat on the off chance that you are surrounded by your friends; then again, you can’t discover satisfaction even in your estate in the event that you are far away from others.

Types of Friends:

There is variety everywhere, so why not in friends. We can see different types of friends during our journey of life. For instance, your best friend at school is someone with whom you just get along the most. That friend, especially in the case of girls, may just get annoyed even if you talk to another of your friend more than her. Such is the childish nature of such friendships that at times it is difficult for others to identify whether you are best friends or competitors.

Then there is another category of your siblings. No matter how much you deny, but your siblings or your elder brother and sisters are those friends of yours who stay on with you for your entire life. You have a different set of friendship with them as you find yourself fighting with them most of the times. However, in times of need, you shall see that they are first ones standing behind you, supporting you.

There is another category of friends called professional friends. You come across such friends only when you grow up and choose a profession for yourself. These friends are usually from the same organisation and prove to be helpful during your settling years. Some of them tend to stay on with you even when you change companies.

Friendship Examples from History:

History has always taught us a lot. Examples of true friendship are not far behind. We have some famous example from history which makes us realise the true value of friendship. The topmost of them are the Krishna and Sudama friendship. We all must have read or heard as to how after becoming a king when Krishna met Sudama, his childhood friend, he treated him with honour even though Sudama was a poor person. It teaches us the friendship need not be between equals. It has to be between likeminded people. Next example is of Karna and Duryodhana, again from the Mahabharat era.

Despite knowing the fact that the Pandavas were his brothers, Karna went on to fight alongside Duryodhan as he is his best friend and even laid down his life for him. What more example of true friendship can one find? Again from the same era, Krishna and Arjun are also referred to as the best of the friends. Bhagavad Gita is an example of how a true friend can guide you towards positivity in life and make you follow the path of Dharma. Similarly, there are numerous examples from history which teach us the values of true friendship and the need to nourish such for own good.

Whether you accept or deny it, a friend plays an important role in your life. In fact, it is very important to have a friend. However, at the same time, it is extremely important to choose the friends wisely as they are the ones who can build you or destroy you. Nonetheless, a friend’s company is something which one enjoys all through life and friends should be treated as the best treasure a man can have.

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Essay on Friendship: Samples in 100, 200, 300 Words

• Updated on  
• Sep 14, 2023

Friendship is a lovely connection that thrives on pure love and care, free from demands. It’s recognized through respect, support, open communication, shared joys, empathy, and unwavering presence. True friends cherish and express this bond in countless meaningful ways. Mentioned below are the essay on friendship that you can write in your school assignments to express gratitude towards them.

Table of Contents

• 1 Friendship Sample Essay in 100 Words
• 2 Friendship Sample Essay in 200 words
• 3 Friendship Sample Essay in 300 Words

Friendship Sample Essay in 100 Words

Everybody needs friends in their life because friends with friendship fill that gap of proper understanding that at some point even our family fails to meet. Whenever challenges come up in life, this friendship becomes a path to overcome those challenges and boosts us toward progress. In the dark and bleak world of reality, friendship fills vibrant and vivid colours of life, enthusiasm, and motivation. Every occasion becomes extra happy when celebrated with that special circle of friends. Every moment spent and lived with your friends, be it sad or happy, dull or motivating, shapes us into who we are. It also helps us see the good in life. 

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Friendship Sample Essay in 200 words

Friendship is something exceptional. Whenever life gets rough, one thing that we can always rely on is our friendship. We know that we have our friends to support us through the tough times in life. Not only that, friendship is such a deep-rooted emotion that even when we don’t share what we are feeling at the same moment, just by looking at our faces, our friends can figure out that something is bothering us. And they, just by having a thoughtful talk with us, have the strength to make all the bothering go away in a snap. Such is the power of friendship. It’s more than meets the eye. However, there are times when we have those life tests that make us reach our limits and test us through thick and thin. 

Everything in life isn’t always smooth and happy, there are phases when even friends get into a fight with each other, but when they come out of that situation with their friendship still intact, then that bonding reaches new heights of strength.

If you have deep friendships with people, always be grateful to god for that, because not every bond of friendship lasts forever. Those people who have friends who last a lifetime are truly blessed because friendship truly is beautiful.

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Friendship Sample Essay in 300 Words

In this vast world, there are innumerable people we meet every day, yet we still meet people who are there with us for a lifetime. The term for those people is “Friends” and the emotion that sustains them is “friendship”. The word friendship may have a particular number of alphabets, but the meaning it conveys cannot be measured in numbers. The word “friendship” is more than meets the eye. The depth it holds in terms of emotions, bonding, trust, understanding, support, communication, and much more is unparalleled. At every phase of our lives, we come across people and don’t even realize the bonds that get forged with time. These bonds are filled with the spirit and essence of trust, honesty, support, etc. hence becoming the pillars of friendship. 

In every person’s life, friendship plays different roles but one thing that every person can agree on without a doubt is that friendship sustains you. Now, there are basically 2 types of friends, first ones are those who are good friends while the other ones are best friends. The best friends are the ones that we share a special bond of affection and love with. They make our lives much richer and easier

In true friendship, there is no place for judgment. True friends can share anything they are feeling without the fear of being judged by the other. To put it simply, we can say that true friendship gives us a reason to become even stronger in life.

Friendship makes us stronger in all aspects. No matter how much we fight our friends, we always come back to them. This is what teaches us the virtue of understanding and being patient. Without an iota of doubt, we can conclude that there is nothing out there that is nearly as beautiful, and as strong as friendship. Lucky are those who have this blessing in their life. Forever cherish it. 

True friendship is one where there is mutual respect, good communication, honesty, and trust. When you know that no matter what, you can rely on your friend and that friend has got your back in every situation. 

The full form of “FRIEND” is” Few Relations In Earth Never Die”.

The word “friendship” is more than meets the eye. The depth it holds in terms of emotions, bonding, trust, understanding, support, communication, and much more is unparalleled. At every phase of our lives, we come across people and don’t even realize the bonds that get forged with time. The power of friendship is such that it can turn a dull day in any person’s life into a really happy one. Every moment spent and lived with your friends, be it sad or happy, dull or motivating, shapes us into who we are. If you have deep friendships with people, always be grateful to god for that, because not every bond of friendship lasts forever. Those people who have friends who last a lifetime are truly blessed because friendship truly is beautiful. 

Hence, we hope that this blog has assisted you in comprehending what an essay on friendship must include. If you are struggling with your career choices and need expert guidance, our Leverage Edu mentors are here to guide you at any point of your academic and professional journey thus ensuring that you take informed steps towards your dream career.

Deepansh Gautam

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• Writing Essay on Friendship: 3 Samples to Get Inspired

When in school or college, you won’t escape the task of writing an essay on friendship. It’s a paper revealing the power of having friends and reflecting on the corresponding values.

It seems easy to write. You craft a narrative about your mates, explaining what they mean to you. And yet, it’s an academic paper. So, some rules are still here on how to structure and format it.

In this article, you’ll find three samples of different essays on friendship. Feel free to use them to get inspired and better understand this paper’s nature and purpose.

Let’s answer all the questions related to friendship essays together!

What Is an Essay on Friendship?

First, the definition:

An essay on friendship is a short academic paper students write to express their thoughts and reflections on the topic.

The purpose is to:

• explore the phenomenon;
• understand what it means to you;
• realize the significance of having close people nearby;
• reveal the pros and cons of committing to a friendship;
• reflect on how friendship can help our wellness.

Friendship essays aren’t about “my friends and I” topics only. You can write about the role of friendship for mental health, craft an expository essay explaining the topic, or build a reflective essay on what friendship means to you.

Friendship Essay Structure

Friendship essays have a standard structure of academic papers. They are short and consist of three parts:

• Introduction about friendship
• Paragraph about friendship
• Friendship essay conclusion

In the intro, you start with an attention grabber. Feel free to use a quote, a surprising fact, or an anecdote. Introduce the topic and finish with thesis statements about friendship.

In a friendship paragraph, you support a thesis with facts, evidence, personal stories, etc. As a rule, essay bodies have three paragraphs minimum. So you can devote each paragraph to one aspect :

• Definition of this concept 
• Why having friends is essential
• What a friend can give you
• Types of friendship  
• Challenges mates meet on their way  
• Characteristics of a good friend  
• How to strengthen a friendship, etc. 

In the essay body, you can use stories and examples from your life to illustrate points. Tell about your friends and share personal thoughts — it will make your paper more compelling to read.

In the concluding paragraph, sum up the points and restate your thesis. Finish on a positive note, leaving readers with the food for thought.

Easier said than done, huh?

Below are three samples of friendship essays for you to see what they look like and how they sound.

3 Samples to Help You Write an Essay About Friendship

While Ralph Waldo Emerson friendship essay (1) is the top example of the paper on this topic, we’ll go further and provide several NEW samples.

Please check:

Short Essay on Friendship

This sample is perfect for high school students. As a rule, teachers ask them to write 150-200-word essays. The task is to describe concepts or things the way they understand them.

Narrative Essay on Friendship

Narrative essays are more about personal stories. Here, you can tell about your friends, include dialogues , and sound less academic.

500 Words Essay Sample on Importance of Friendship

Over to you.

Now, you have three samples and know how to structure this paper. Ready to write yours?

Let’s begin with the “Why is friendship important?” essay — and you’ll see that it’s not super challenging to craft. Be honest, share your thoughts, and don’t hesitate to write personal reflections on the topic.

Still don’t know how to start your essay on friendship? Our writers are here to help. 

References:

• https://archive.vcu.edu/english/engweb/transcendentalism/authors/emerson/essays/friendship.html
• Essay samples
• Essay writing
• Writing tips

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Essay on Friendship

Here we have shared the Essay on Friendship in detail so you can use it in your exam or assignment of 150, 250, 400, 500, or 1000 words.

You can use this Essay on Friendship in any assignment or project whether you are in school (class 10th or 12th), college, or preparing for answer writing in competitive exams. 

Topics covered in this article.

Essay on Friendship in 150 words

Essay on friendship in 250-300 words, essay on friendship in 500-1000 words.

Friendship is a cherished bond that brings joy, support, and companionship into our lives. It is based on trust, understanding, and shared experiences. True friends offer comfort and a sense of belonging.

Friends play a significant role in our lives. They celebrate our successes, provide support during tough times, and make our journey more enjoyable. Through friendships, we learn, grow, and gain new perspectives. Friends inspire us and motivate us to become better versions of ourselves.

Maintaining friendships requires effort and commitment. It involves mutual respect, trust, and open communication. Quality time spent together strengthens the bond.

In a fast-paced world, friendships are invaluable. They offer love, acceptance, and understanding. True friends stand by us, providing support and making life more meaningful.

In conclusion, friendship is a precious gift that enriches our lives. It brings happiness, support, and a sense of belonging. Nurturing and cherishing friendships is essential for our well-being and happiness.

Friendship is a beautiful bond that brings joy, support, and companionship into our lives. It is a connection built on trust, mutual understanding, and shared experiences. True friendship goes beyond superficial interactions and offers a deep sense of comfort and belonging.

Friends play a significant role in our lives. They are there to celebrate our successes, lend a listening ear during challenging times, and provide a support system that helps us navigate the ups and downs of life. Friends bring laughter, happiness, and emotional support, making our journey more enjoyable and meaningful.

Friendship also allows us to learn and grow. Through our interactions with friends, we gain new perspectives, broaden our horizons, and develop important life skills such as empathy, communication, and compromise. Friends inspire us to be better versions of ourselves and provide a sense of motivation and encouragement.

Maintaining and nurturing friendships require effort and commitment. It involves mutual respect, trust, and open communication. Spending quality time together, sharing experiences, and being there for each other strengthens the bond of friendship.

In a fast-paced and often lonely world, friendships are invaluable. They provide a sense of belonging, happiness, and a support network that enriches our lives. True friends stand by us through thick and thin, offering love, acceptance, and understanding. They are the pillars of support who make life’s journey more meaningful and enjoyable.

In conclusion, friendship is a precious gift that adds immense value to our lives. It is a connection built on trust, understanding, and shared experiences. Friends offer support, laughter, and companionship, making our lives more fulfilling. Nurturing and cherishing friendships is essential for our well-being and happiness.

Title: Friendship – The Essence of True Connection

Introduction:

Friendship is a unique and valuable bond that enriches our lives with joy, support, and companionship. It is a connection that goes beyond mere acquaintanceship, rooted in trust, understanding, and shared experiences. This essay explores the significance of friendship, its qualities, the benefits it brings, and the ways to nurture and cherish these precious relationships.

The Meaning of Friendship

Friendship is a deep and meaningful relationship between individuals characterized by mutual affection, trust, and empathy. It is a bond that offers companionship, understanding, and support in both good times and bad. True friendship is built on honesty, respect, and genuine care for one another.

Qualities of True Friendship

True friendships possess several key qualities. Trust is paramount, as friends confide in each other without fear of judgment or betrayal. Mutual understanding allows friends to empathize and provide emotional support. Respect is essential, as friends accept and appreciate each other’s individuality. Loyalty ensures that friends stand by one another through thick and thin. Communication is vital for maintaining open and honest dialogue, fostering a strong and lasting connection.

Benefits of Friendship

Friendship brings numerous benefits to our lives. Emotional support from friends helps us cope with challenges, reduces stress, and boosts our mental well-being. Friends offer a safe space for sharing thoughts, feelings, and experiences, providing a sense of comfort and validation. They provide a support network during difficult times, lending a listening ear and offering guidance. Friends also bring joy, laughter, and fun into our lives, creating cherished memories and experiences.

Nurturing and Cherishing Friendships

To foster and maintain strong friendships, it is essential to invest time and effort. Regular communication and quality time spent together strengthen the bond. Active listening and empathy are crucial, allowing friends to truly understand and support one another. Celebrating each other’s successes and offering support during challenges cultivates a sense of solidarity. Honesty and transparency build trust, ensuring a foundation of authenticity in the relationship. Respecting boundaries and accepting differences helps sustain harmony within friendships.

The Role of Friendship in Personal Growth

Friendship plays a significant role in personal growth and development. Friends offer different perspectives, expanding our horizons and challenging our beliefs. They provide constructive feedback, helping us improve and grow as individuals. Through shared experiences, we learn valuable life lessons and acquire new skills. Friends inspire us to pursue our passions, push our boundaries, and achieve our goals. Their support and encouragement fuel our motivation and self-confidence.

Types of Friendship

Friendships come in various forms, ranging from childhood friends to work colleagues, from online companions to lifelong confidants. Each type of friendship brings unique dynamics and contributes to our personal growth and well-being.

Conclusion :

Friendship is a precious and invaluable connection that enhances our lives in countless ways. It offers companionship, support, and a sense of belonging. True friends stand by us through thick and thin, celebrating our successes and providing comfort during difficult times. Nurturing and cherishing friendships require effort, empathy, and open communication. By investing in these relationships, we create a support system that enriches our lives and helps us grow as individuals. Friendship is a gift that brings joy, love, and understanding, making life’s journey more meaningful and fulfilling.

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Friendship Essay

500+ words essay on friendship.

Individuals come across numerous people throughout their life. Those who are near us become our companions. We may have a big group of companions in school and college, yet we realise that we can rely on only a few with whom we share genuine friendships. Here, we have provided an essay on friendship for students. By referring to this essay on friendship essay, students of Classes 5 to 8 can become familiar with essay writing skills. They can learn how to organise their thoughts in an effective way and put them in words. This essay will work as a sample for them. Practising Essays on different topics will enhance their writing skills and thus help them to score high marks in English exams.

We have different types of relationships with people around us. With a few of them, we share a blood bond, such as with our family and with others, we forge our own connections. Friendship is one such relationship which we choose by ourselves. God has given us this liberty to choose friends because they are, in most instances, for a lifetime. A friend is someone who is initially a stranger and then takes his/her place above all other relationships. Friendship is considered one of the treasures that anyone can have.

Friendship can exist between people, regardless of their age and gender. It can even happen between an old man and a small boy. Friendship can also exist between humans and their pet animals. Moreover, it can also be felt in familial relationships such as between father and son, mother and daughter etc. A simple bond of friendship can help uproot various prejudices and negative thoughts from society, such as religious conflict, violence, human rights abuse, poverty, illiteracy, etc. Friendship can generate passion among people to create a better world where all are united together.

Role of a Friend

Friends are an integral part of our life. To develop a strong, true friendship, we should treat friends with love and respect the way we would expect them to treat us. In this way, the friendship will last longer. Some of the ways that define the role of friendship in achieving success are:

• Encouraging and motivating
• Creating a comfort zone
• Listening to each other and providing truthful opinions
• Adding joy to life
• Sharing secrets and being reliable
• Caring and unconditional love
• Helping to grow individually

Best Qualities of a Good Friendship

There is a famous proverb, “A friend in need is a friend indeed”. It means that though we may have several friends at the time of prosperity, many desert us at the time of adversity. We can examine the sincerity of a friend during our hard times. Only a sincere and faithful friend remains with us in times of trouble. All others abandon us.

Friendship is established over the sacrifice, love, faith, and concern of each other. Below we have mentioned some qualities that exist in a good friendship:

• Honest and trustworthy
• Accepting and loyal
• Non-judgemental
• Inspiring and motivating
• Helpful and generous

Famous Examples of Friendship in Indian Mythology

In Indian Mythology, we can find various examples of true friendship. All of us have heard the story of Krishna and Sudama. Sudama was a poor brahmin. His condition became so impoverished that he could not afford food for his family. Then he decided to go to Dwarka to meet his childhood friend Krishna. When he reached Dwarka, he requested the gatekeeper to let him meet with Krishna. As he was dressed dirty, the gatekeeper did not allow him to enter. But, he requested several times and asked the gatekeeper to inform Krishna that his childhood friend was there to meet him. Finally, the gatekeeper showed mercy on him and sent the message to Krishna. On hearing the news of Sudama’s arrival, Krishna came running and welcomed him with an open heart. He also helped him financially by giving him plenty of wealth.

Similarly, there are various stories of friendship described in Indian Mythology. A few of them are the friendship of Karna and Duryodhana, Ram and Sugreeva, Krishna and Arjun.

Essays Topics for Students’ Practice

After writing an essay on friendship, students must practise essays on similar topics. To help them with this, we have provided a few essay topics as suggestions:

• Friendship Day Essay
• Essay on My Best Friend
• Essay on Memories of My Childhood Friends
• Essay on the Importance of True Friendship

Frequently Asked Questions on Friendship

Who is a true friend.

A true friend is one who stands for you and is always ready to help you. He/she understands you and values your feelings. Whose company makes you feel happy, and you can share your thoughts and emotions without any hesitation or fear?

Why do we need friends in our life?

Friends bring happiness into our life. They help in solving problems, whether personal or professional. By talking to them, our stress reduces, and we feel better. Friends improve our self-confidence and help us to find purpose in our life. They offer companionship and thus prevent loneliness.

When is Friendship Day celebrated?

Each year on the first Sunday of August, Friendship Day is celebrated in India.

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Home — Essay Samples — Sociology — Friendship — The Role of Friendship in My Life

The Role of Friendship in My Life

• Categories: Friendship

About this sample

Words: 697 |

Published: Apr 15, 2020

Words: 697 | Pages: 2 | 4 min read

Table of contents

Friendship essay outline, friendship essay example, introduction.

• The significance of friendship in life
• Introduction to the best friend, Katy

First Encounter with Katy

• Initial impressions of Katy
• Formation of friendship

Supportive Friendship

• Encouragement and positive outlook during poor test grades
• Reciprocal assistance in academics

Facing Challenges Together

• Approach to final semester tests
• Encountering disappointment and offering support

Strengthening the Friendship

• Mutual determination to improve academically
• Emotional moment of appreciation and unbreakable bond
• Reflection on the importance of friendship
• Treasuring meaningful friendships

Works Cited:

• Faber Taylor, A., & Kuo, F. E. (2009). Children With Attention Deficits Concentrate Better After Walk in the Park. Journal of Attention Disorders, 12(5), 402-409.
• Louv, R. (2008). Last child in the woods: Saving our children from nature-deficit disorder. Algonquin Books.
• Miller, J. R. (2005). Biodiversity conservation and the extinction of experience. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 20(8), 430-434.
• Pergams, O. R., & Zaradic, P. A. (2008). Evidence for a fundamental and pervasive shift away from nature-based recreation. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 105(7), 2295-2300.
• Pretty, J., Peacock, J., Sellens, M., & Griffin, M. (2005). The mental and physical health outcomes of green exercise. International Journal of Environmental Health Research, 15(5), 319-337.
• Roszak, T. (1995). The voice of the earth: An exploration of ecopsychology. Phanes Press.
• Sobel, D. (2008). Childhood and nature: Design principles for educators. Stenhouse Publishers.
• Ulrich, R. S. (1984). View through a window may influence recovery from surgery. Science, 224(4647), 420-421.
• Wells, N. M. (2000). At home with nature: Effects of “greenness” on children's cognitive functioning. Environment and Behavior, 32(6), 775-795.
• Wilson, E. O. (1984). Biophilia. Harvard University Press.

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Importance of Friendship Essay Example, with Outline

Published by gudwriter on May 10, 2018 May 10, 2018

Ready for importance of friendship essay? Take a look at this informational resource featuring an outline, APA style format, and a list of references. Use ideas from this essay sample to form the focus of your writing assignment. To achieve high grades order admission essays from experienced tutors who will help you with your essay.

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Importance of Friendship Essay Outline

Introduction.

Thesis: Friendship brings people together in a bond that helps them realize and experience a meaningful life.

Paragraph 1:

A good friend is always available irrespective of the circumstances.

• A true friend cares for their friends, accepts them unconditionally, tolerates their shortcomings, and encourages them even in the face of hopelessness.
• A loyal friend makes one to be who they are without fearing victimization or judgment.
• A good friend can know one more than one knows themselves.
• A friend can tell one without fear what one does not want to tell oneself.

Paragraph 2:

Friendship is like a partnership since it brings two people together on equal terms that are binding to both of them.

• Friends give their all and love each other unconditionally and do even more so as to sustain it.
• The ugly, the bad, and the good should be endured in friendship.
• A good friend brings out the best in someone.
• A person in friendship expects their initiatives to be attended to even when they are down with illness.

Paragraph 3:

Friendship can be compared to family and can even do more than a family could do for a person.

• Sometimes, the friends one has are the family they wish they had or the family they find easier to deal with as compared to their blood family.
• One’s blood family may ignore, ridicule, judge, or even misunderstand them.
• One may get from their friends that which they do not get from their family.
• A true family is not linked by the bond of blood but the bond of joy and respect in each other’s life.

Paragraph 4:

“A friend in need is a friend in deed” is an old cliché that speaks about true friendship.

• It essentially means that a true friend will always help in times of need.
• I fully understood the meaning of this saying when a classmate friend of mine once handed in my takeaway assignment in my absence.

Friendship brings people together to form a greater and stronger whole than its individual parts. Friends act and react in ways that show that they love and care for each other.

Importance of Friendship Essay Example

Almost every human being has friends or at least a friend with whom they spend time together. Friendship is about knowing someone better than others do and counting on them whenever the need arises. A friend is like a gift that one gives oneself. It is doubtless that out of friendship, one lives the fullness of life. Some of the qualities that are expected from friendship include trust, honesty, and authenticity. These are qualities that are majorly concerned with remaining true to a friend and providing them a shoulder to lean on all the time. Friendship brings people together in a bond that helps them realize and experience a meaningful life. Gudwriter offers two paragraph essay examples from any topic.

A good friend is always available irrespective of the circumstances. A true friend cares for their friends, accepts them unconditionally, tolerates their shortcomings, and encourages them even in the face of hopelessness. Even at that moment when everyone decides to walk away from a person for whatever reason(s), their true friend would walk in and be with them and support them. With a loyal friend, one can be who they are without fearing victimization or judgment because they know the friend fully understands them. A good friend can as a matter of fact know one more than one knows themselves. In addition, a friend can tell one without fear what one does not want to tell oneself. If one is on a wrong path, the friend would tell them as soon as they notice it.

Additionally, friendship is like a partnership since it brings two people together on equal terms that are binding to both of them. They give their all and love each other unconditionally and do even more so as to sustain it. In a friendship, there should be expected to be the ugly, the bad, and the good, all of which should be endured. A good friend brings out the best in someone by encouraging them and prevailing upon them to make the best out of their abilities and strengths. Just like in a business partnership, a person in friendship would expect their initiatives to be attended to even when they are down with illness. This is why it could be true to say that life is partly what one makes it and partly what the friends they choose make it.

Friendship can also be compared to family and can even do more than a family could do for a person. Sometimes, the friends one has are the family they wish they had or the family they find easier to deal with as compared to their blood family. One’s blood family may ignore, ridicule, judge, or even misunderstand them. In such a case, they would get from their friends that which they do not get from their family. However, in the best case scenario, friendship can also develop between or among family members. Normally, a true family is not linked by the bond of blood but the bond of joy and respect in each other’s life. One should consider a good friend of theirs as their greatest relation because just one loyal friend is more than a thousand relatives.

“ A friend in need is a friend in deed ” is an old cliché that speaks about true friendship. It essentially means that a true friend will always help in times of need. I never really gave much weight to this saying until I once had to rely on a friend and classmate for an important favor. I had missed school due to an unavoidable circumstance on a day everyone in the class was to hand in their final takeaway assignment in print format. I tried calling people I had thought were my friends among my classmates but none was willing to help. When I was just about to give up, Jasmine, a classmate who was not so close a friend, called and asked me to email her my assignment. I later learnt she downloaded the assignment, printed it, and handed it in together with hers. From then, I am careful about people I treat as friends.

Friendship brings people together to form a greater and stronger whole than its individual parts. Friends act and react in ways that show that they not only love each other but care for them too. It is akin to striking a partnership in which one partner is always there for the other partner in his or her absence. Friends broaden each other’s horizon by opening new doors for each other. They seek to soar beyond limits as a single determined force. Indeed, friendship guarantees one a meaningful and fulfilling life.

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Together Forever

What If Friends Are The Life Partners That Matter Most?

Recent books have made the case that marriage is the key to American prosperity — and divorce the key to happiness. But what if we made our friendships the center of our lives?

Americans are lonely, alarmingly so. Last year, the nation’s leading public health authority, the US Surgeon General, released a report documenting an “epidemic of loneliness and isolation.” In recent years, about half of Americans reported experiencing loneliness, which has effects on mortality akin to smoking three-fourths of a pack of cigarettes a day. Time was, people solved the loneliness problem by getting, and staying, married. Today, the share of 25- to 54-year-olds who are married is down to just over one in two, a sharp drop from three decades ago, when two out of three prime-working age people came home to a spouse. Friendship has taken a hit as well. The share of Americans who report having three or fewer close friends has nearly doubled to 49% in 2021, up from 27% in 1990.

Amidst a clear vacuum in human connection and flourishing comes a spate of books about what kinds of bonds make for a well-lived life and, by extension, a well-adjusted society. To hear marriage advocates tell it, matrimony comes with a whole host of financial and psychological benefits for its participants. Just as, or perhaps even more, important are the benefits marriage confers on any children that issue from such a union. By contrast, if you take divorce advocates at their word, breaking free of marriage and its inherent patriarchy brings its own suite of perks, not least of which is happiness. Then there are the friendship advocates, who argue that the relationships many people consider peripheral should occupy a more central role in our lives. (There are also the polyamory advocates, but that’s probably another essay).

Marriage’s most prominent recent defenders are a pair of social scientists who have mined their disciplines for supporting data. Melissa S. Kearney, an economist , focuses on children’s outcomes in The Two-Parent Privilege: How Americans Stopped Getting Married and Started Falling Behind , in which she marshalls numerous studies showing that the children of married two-parent families are more likely to avoid incarceration, graduate high school, and find employment. In Get Married: Why Americans Should Defy the Elites, Forge Strong Families, and Save Civilization , the sociologist Brad Wilcox musters surveys and data that show people who marry are wealthier, happier, and live more meaningful lives.

Wilcox suggests viewing marriage almost like a business whose product is successful children.

Kearney posits herself as a bold iconoclast, speaking truth to her economist colleagues who would rather focus on charts and graphs than address the messy business of marriage. This is a strange assertion, because economists have studied these matters for decades, and Kearney draws heavily on their findings, as well as on her own work linking family structure to children’s well-being. While these studies do point to better outcomes for kids who grow up in married households, many of them are not designed to untangle correlation and causation. In fact, some studies that do control for income and parental structure point to resources, rather than family structure, as the salient variable: Harvard sociologist Christina Cross, for example, has found that Black students from low-income single-parent households had similar educational outcomes as those from low-income two-parent households; it was Black youth from well-off two-parent households who did better .

Wilcox’s approach is even more confusing. A sociologist with a PhD. from Princeton, he styles himself as a man of the people and calls out “elite hypocrisy” on marriage, a strawman represented by couple of Huffington Post and Bloomberg columns and a few quasi-highbrow cultural artifacts (the Noah Baumbach film Marriage Story comes in for a beating). Wilcox presents solutions by zeroing in on four demographic groups — Asian-Americans, “Strivers” (who are proxied by college degrees), the faithful, and conservatives — who he calls the “Masters of Marriage” for their higher-than-average marriage rates. By replicating their behaviors or values, his theory goes, one can become an ace at marriage.

For example, he suggests viewing marriage almost like a business whose product is successful children, citing a Korean-American woman named Lisa Lee. Lee tells Wilcox that “Romance is not her first priority in her marriage: ‘It may sound really cold to say that it’s an economic partnership, but in some ways it is. And the project of raising our children is, at the moment, the overwhelming priority for [me and my husband] until they are out of the house and financially independent.’” Lee’s mindset, he continues, “is consistent with my research showing that Asian Americans are more likely than Whites, Hispanics, and Blacks to believe that couples with children should make every effort to stay married, even if they are not happy.”

Stick with it, even if it makes you miserable, is a tough pill to swallow, whatever your ethnic background. And is this really best for the kids? Kids aren’t dumb. In my observation, children sense when their parents are unhappily married. Not only will they grow up without a model of a healthy and loving relationship, but they often don’t feel good at home when they see that one or both of their parents is unhappy, or isn’t respected or valued by the other parent.

Which leads us to divorce, the star of Lyz Lenz’s new memoir This American Ex-Wife: How I Ended My Marriage and Started My Life . The book opens with a detailed description of the contents of a bag of trash her husband has let fall off a bench and cover the floor, where she happens upon it at 1 a.m., returning home from a work trip. “Go-­GURT wrappers, tissues, plastic plates, Goldfish crackers, damp napkins, orange peels, dried chunks of cheese, and a broken toy from a fast food chain.” Her husband has left the trash on the bench with the intention of taking it out the next day, but if past behavior predicts future outcomes, it will eventually fall to her. Once, she recounts, he left the bag on the bench for a full week before the rotting smell pushed her to blink first and take it outside, then clean up the wet mess. A couple of pages later, she recounts how she realized, several months earlier, that he had been hiding her belongings — shirts, mugs — simply because he dislikes them. After months of weekly couples therapy, during which he promises to stop, another item disappears. “I knew he’d taken it. And he’d taken it because he didn’t like it. He didn’t like me,” she concludes.

One obvious takeaway: Don’t marry someone who doesn’t like you or sounds like a real schmuck. Spend time instead with people who love you, value you, and support you.

Lenz proceeds to extrapolate a lesson that would set Wilcox’s hair on fire: the path to happiness and fulfillment, especially for straight women, winds through divorce, rather than in the fundamentally broken institution of marriage. She recounts the myriad ways that marriage reinforces patriarchy, both in the past and in the present: the laws and practice of coverture , for example, in which a woman’s legal identity is subsumed by her husband upon marrying, or research showing that single mothers today actually do less housework and have more free time and more sleep than their married counterparts. (Women, she notes, initiate nearly 70% of divorces.) Men are the villains of Lenz’s book; the heroes are the friends and family who support her. With their help, and with the delightful company of her two children, she rebuilds a life around her own freedom and fulfillment, both professional and, at times, sexual.

One obvious takeaway from Lenz’s story is: don’t marry someone who doesn’t like you or sounds like a real schmuck. Spend time instead with people who love you, value you, and support you. If this all seems fairly intuitive, the message appears to have been lost on the marriage advocates, whose laser focus on marriage per se obscures any curiosity about what it actually is about marriage that can — but doesn’t always — make people’s lives better.

It is precisely this quality of connection, and its role in a good life, that is the subject of The Other Significant Others: Reimagining Life with Friendship at the Center , journalist Rhaina Cohen’s case that deep friendships deserve a more prominent place in our lives, our vocabulary, and our legal system. Cohen, a podcast producer and print reporter, presents a series of case studies, interwoven with social science, that deftly illustrate why relationships are so essential to our well-being. These friendships are characterized by exceptional compatibility and a commitment to the other person and to the relationship that is rarely seen outside of romantic partnership. Yet, Cohen writes, “Society neglects the possibilities for profound platonic connection,” with few legal or social avenues that accord them the recognition they deserve.

Marriage is so privileged in the United States that the meaningful non-marital relationships are incomprehensible — socially, legally, and even linguistically — in that few people can identify the appropriate label for their connection.

Many of the friends Cohen profiles live together. Nick and Art are two youth pastors in their late twenties who met as undergraduates at a small Christian college. After Art came out as gay, and decided he had to become celibate in order to retain his faith, he didn’t think he could face the lifetime of loneliness ahead. Nick suggested he move in, despite his own discomfort with homosexuality, which he actively worked to overcome. By the end of the chapter, Nick has a girlfriend, Morgan; she texts Art a photo of a couch she likes, to ask him if they can buy it for their shared home when she and Nick get married. “Absolutely,” he tells her.

Another pair of friends, Stacey and Grace, are planning along with their other best friend Caroline to all make their lives in Chicago, where they met as undergraduates. After they graduate, the pair find themselves traveling for holidays to see one another, and making major life plans together, such as where to live and settle down. They debrief after they’ve read something meaningful and ask each other for work advice. They describe themselves as “same soul.” Grace tells Cohen, “It’s hard to mark where one person begins and the other ends.”

Barb and Inez, two women who met in the 1960s and have been friends ever since Barb, who couldn’t have biological children for medical reasons, invited herself on a two-week road trip Inez was taking with her two sons. More than 50 years later, they share a ranch house they call “the Hermitage.” They alternate taking out the trash, and remind each other to turn off the hose or take their medications. This serene set-up won’t fend off death or keep down the extortionate costs of long-term care in America, but Barb and Inez know they have each other for as long as they are sound of body. In sickness and in health, you might say.

What struck me about these friendships was not simply the depth of care and tenderness that made each portrait more moving than the last, but the remarkable nature of each individual person in the relationship. To a one, the friends in the book come across as thoughtful, open, service-oriented, humble, self-aware, and communicative, people for whom connection and caring for others are guiding principles in their lives. Art and Nick are youth pastors, called to serve their faith communities. Barb and Inez cared for their friend Ann during years of cancer treatment, spending her last day with her in hospice. Andrew and Toly, another pair of “platonic life partners,” volunteered together as software developers in Tanzania and cofounded a nonprofit.

They also embrace the hard work of being in a deeply committed relationship with another person. Nick faces his own “homohysteria” with a framework he and Art came up with (“ What is moral? What is cultural? What is personal ?”) to help him overcome his discomfort with things such as Art’s expressions of physical affection. Lenz’s husband, by contrast, comes across as unkind, obstinate, and selfish — not great marriage material, but not very promising friend material either. After her divorce, many of the men she goes on to date also don’t treat her especially well. One friend she goes on a romantic road trip with announces, upon its conclusion, that he’s reuniting with an ex; another boyfriend, a “midlist writer” who “donated to liberal causes, posted on social media about how Black lives matter, fundraised for reproductive rights, and supported mutual aid” refuses to wear a condom with her and gets mad at her for asking. These examples (and her own acknowledgement that marriage “doesn’t have to be this way”) chip away at the idea that it’s marriage that’s the problem, and divorce that’s the solution, and suggest instead that a lack of basic decency, empathy, and communications skills makes these liaisons such letdowns.

That not-too-groundbreaking insight —that it is the qualities of the people in a relationship that make the relationship succeed or founder — does not lend itself to neat policy prescriptions. Government-funded marriage promotion programs with the express aim of teaching relationship and communication skills have an almost embarrassingly poor track record, which even Kearney admits. Changes to the tax code, such as eliminating the “benefits cliff” that strips low-income people of welfare benefits if they marry and increase their household income, makes clear ethical, moral, and economic sense, but it is not going to save a relationship in which one or both parties is selfish or oblivious. Both Wilcox and Kearney call for a cultural shift to reprioritize marriage, but as Cohen’s book shows, marriage is already so privileged in the US that the meaningful non-marital relationships she profiles are incomprehensible — socially, legally, and even linguistically — in that few people can identify the appropriate label for their connection.

Cohen asks us to imagine more for our friendships, to think about what they could be if we weren’t so laser-focused on romance.

Cohen argues for legal reforms that would unbundle the privileges of marriage, such a simple two-page form offered by the state of Colorado known as a “designated beneficiary agreement.” It allows people to grant rights to another person (a friend, child, or parent, for example) in 16 categories, most of which touch on health and finances, such as being a health care proxy or the beneficiary of a life insurance policy, without paying for the costly services of an estate or family attorney. Such an option wouldn’t remove the many privileges of marriage, but redistribute them to a wider range of people.

Finally, Cohen asks us to imagine more for our friendships, to think about what they could be if we weren’t so preoccupied with romance. She ends the book with the story of how she and her husband moved in with two friends, Naomi and Daniel, and their children. The entire process was characterized by warmth, communication, and vulnerability. An early lunch conversation centers around what was most likely to go wrong in their living situation. “Hearing all of us utter our concerns and acknowledge that our living arrangement was potentially fragile, instead of making it feel doomed, brought me closer to Naomi and Daniel,” Cohen writes.

The lesson I took from Cohen’s book was that these qualities and values — self-awareness, empathy, openness, and intentional communication — are what made those relationships so beautiful to behold. Perhaps because we live in a time when the opposite qualities are too often lionized and rewarded, to say nothing of algorithmically incentivized, I relished reading about such kind people, their loveliness vivid on the page. I came away thinking that if we could only fortify these qualities in people, then relationships, marital or not, and the human and societal flourishing that comes with deep connection, might just take care of themselves.

Anna Louie Sussman is a New York-based journalist an d 2024 Alicia Patterson fellow w ho reports on gender, economics, health, and reproduction. She is currently at work on the book Inconceivable: Reproduction in an Age of Uncertainty , which looks at the challenges people face in starting and growing their families. She has previously written for Romper about how the new class of weight loss drugs might impact fertility .

Understanding the Complexities of Women’s Friendship

Women’s friendships tend to be more intimate and fragile than men’s. here’s why..

Posted May 10, 2024 | Reviewed by Davia Sills

• Women often have higher expectations for support and intimacy in close relationships.
• Changing one's perception of conflict to being an opportunity for growth can strengthen friendships.
• Three affinities are central to understanding the intimacy and fragility of women’s friendships.

I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Danielle Bayard Jackson, author of Fighting for Our Friendships: The Science and Art of Conflict and Connection in Women’s Relationships , to talk about her book. I learned so much in our discussion and I’m excited to share it with you all.

Dr. Marisa G. Franco (MF): Your book is really insightful, especially because it delves into the intersection of gender and friendships, which isn’t often explored. Can you share more about why women’s friendships are unique?

Danielle Bayard Jackson (DBJ): Thank you so much. I’m thrilled you enjoyed the book. I began noticing these differences back when I was a high school teacher. The way girls and guys congregate and react to certain situations showed me our unique ways of bonding and conflict resolution. It struck me that what may disrupt girls might not even register with the boys. These observations continued into adulthood, confirming my suspicions. Through my own experiences and conversations with other women, I became increasingly curious about our distinct modes of communication and cooperation .

MF: bell hooks pointed out that fear of direct confrontation can push us toward indirect methods like gossip because it serves as an alternative when addressing issues directly seems too risky due to potential consequences. Have you heard that?

DBJ: Absolutely. While we may outwardly denounce gossip, it does fulfill a basic sociological need by helping us navigate social dynamics. Deborah Tannen is a sociolinguist who says to ask yourself, “Am I talking about or am I talking against?” which highlights a crucial distinction. Am I talking about my friend because I’m trying to process my feelings? Or am I secretly taking delight in having you perceive her negatively?

MF: I feel like that is a great thing to keep in mind. I think some people think if you’re talking about me behind my back, it’s automatically bad. But viewing gossip as a tool for processing emotions rather than as being inherently negative can shift our understanding of its role in friendships.

Your book brilliantly explores this conundrum of women’s friendships—that while, on one hand, they tend to be more intimate than men’s friendships, on the other hand, they are more fragile. Why do you think this combination exists?

DBJ: I think it comes down to the expectations we place on our close relationships. Research suggests that women have higher expectations of support and intimacy in their close relationships than men do. Women integrate our friends into our lives as deeply as siblings, whereas men treat their friends more like cousins.

With such high expectations, even minor conflicts can feel like major violations. I know I’m generalizing here, but we tend to know that men aren’t as intimately interwoven, that maybe they don’t see and hang out with each other as often [as women do].

MF: Is there a way to achieve intimacy without fragility? And what does that look like?

DBJ: I believe our relationship with conflict holds the key. Unlike other contexts where conflict is expected, we often don’t anticipate it in friendships. If your attitude toward friendship itself is that friendship is supposed to be recreational and fun, then conflict is going to feel inappropriate to your objectives for friendship. Changing our perception of conflict from a sign of impending doom to an opportunity for growth can strengthen our friendships.

MF: Yeah, absolutely. I think I’m a recovering conflict-avoidant, and I will say that I think people avoid conflict because they think it has to look like attacking each other. It has to look like antagonism. So I totally agree with you that it’s us understanding that conflict can be defanged, that it doesn’t have to be even raised voices. It can feel like an act of love.

But you have this really great concept of the “three affinities of female friendship” for why conflict tends to happen in women’s friendships. Tell us about it.

DBJ: Of course! The three affinities—symmetry, support, and secrecy—are central to understanding women’s friendships. These qualities, while fostering intimacy, also make these friendships more susceptible to disruption when violated. So women prioritize symmetry, that feeling of, "Girl, you’re like me; you get it" support—because the research says that the number-one thing women look for in their same-sex friendships is emotional support and then secrecy, which is this feeling of you and I are exclusive. We’re in this vault together. And I’m not saying that men don’t value these things, but women highly prioritize these things.

Recognizing these affinities provides a framework for identifying and addressing issues within friendships. I’m able to name, you know, when she criticizes me or when she’s judgmental of my parenting choices or my eating choices, it feels like she’s elevating herself, because criticizing me is you saying that your choices are superior to mine. And so what’s happening here is that I feel like she thinks she’s better than me.

MF: It’s fascinating how these affinities shape the dynamics of female friendships, and understanding them can help navigate conflicts more effectively. Typically, when it comes to conflict in friendship, we don’t make the unsaid said . It can just feel like “there’s something off, but I can’t really tell what it is.” And it just continues to build and accumulate. It’s helpful to have that framework to ask yourself, “I don’t know what’s off, but is it symmetry? Is it support? Is it secrecy?” It gives us a little bit of an audit in those situations.

If you’ve enjoyed this snippet of our conversation, I encourage you to pick up Danielle’s new book, Fighting for Our Friendships . The book is out now and offers a refreshing exploration of the intricacies of female friendships.

Thank you to Danielle for sitting down with me to talk and I encourage you all to follow her work .

Cox, D. A. (2021). The state of American friendship: Change, challenges, and loss. Survey Center on American Life .

Marisa Franco, Ph.D., was previously a professor at Georgia State University, where she became an academic expert on friendship. She currently works as a policy fellow at Millenium Challenge Corporation.

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Guest Essay

Saying Goodbye to My Brilliant Friend, the Poetry Critic Helen Vendler

By Roger Rosenblatt

The author, most recently, of “Cataract Blues: Running the Keyboard.”

One makes so few new friends in older age — I mean, real friends, the ones you bond with and hold dear, as if you’d known one another since childhood.

Old age often prevents, or at least tempers, such discoveries. The joy of suddenly finding someone of compatible tastes, politics, intellectual interests and sense of humor can be shadowed, if tacitly, by the inevitable prospect of loss.

I became friends with Helen Vendler — the legendary poetry critic who died last week — six years ago, after she came to a talk I gave at Harvard about my 1965-66 Fulbright year in Ireland. Our friendship was close at the outset and was fortified and deepened by many letters between us, by our writing.

Some critics gain notice by something new they discover in the literature they examine. Helen became the most important critic of the age by dealing with something old and basic — the fact that great poetry was, well, lovable. Her vast knowledge of it was not like anyone else’s, and she embraced the poets she admired with informed exuberance.

The evening we met, Helen and I huddled together for an hour, maybe two, speaking of the great Celtic scholar John Kelleher, under whom we had both studied; of Irish poetry; and of our families. Helen was born to cruelly restrictive Irish Catholic parents who would not think of her going to anything but a Catholic college. When Helen rebelled against them, she was effectively tossed out and never allowed to return home.

She told me all this at our very first meeting. And I told her the sorrows of my own life — the untimely death of my daughter, Amy, and the seven-plus years my wife, Ginny, and I spent helping to rear her three children. And I told Helen unhappy things about my own upbringing. The loneliness. I think we both sensed that we had found someone we could trust with our lives.

I never asked Helen why she had come to my talk in the first place, though I had recognized her immediately. After spending a life with English and American poetry — especially the poetry of Wallace Stevens — how could I not? The alert tilt of her head, the two parenthetical lines around the mouth that always seemed on the verge of saying something meaningful and the sad-kind-wise eyes of the most significant literary figure since Edmund Wilson.

And unlike Wilson, Helen was never compelled to show off. She knew as much about American writing as Wilson, and, I believe, loved it more.

It was that, even more than the breadth and depth of her learning, that set her apart. She was a poet who didn’t write poetry, but felt it like a poet, and thus knew the art form to the core of her being. Her method of “close reading,” studying a poem intently word by word, was her way of writing it in reverse.

Weeks before Helen’s death and what would have been her 91st birthday, we exchanged letters. I had sent her an essay I’d just written on the beauty of wonder, stemming from the wonder so many people felt upon viewing the total solar eclipse earlier this month. I often sent Helen things I wrote. Some she liked less than others, and she was never shy to say so. She liked the essay on wonder, though she said she was never a wonderer herself, but a “hopeless pragmatist,” not subject to miracles, except upon two occasions. One was the birth of her son, David, whom she mentioned in letters often. She loved David deeply, and both were happy when she moved from epic Cambridge to lyrical Laguna Niguel, Calif., to be near him, as she grew infirm.

Her second miracle, coincidentally, occurred when Seamus Heaney drove her to see a solar eclipse at Tintern Abbey. There, among the Welsh ruins, Helen had an astonishing experience, one that she described to me in a way that seemed almost to evoke Wordsworth:

I had of course read descriptions of the phenomena of a total eclipse, but no words could equal the total-body/total landscape effect; the ceasing of bird song; the inexorability of the dimming to a crescent and then to a corona; the total silence; the gradual salience of the stars; the iciness of the silhouette of the towers; the looming terror of the steely eclipse of all of nature. Now that quelled utterly any purely “scientific” interest. One became pure animal, only animal, no “thought-process” being even conceivable.

One who claims not to know wonders shows herself to be one.

She was so intent on the beauty of the poets she understood so deeply, she never could see why others found her appreciations remarkable. Once, when I sent her a note complimenting her on a wonderfully original observation she’d made in a recent article, she wrote: “So kind of you to encourage me. I always feel that everything I say would be obvious to anyone who can read, so am always amazed when someone praises something.”

Only an innocent of the highest order would say such a beautiful, preposterous thing. When recently the American Academy of Arts and Letters awarded her the Gold Medal for Belle Lettres and Criticism, Helen was shocked.

“You could have floored me when I got the call,” she wrote to me, adding: “Perhaps I was chosen by the committee because of my advanced age; if so, I can’t complain. The quote that came to mind was Lowell’s ‘My head grizzled with the years’ gold garbage.’”

She was always doing that — attaching a quotation from poetry to a thought or experience of her own, as if she occupied the same room as all the great poets, living with them as closely as loved ones in a tenement.

Shelley called poets the “unacknowledged legislators of the world.” I never fully got that famous line. But if the legislators’ laws apply to feeling and conduct, I think he was onto something. If one reads poetry — ancient and modern — as deeply as Helen did, and stays with it, and lets it roll around in one’s head, the effect is transporting. You find yourself in a better realm of feeling and language. And nothing of the noisier outer world — not Donald Trump, not Taylor Swift — can get to you.

In our last exchange of letters, Helen told me about the death she was arranging for herself. I was brokenhearted to realize that I was losing someone who had given me and countless others so much thought and joy. Her last words to me were telling, though, and settled the matter as only practical, spiritual Helen could:

I feel not a whit sad at the fact of death, but massively sad at leaving friends behind, among whom you count dearly. I have always known what my true feelings are by whatever line of poetry rises unbidden to my mind on any occasion; to my genuine happiness, this time was a line from Herbert’s “Evensong,” in which God (always in Herbert, more like Jesus than Jehovah), says to the poet, “Henceforth repose; your work is done.”

She closed her letter as I closed my response. “Love and farewell.”

Roger Rosenblatt is the author, most recently, of “Cataract Blues: Running the Keyboard.”

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Book Review: Memoirist Lilly Dancyger’s penetrating essays explore the power of female friendships

The Associated Press

May 6, 2024, 10:51 AM

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Who means more to you — your friends or your lovers? In a vivid, thoughtful and nuanced collection of essays, Lilly Dancyger explores the powerful role that female friendships played in her chaotic upbringing marked by her parents’ heroin use and her father’s untimely death when she was only 12.

“First Love: Essays on Friendship” begins with a beautiful paean to her cousin Sabina, who was raped and murdered at age 20 on her way home from a club. As little kids, their older relatives used to call them Snow White and Rose Red after the Grimm’s fairy tale, “two sisters who are not rivals or foils, but simply love each other.”

That simple, uncomplicated love would become the template for a series of subsequent relationships with girls and women that helped her survive her self-destructive adolescence and provided unconditional support as she scrambled to create a new identity as a “hypercompetent” writer, teacher and editor. “It’s true that I’ve never been satisfied with friendships that stay on the surface. That my friends are my family, my truest beloveds, each relationship a world of its own,” she writes in the title essay “First Love.”

The collection stands out not just for its elegant, unadorned writing but also for the way she effortlessly pivots between personal history and spot-on cultural criticism that both comments on and critiques the way that girls and women have been portrayed — and have portrayed themselves — in the media, including on online platforms like Tumblr and Instagram.

For instance, she examines the 1994 Peter Jackson film, “Heavenly Creatures,” based on the true story of two teenage girls who bludgeoned to death one of their mothers. And in the essay “Sad Girls,” about the suicide of a close friend, she analyzes the allure of self-destructive figures like Sylvia Plath and Janis Joplin to a certain type of teen, including herself, who wallows in sadness and wants to make sure “the world knew we were in pain.”

In the last essay, “On Murder Memoirs,” Dancyger considers the runaway popularity of true crime stories as she tries to explain her decision not to attend the trial of the man charged with killing her cousin — even though she was trained as a journalist and wrote a well-regarded book about her late father that relied on investigative reporting. “When I finally sat down to write about Sabina, the story that came out was not about murder at all,” she says. “It was a love story.”

Readers can be thankful that it did.

AP book reviews: https://apnews.com/hub/book-reviews

Copyright © 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed.

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Like Love by Maggie Nelson review – music, passion and friendship

Vibrant essays from the author of The Argonauts touch on art, inspiration, and many of the central dilemmas of our times

“A s a child I had so much energy I’d lie awake and feel my organs smolder,” Maggie Nelson wrote in 2005’s Jane: A Murder . She was a dancer before she was a writer and you can feel the commitment to the fire of bodily motion in her masterpieces: the shimmeringly brutal excavation of girlhood and violence in Jane , the story of her aunt’s killing at the hands of a rapist; the clear-headed yet ecstatic celebration of the transformations of pregnancy and top surgery, and the new kind of family she and her trans partner brought into being in The Argonauts (2015). Her dedication to the material finds the forms it needs; I don’t think she sets out to bend genres. Instead, her high-stakes eviscerations of body settle into radically new forms.

Is this the energy of the rebel or the valedictorian? For decades, Nelson has parted her hair, fastened her top button, won the right grades and grants while throwing herself voluptuously into the counterculture, dreaming of being an “ electric ribbon of horniness and divine grace ” like one of her inspirations, Prince . It’s an American energy – expansive, new, full of power, pleasure, change and motion; a frontier energy, even when she’s writing about New York. We can hear Whitman behind her, and Emerson. “Power ceases in the instant of repose,” Emerson pronounces in Self-Reliance ; “it resides in the moment of transition from a past to a new state, in the shooting of a gulf, in the darting to an aim.”

A decade after The Argonauts became the bible of English graduates everywhere, the essays in Like Love arrive to help us understand Nelson’s place in a culture where, to her half-delight, she has become such a powerful voice. Spanning two decades, they range from appreciations of influences including Prince and Judith Butler , to wild, freefalling conversations with figures such as Björk, Wayne Koestenbaum and Jacqueline Rose. There is a passionate, wondering account of her formative half-erotic friendship with the singer Lhasa de Sela . The writing isn’t consistent, any more than her books are. But I like to take my thinkers and writers whole, as she does. The essays offer a kind of composite self-portrait, and illustrate how she thinks, sometimes painstakingly, sometimes with casual jubilance, about some of the central dilemmas of our time.

In the face of the climate crisis, how to avoid “giving in to the narcissistic spectacle of the slo-mo Titanic going down”? In the face of the crisis in feminism, how and whether to move beyond sexual difference? The written exchanges show her interlocutors thinking it through, too. “ You dare to step into the future like no one else atm ,” Björk says. It’s true. This is where all that restless energy is leading. This is why she’s an Emersonian, shying away from nihilism. “There are new lands, new men, new thoughts,” Emerson wrote in Nature , discarding the “dry bones” of his ancestors; “Let us demand our own works and laws and worship.”

In her powerful piece on the artist Carolee Schneemann , Nelson posits her as a female incarnation of Emerson’s self-reliant man. But it’s Nelson herself who proffers new laws and worship – whose project amounts to a practical philosophy of contemporary American culture. In The Argonauts she offers the gift of a future we can somehow share; one that acknowledges the miseries of the present, that has space for dreams, but is obstinately material and in our world. Here, in dialogue with Jacqueline Rose, she proposes that “ Everybody deserves the kind of non-stultifying internal breathing space of fluidity or instability that is attributed to queers, or to women, or whatever.”

Like Love’s title comes from writer and theatre critic Hilton Als ’s vision of a group on the subway not as white women or black men but as mouths that need filling “with something wet or dry, like love, or unfamiliar and savory, like love”. Nelson, too, is drawn to mouths – to orifices in general – as organs of pleasure and pain, and as portals enabling a radical openness.

Because Nelson likes writing about her friends, there’s a kind of homogeneity to much of the book that cumulatively left me feeling a little claustrophobic, longing especially for the roominess of time travel. With the exception of 2009’s Bluets , Nelson’s writing is so located in the postwar world that the past can feel entirely absent. This is her affinity with Emerson and Whitman again – her song to the future – but I wonder if I’m alone in wishing that, alongside those two often acknowledged ancestors, her future could have artists, activists and libertines from earlier centuries informing it, too.

Which is not to say that she’s wrong to write about the people in her circle. The brutality of the present moment may require us precisely to batten down the hatches and commit to extreme solidarity. At a time when institutional life is collapsing, when the pandemic privileged family over friends, when work expands in ways that leave many too exhausted to socialise, Nelson demonstrates what it means to dedicate yourself to a cohort with seriousness and strenuousness. “You, to me, quickly became an inspiration,” she tells the poet Brian Blanchfield , “a brother, a support in times of seriously dark waters, an editor, a lender of excellent and pivotal books, a cheerleader, a colleague, a couch sleeper (and couch mover), a fellow swimmer … a corrupting gambler, (queer) family.” Like Love may be one of the most movingly specific, the most lovingly unruly celebrations of the ethics of friendship we have.

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Harnessing the Power of Critical Thinking in Daily Life

This essay about critical thinking outlines its importance and practical applications in everyday life. It defines critical thinking as the art of analyzing and evaluating information to form reasoned conclusions, emphasizing the importance of questioning information, structuring thoughts, and self-reflection. The essay discusses how critical thinking encourages creativity and systematic problem-solving, which are valuable in both professional and personal settings. Challenges such as information overload and the necessity for constant skepticism are also addressed. Furthermore, the essay explores the role of critical thinking in education, advocating for a learning environment that promotes independent thought and exploration. Overall, it presents critical thinking as a vital skill that enhances decision-making and fosters a more informed, discerning society.

How it works

Critical thinking isn’t merely a buzzword or a skill reserved for the confines of academia; it’s a robust, everyday tool that can dramatically enhance our decision-making and problem-solving capabilities. So, what exactly is critical thinking? Simply put, it’s the art of analyzing and evaluating information to reach well-reasoned conclusions. It’s about being actively engaged in your thought processes, challenging conventional wisdom, and not taking things at face value.

Critical thinking starts with questioning. Whenever you encounter new information, whether through a conversation, reading, or media, it involves pausing and asking yourself: What is the evidence? Who benefits from this information? Could there be a bias? Consider a scenario where you read a headline that feels emotionally charged; a critical thinker would step back and assess the source, check for other evidence, and not let initial emotions drive immediate reactions.

Structuring your thoughts is another cornerstone of critical thinking. It’s not just about what you think but how you organize those thoughts. This could mean prioritizing what’s most important or structuring your day to optimize for peak mental performance. For example, in planning a project, critical thinking helps lay out clear, manageable steps, ensuring that each phase builds on the previous one for coherent results.

Self-reflection is a significant, albeit challenging, aspect of critical thinking. It requires us to examine our own beliefs and motivations critically, asking ourselves why we hold certain views and being open to adjusting those views in light of new evidence. This self-examination extends to recognizing personal biases—everyone has them, and they can color our perceptions and decisions in subtle, sometimes profound ways.

Critical thinking also dovetails with creativity. It pushes us to question existing approaches and brainstorm innovative solutions. This creative problem-solving becomes invaluable in workplaces that value adaptability and forward-thinking, where the usual solutions don’t always resolve new or complex problems.

However, developing and maintaining strong critical thinking skills is not without its challenges. It demands a consistent, deliberate effort and the mental flexibility to consider multiple viewpoints and outcomes. In today’s fast-paced world, where information overload is common, it can be particularly daunting to sift through vast amounts of data to find what’s relevant and true.

Moreover, instilling critical thinking in educational environments can be tricky. It requires creating a space where questioning is encouraged, and students aren’t penalized for thinking outside the box or challenging the status quo. Educators must strike a balance between guiding students and giving them the freedom to explore ideas independently.

In the real world, critical thinking is more than an academic exercise; it’s a practical skill that affects every decision we make. From discerning which job offer to accept to navigating personal relationships, the ability to analyze facts dispassionately, understand logical connections, and make informed judgments is invaluable. It helps us avoid manipulation and make decisions that align with our values and goals.

In essence, critical thinking is about cultivating a mindset that questions, analyzes, and innovates. It empowers us to tackle complex challenges, reduces our susceptibility to misinformation, and enhances our ability to communicate effectively. By fostering this skill, we can improve not only our own lives but also contribute to a more rational, informed society.

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Harnessing the Power of Critical Thinking in Daily Life. (2024, May 12). Retrieved from https://papersowl.com/examples/harnessing-the-power-of-critical-thinking-in-daily-life/

"Harnessing the Power of Critical Thinking in Daily Life." PapersOwl.com , 12 May 2024, https://papersowl.com/examples/harnessing-the-power-of-critical-thinking-in-daily-life/

PapersOwl.com. (2024). Harnessing the Power of Critical Thinking in Daily Life . [Online]. Available at: https://papersowl.com/examples/harnessing-the-power-of-critical-thinking-in-daily-life/ [Accessed: 12 May. 2024]

"Harnessing the Power of Critical Thinking in Daily Life." PapersOwl.com, May 12, 2024. Accessed May 12, 2024. https://papersowl.com/examples/harnessing-the-power-of-critical-thinking-in-daily-life/

"Harnessing the Power of Critical Thinking in Daily Life," PapersOwl.com , 12-May-2024. [Online]. Available: https://papersowl.com/examples/harnessing-the-power-of-critical-thinking-in-daily-life/. [Accessed: 12-May-2024]

PapersOwl.com. (2024). Harnessing the Power of Critical Thinking in Daily Life . [Online]. Available at: https://papersowl.com/examples/harnessing-the-power-of-critical-thinking-in-daily-life/ [Accessed: 12-May-2024]

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