“Together, walking in open spaces is fun,” or why do you need friends?

Man lives in society and inevitably drawn to communicate with other people supporting and nourishing friendships or friendships.

But what friendship is and why friends are needed at all, few of us realize. Friends appear and disappear from life in a completely natural way, but is it really so?

Psychology and types of friendship

From the point of view of psychology, the phenomenon of friendship is defined as a special kind of relationship between people characterized by people's interest in each other, mutual support, joint pastime, dedication and selfless help.

It is, in fact, such marriage, only without sexual relations. Friendly relations satisfy a person’s need for participation, sharing of interests and impressions.

Depending on what the person most needs, friendship is divided into several types:

Friendship partnership - such communication does not affect personal space and is limited only by the working environment. This is a friendship of colleagues and business partners, which, as a rule, is terminated if a person changes his field of activity or place of work.
Friendship friendship - born under the influence of temporary circumstances and a forced long-term joint pastime. These are fellow students, employees of one department, neighbors, visitors of one fitness club or another event. In this case, people choose the company of those with whom they can most comfortably spend time.
A distinctive feature of such a friendship is its not tension - the friends, although they learn about each other’s problems, do not participate in them at all.
Friendship-psychological affinity (or friendship of equals) is the closeness of people with common interests, temperaments, social status, views on life. Such people understand each other perfectly and resemble the other halves. But such friendship is not always eternal - people change and eventually stop understanding each other.
Unequal friendship - Often a person makes friendship with a more successful and bright person because of his low self-esteem. As a rule, a more beautiful and successful friend uses his unpretentious friend for his own purposes.
Situational friendship - this is forced communication between people connected with one situation: friendship between two parents of schoolchildren, friendship with a “useful” colleague, and so on.
Friendship cooperation - This is a social interaction in which friends exchange experiences, moral experiences, material and psychological support. For this kind of friendship is very important exchange of impressions and help.
Such cooperation has a peculiar “code”: sharing news, providing moral and material support, providing voluntary assistance in case of trouble, keeping secrets, and so on.
Friendship is maintained until the "code" is respected.
Friendship with families - some families are friends for generations: go to each other for a visit, are chosen together for nature, gather for events and so on.
Children's friendship - a person with his friend grows up, recognizes this world. If this sweet and naive friendship survives all the trials, it will last forever.
Noble friendship - does not depend on external circumstances, habits and temperaments of friends, world views, distances and other conditions. Such friendship is checked by distance, time, the negative circumstances of life and other things, and still remains. The main condition for such communication is the ability to make friends and the desire to help and understand.

There is also male and female friendship, which differs from each other only in the fact that women share news and problems with each other, complain about life and ask for advice.

Men are not particularly accustomed to sharing their problems with each other - they just spend time with their friends.

About the main types of friendship in this video:

Value at different stages of human development

In early childhood Friendship comes down to joint walks, games, cartoons and other similar activities. Children easily quarrel and reconcile, do not try to use each other and benefit.

In adolescence and youth friends become the most important people in a person’s life.

It is to them that he trusts his secrets and secrets, shares all his impressions, discusses a movie or a book for hours.

Often this communication stops due to relocation, admission to the university and due to other circumstances.

In adulthood friends share their everyday problems with each other, ask for advice about relationships, talk about family and troubles at work. Friends do not have enough time for frequent meetings due to lack of time, but this does not spoil the relationship.

Friendship rarely persists to mature and old age - over the years, it simply displaces marital relations and parenting. However, there is a friendship that lasts the entire adult life, but this rarely happens.

With age, a person becomes more confident in himself, understands what he wants from life, so the need for old friends disappears.

Marriage or marriage of one of friends causes a serious danger to friendship - now the whole life of a person will mainly revolve around the beloved and children, pushing the friend far into the background.

However, its friendship becomes true - A true friend will donate his time and interests to help and support.

He does not need to be asked or persuaded - he will voluntarily give help and will not demand anything in return. In a difficult life situation, such a friend will not let him fall into the abyss of despair and depression.

"Pros" and "cons" of friendly relations

Friendships, like any other, have advantages and disadvantages.

"Pros" of friendly relations:

meeting the need for communication;
the opportunity not to be lonely;
common interests with another person - there is someone with whom to discuss a book or film, go to a planetarium or go shopping, and so on;
help and support in any life situation;
psychological help - to listen to news and problems, to give advice, to console and more.

"Cons" friendships:

official duties - a friend should help and support, console and listen regardless of whether he wants it or not;
unjustified expectations from the behavior of a friend;
observance of certain rules of friendship - the so-called "code". Each pair or group of friends has it.

Friends are pulling down. How to get rid of friends? Tips:

Can you live without friends?

Theoretically man can live without friends but almost such a life can hardly be called full.

Each person unconsciously wants to become part of some social group.

Living in a society without a special connection with a particular person, the individual begins to feel lonely and miserable. Therefore, a person needs friends for a full life.

If a person deliberately does not want to make friends, saying that he does not need them, this may mean two different conclusions.

First conclusion - this is the unwillingness of a person to communicate and share with someone his impressions and life events. Such people are called introverts or phlegmatic persons.

Second conclusion - It is the fear of making friends because of the possible pain that such a relationship can bring. A person wants the appearance of friends in his life, but is afraid of being left or rejected once. Therefore, he rejects such a relationship in advance.

Why are people friends?

The reasons why people make friends are:

Need for communication - A person feels more comfortable when he can discuss his problems and experiences with another person.
Sense of security and self-confidence - being in a group a person feels that he is not alone, protected from possible danger.
Search for faith in yourself, some kind of knowledge - if a person does not receive enough care and attention from his parents, he begins to look for it in the surrounding people - friends. A friend will always give advice and comfort in moments of despair.
Thrust to similar - According to researchers, people are most often friends with people who resemble him externally. People unconsciously begin to reach out to each other due to external and internal similarity.
The ability to be yourself - it’s not necessary to be good, smart, successful with friends, it’s enough to be as you are.
Fear of being alone is the instinctive desire of a person to remain in the "pack", in a large number of people. That is what provides survival.

Why is friendship so important to people? Each of us, consciously or unconsciously, strives for the society of other people, forging connections and birth, the development of friendship.

To any person It is important to have friends for the following reasons:

the opportunity to have fun, raise your spirits, which favorably affects mental health;
the opportunity to speak out, to share secrets, to get advice and support;
receiving help in a difficult situation - even in trouble, a person knows that he is not alone, that there is someone who will take care of him;
psychological security and support;
to be useful - a friend not only speaks out, but also listens, and also gives advice. It gives a sense of value, usefulness, utility;
leisure activities with a pleasant person - with a friend you can go to the movies, go shopping, go on vacation, go to watch the moon at three o'clock and so on.

A person has no friends - what does this mean?

It also happens that a person has no friends at all. A similar phenomenon may denote several things:

Psychological "unnecessary" in the communication and society of another person. It can also talk about self-sufficiency and originality of the person, as well as a complex character.
Internal problems that do not allow a person to get close to other people, communicate comfortably.
Fear of betrayal - if in the past a man was hurt or betrayed by friends, then in the present he will not want to come close to anyone for fear of being abandoned, betrayed again.
Introvert temperament - As a rule, such a person does not need any communication, he is quite satisfied with his loneliness.
Inability to be friends - such a person makes friends from time to time, but cannot save them.

As one of the heroes of the Godfather film said, “Friendship is everything. Friendship is more than talent, more than power. It is almost the same as family.”

Friendship is really one of the most important things in life, so you should not avoid it, but rather go to meet it.

Is it true that we need friends? Find out from the video: