Friendships
Friendship have the same power and influence over your life as family relationships, sometimes even more. Close friendships have an intimacy about them that allow each person to share their lives and secrets. We learn and grow from friendships just as we do from relationships within families and those with lovers.
We learn about friendships in childhood, to trust, to love, to share, to care. If you can maintain good friendships at that point in your life, you will generally follow the same paterns throughout your life, as our issues keep us consistent in how we behave.
Some people seems to have many friends, while others tell me that no one wants to be their friend, for no apparent reason, which of course goes to issues. People who can't make friends, or find people annoying in general, have pets instead.
Sometimes you meet someone and there is a special connection from the onset. It is a often a recognition on the soul level. Your frequencies match, you feel a link or special bond, and you want to spend more time together. This does not necessarily reflect a romantic relationship, though one could develop in time, if it is meant to be part of the experience. Wth romance, it can't be one sided. Either both people want it, or it won't work.
Karmic friendships are the people who come into our lives for learning lessons. They may be lifelong friendships or short term. The lessons can be positive or negative, depending on what one's soul is searching for at that time. It is all about the experience.
Karmic friendships often have a chemistry about them, a special unspoken dynamic, though not necessarily romantic.
As we study metaphysics we understand that these friendships come from lifetimes where soul are experiencing together in many realities - parallel, past, or future, depending on how you view the movement of time.
Karmic relationships are never limitted by race, age, and sexual barriers. They have a purpose, that will be played out.
Metaphysical friends enter your life, share for a time, then generally leave. Sometimes they return; often they do not. They are sometimes people you would not have chosen as friends, had you not been on the path to healing and self-awareness. Metahysical friends are free spirits and searchers such as yourself, and do not have the where-with-all to make you feel complete.
If the karmic relationship becomes romantic, then separates, there is often a tendency to remain attached at some level, "Can't we still be friends?" There is a feeling of being incomplete without the person in your life, which sadly goes to co-dependency and often emotional problems.
The world is in an escalating state of flux and change, reflected in our friendships, and time available to be spent with others. It is oftne not easy to maintain full time friendships with people. Technology helps us bridge the time gap, if only to say, "Hello."
Do you attract a karmic friendship the same way you attract a karmic lover? Yes it is the same - and often the same soul.
Balance - To be in a positive friendship, is to be is a functional positive space and know the parameters of the friend in question. You can't have a functional friendship with someone who is dysfunctional and has with endless issues and vices, which drag you down with that person. People stuck in issues who will not get help, must be let go of, no matter what the karma. The same is true of family members. In this day and age, with seek friends for fun, compassion, and to hep us heal.
Friends will welcome each other's company and exhibit loyalty towards each other, often to the point of altruism. Their tastes will usually be similar and may converge, and they will share enjoyable activities. They will also engage in mutually helping behavior, such as exchange of advice and the sharing of hardship. A friend is someone who may often demonstrate reciprocating and reflective behaviors. Yet for many, friendship is nothing more than the trust that someone or something will not harm them. Value that is found in friendships is often the result of a friend demonstrating on a consistent basis:
In a comparison of personal relationships, friendship is considered to be closer than acquaintanceship, although there is a range of degrees of intimacy in both friendships and acquaintances. Friendship and acquaintanceship can be thought of spanning across the same continuum. The principal disciplines studying friendship are sociology, anthropology and zoology. Various theories of friendship have been proposed, among which are social psychology, social exchange theory, equity theory, relational dialectics, and attachment styles.
History - Friendship is considered one of the central human experiences, and has been sanctified by all major religions. The Greco-Roman had, as a paramount example, the friendship of Orestes and Pylades. The Abrahamic faiths have the story of David and Jonathan. The Christian Gospels state that Jesus Christ declared, "No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends."(John 15:13)
Philosophy - Aristotle is perhaps best known for his discussion (in the Nicomachean Ethics) of philia, which is usually (somewhat misleadingly) translated as "friendship", and certainly included friendship, though is a much broader concept.
Friends usually will engage in various forms of physical contact, at times spontaneous and other times of a ritualized nature. This is often used as an outward symbol of their friendship.The form and context of the physical contact has varied historically, culturally, and developmentally. In the West, these manifestations, with the exception of the more formal ones, can be seen with greater frequency among young children, opposite sex friends, and among female friends. In the East they are more equally distributed.
The most common are: handshakes, holding hands, high five, hugging, walking arm-in-arm, placing an arm over the other's shoulder or waist, kissing, imitation of fight (e.g. a punch on the shoulder, usually among males.)
Developmental issues - In the sequence of the emotional development of the individual, friendships come after parental bonding and before the pair bonding engaged in at the approach of maturity. In the intervening period between the end of early childhood and the onset of full adulthood, friendships are often the most important relationships in the emotional life of the adolescent, and are often more intense than relationships later in life. These friendships are most often with one's age and sex peers, though equally intense bonds can form with older or younger individuals.
Cultural variations A group of friends consists of two or more people who are in a mutually pleasing relationship engendering a sentiment of camaraderie, exclusivity and mutual trust. There are varying degrees of "closeness" between friends. Hence, some people choose to differentiate and categorize friendships based on this sentiment.
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