The Power of Friendship
Have you thought about how important maintaining a valuable friendship is? — Proverbs
27:9 “A sweet friendship refreshes the soul.”. This quote from the bible highlights how a friendship
replenishes and renews a soul. It means that no matter what we struggle with, a true friend will
cheer us up or just be present beside us during hard times.
Good morning/Afternoon Madam Pita and friends. My name is Winny Tejasukmana and
today I will talk about why people cannot maintain a true friend. Throughout my life, I have had a
fair number of friends. I used to struggle to be friends with other people, but my friend Eveline
always stuck with me no matter what. She now lives in Singapore but, we are still best friends till this
day. Currently, I have another best friend, Allyson, who matches my freak. A real friendship is not
just a friendship, but it is about having someone, someone that loves you unconditionally, someone
who will never leave you. In this generation, many people know what friendship is yet, many people
still struggle to maintain a true friend that is valuable. Today, I will talk about why we need to
maintain a close friendship and why people struggle to maintain it with the solutions to each
problem.
Humans are social creatures who rely on each other. A human cannot live in seclusion from
other humans, we need each other to survive. That is why maintaining your friendship is important.
The first reason why people struggle to maintain a valuable friendship is because they are not
spending enough quality time with their friends. SMU psychology professor Nathan Hudson
conducted research and statistic that says that people who spend quality time with friends are way
happier in their relationships. Not spending enough quality time with friends can slowly make your
friends drift away from you. A few years ago, I kept spending less time with a friend until we
eventually stopped talking altogether. This shows how we need to spend more quality time with
friends since spending less time can destroy the relationship.
The next problem people encounter while trying to maintain a true friendship is the lack of
communication. According to www.betterhelp.com, If you are not able to get to know your friend on
a deeper level, then meeting each other’s needs will be impossible and eventually cause
misunderstandings. Those misunderstandings can happen because friends may assume the worst
about someone due to a lack of communicating. For example, someone refuses to communicate
why they are mad at their friend and just assumes that the friend knows what they are talking about.
The miscommunication will eventually cause friends to break up their friendships. So,
communicating is essential for a relationship and people should start communicating more to each
other instead of bottling their feelings up.
Now, we will move on to the cause of those problems. In average, people spend only two
hours and 45 minutes a week with their friends according to the Census Bureau's 2021 American
Time Use Survey. The lack of spending quality time with your friend could be caused by a busy
schedule. It can lead people into focusing on their work and neglecting their friendships. For
example, someone refuses every invitation to hangout and just keeps focusing on work. Slowly the
friend will stop trying to bother the person and eventually they stop being friends. The lack of
communication can be caused by people assuming stuff about their friends and unspoken
expectations that they expect form their friends. People sometimes just assume that their friends
know what they want and expect them to understand without communicating. For example,
someone just expects their friend to know what they are talking about.
Finally, let us move on to the solutions for each of the problems. It is known that managing
your time is a great thing to do, but it can also benefit your friendship by giving time to have quality
time with them. You can do it by maybe rescheduling your schedule for just a little bit of time. This
solution can be implemented during times when your schedule is very packed. Managing your time
can create a time where you can bond with your friends and spend time with them. The lack of
communication can be solved by spending a few minutes to talk with your friends to communicate
your feelings. Spending a few minutes of communications can let you understand the problems in
the relationship. It can be implemented during a discourse with your friend. Spending some time to
talk about the problem may help for people to understand and resolve misunderstandings.
In conclusion, a valuable friendship is extremely important for our well-being and
maintaining that relationship is such an important task as well. There are many problems that come
between the friendships but there are also many solutions to resolve them. In a good relationship,
friends communicate well and avoid misunderstandings, they also spend time with each other. So,
you should value and appreciate the friends you currently have, because, you never know when you
will find another friend like your best friend. “Friendship isn’t easy but there is no doubt it is worth
fighting for” Twilight sparkle, from My Little Pony.
To infinitive: Red
Noun clause: Yellow
Adjective clause: Green
Gerund: Light blue
If conditional: Dark blue
Reduced relative clause: Pink
Passive reporting structure: Light grey
