Category: FRIENDSHIP

  • For he who is angry on account of the things which have been done to him, and demands satisfaction would not be able to obtain the praise of forbearance; but when a man dismisses the consideration of all past evils, although they are many and painful, but is compelled to take steps for self-defense from fear of the future and by way of providing for his own security, no one would deprive him of the rewards of moderation. 

    Nevertheless, David did not act even thus, but found a novel and strange form of moral wisdom. And neither the remembrance of things past, nor the fear of things to come, nor the instigation of the captain, nor the solitude of the place, nor the facility for slaying, nor anything else incited him to kill; but he spared the man who was his enemy and had given him pain, just as if he was some benefactor and had done him much good. What kind of indulgence then shall we have if we are mindful of past transgressions and avenge ourselves on those who have given us pain, whereas that innocent man who had undergone such great sufferings and expected more and worse evils to befall him in consequence of saving his enemy, is seen to spare him, so as to prefer incurring danger himself and to live in fear and trembling, rather than put to a just death the man who would cause him endless troubles?

    His moral wisdom then we may perceive, not only from the fact that he did not slay Saul when there was so strong a compulsion, but also that he did not utter an irreverent word against him, although he who was insulted would not have heard him. Yet we often speak evil of friends when they are absent, he on the contrary not even of the enemy who had done him such great wrong. His moral wisdom then we may perceive from these things, but his lovingkindness and tender care from what he did after these things. For when he had cut off the fringe of Saul’s garment and had taken away the bottle of water, he withdrew afar off and stood and shouted and exhibited these things to him whose life he had preserved, doing so not with a view to display and ostentation, but desiring to convince him by his deeds that he suspected him without a cause as his enemy, and aiming therefore at winning him into friendship. Nevertheless, when he had even thus failed to persuade him, and could have laid hands on him, he again chose rather to be an exile from his country and to sojourn in a strange land and suffer distress every day in procuring necessary food than to remain at home and vex his adversary. What spirit could be kinder than his? He was indeed justified in saying, “Lord remember David and all his meekness” (Ps. 131:1).

    Saint John Chrysostom
    If Thine Enemy Hunger, Feed Him
    Homilies on Profitable Subjects

  • Nothing will ever please me, no matter how excellent or beneficial, if I must retain the knowledge of it to myself. And if wisdom were given me under the express condition that it must be kept hidden and not uttered, I should refuse it. No good thing is pleasant to possess, without friends to share it.

    —Seneca, Letters from a Stoic

  • When you go to visit any of your relations or friends, do not go to their house in order to eat and drink well, but go there in order to take part in friendly and sincere conversation with them, to refresh your soul from worldly vanities by friendly and loving intercourse, to be mutually comforted by your common faith. For “I seek not yours, but you,” says the Apostle.

    —St. John of Kronstadt, My Life in Christ

  • Loneliness is an unsatisfied desire for love and connection with others, and this person finds it difficult to satisfy it. Perhaps the real reason for the inability of this person to connect with others is the lack of love within him, for if he sowed love, he would reap love too. This is a kind of selfishness, for he wants people to love him while he does not have the readiness to offer this love. He wants others to connect with him though he does not have the readiness himself to connect with them.

    …

    For if the infant remains attached to his father and mother his whole life, [he will have negative issues]; therefore, detachment must take place, that he may become disciplined, and his life may become healthy.

    And it happens sometimes that the fathers and mothers delay the onset of detachment in the life of their children, and by this they impede their growth and maturity.

    …

    But gloominess may be generated in the heart, making them depressed and sad, and the feeling of abandonment arises in him, so he feels that all [people] have abandoned him, and this makes him feel insecure too. And then he may reach despair and loss of the meaning of life, all these making him turn into a rebellious person against society, and [making him] violent.

    If the feeling of loneliness increased within a person, and he became fully convinced that he is unloved and undesirable, then he would distance himself fully from others and would avoid them.

    This however will make him lonelier, and then he will go into a vicious cycle.

    Of the curious matters, concerning loneliness, which were observed, is that they found that the lonely person turns creative and inventive. For there are people who feel lonely, yet they have composed wonderful musical pieces, and there are others who have painted the most beautiful paintings.

    Nevertheless, this does not make us conclude that loneliness creates innovativeness nor inventiveness in man’s life. But what happens is that if a man were already talented in a particular field, like painting, music, poetry, or writing, then loneliness makes them excel all the more in their talent. This loneliness may polish these talents, thereby making the talented person produce a creative and inventive product.

    —H.E. Metropolitan Youssef, How to Overcome Loneliness [The Definition of Loneliness]

    …

    Research has shown that loneliness may begin from childhood. If a young child was brought up without being taught how to form friendships in his life, then when he reaches adolescence, having no friendships in life, it would be difficult for him to form friendships afterwards. Therefore, the feeling of loneliness would continue with him. The child may have formed friendships, but not with people who had a positive impact on his life, and therefore he will feel lonely when he grows up. This makes clear the importance of the role of fathers and mothers in encouraging their children to form valuable and meaningful friendships in their childhood.

    …

    1. One of the very important causes of loneliness is that the child was left alone in infancy, as it happens in the cases of divorce. The father and mother may dispute with one another over who would get custody of the child. And it may happen that neither of them wants to take the child with them, and then the child feels abandoned, especially [coming] from people who do impact his lite.

    ….

    Divorce causes loneliness for the following three reasons:

    …

    Take to yourself the Lord as a friend, a father, and a shepherd, as David the prophet said, “When my father and my mother forsake me, then the LORD will take care of me.”

    —H.E. Metropolitan Youssef, How to Overcome Loneliness [The Treatment for Loneliness]

  • Lord, consider me among the despised and nonexistent, but do not deprive me of working with You. Allow me to have an existence before You, although, in my eyes, and perhaps in the eyes of people, I am despised and nonexistent (1 Cor 1:28).

    …

    Lord, it is a blessed hour when I sit with myself. When I sit with myself I sit with You, because, although I might not see You, You are within me. It is the same as when You were in the world and the world did not know You.

    …

    Behold, O Lord, I confess to You that now whenever I sit with myself, I feel every time that my self is more precious than the whole world, “For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?” (Mk 8:36). Whenever I feel that my self is more valuable than the world, the world grows smaller and smaller in my eyes, and I take from You the grace of indifference to everything. When I am thus indifferent, I find You before me, encouraging me: “Do not fear, for I am with you” (Gen 26:24).

    When I sit, O Lord, with myself, I discover what is inside me, and I also see how the strangers transgressed Your sanctuaries within me (Jer 51:51). When I see that, and expose it before You, for You to keep my soul from strangers, then our session goes on and on, and I find many things to say to You. Here, human consolations pale in comparison. I do not seek human companionship, but rather I seek solitude, retreat, and stillness, so as not to be deprived of this dire need, my session with You, which provides me with contrition and purity.

    …

    I love You, and love sitting with You more than sitting with other people.

    …

    Give me, O Lord, to leave people, and become occupied with myself, to connect with You.

    —H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Dialogue with the Divine

    from the poem ‘A Whisper of Love’

    Wherever You are, there shall my thoughts be
    Family and friends have I forgotten

    —H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Dialogue with the Divine

  • • Friends are better than money. Almost anything money can do, friends can do better. In so many ways a friend with a boat is better than owning a boat.

    68 Bits of Unsolicited Advice
    Kevin Kelly

  • So solitude can mean introspection, it can mean the concentration of focused work, and it can mean sustained reading. All of these help you to know yourself better. But there’s one more thing I’m going to include as a form of solitude, and it will seem counterintuitive: friendship. Of course friendship is the opposite of solitude; it means being with other people. But I’m talking about one kind of friendship in particular, the deep friendship of intimate conversation. Long, uninterrupted talk with one other person. Not Skyping with three people and texting with two others at the same time while you hang out in a friend’s room listening to music and studying. That’s what Emerson meant when he said that “the soul environs itself with friends, that it may enter into a grander self-acquaintance or solitude.”

    Introspection means talking to yourself, and one of the best ways of talking to yourself is by talking to another person. One other person you can trust, one other person to whom you can unfold your soul. One other person you feel safe enough with to allow you to acknowledge things—to acknowledge things to yourself—that you otherwise can’t. Doubts you aren’t supposed to have, questions you aren’t supposed to ask. Feelings or opinions that would get you laughed at by the group or reprimanded by the authorities.

    This is what we call thinking out loud, discovering what you believe in the course of articulating it. But it takes just as much time and just as much patience as solitude in the strict sense. And our new electronic world has disrupted it just as violently. Instead of having one or two true friends that we can sit and talk to for three hours at a time, we have 968 “friends” that we never actually talk to; instead we just bounce one-line messages off them a hundred times a day. This is not friendship, this is distraction.

    Solitude and Leadership
    William Deresiewicz

  • “Friendship arises out of mere Companionship when two or more of the companions discover that they have in common some insight or interest or even taste which the others do not share and which, till that moment, each believed to be his own unique treasure (or burden). The typical expression of opening Friendship would be something like, “What? You too? I thought I was the only one.”

    … It is when two such persons discover one another, when, whether with immense difficulties and semi-articulate fumblings or with what would seem to us amazing and elliptical speed, they share their vision – it is then that Friendship is born. And instantly they stand together in an immense solitude.”

    ― C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

  • There is a cute, though wonderfully accurate, metaphor for what has to happen within a good friendship. A good friendship can be compared to two porcupines caught in a snowstorm. Whenever they get too far away from each other, they begin to feel cold. Yet if they get too close to each other, their quills begin hurting each other. They are forced then to maintain a very delicate balance between distance and closeness.

    —Ronald Rolheiser, The Restless Heart: Finding Our Spiritual Home in Times of Loneliness

  • “True friendship requires closeness, affection, support, and mutual encouragement, but also distance, space to grow, freedom to be different, and solitude.”

    —Henri Nouwen