Our background and experience will have a strong influence on the meanings we attach to even the most common of words. We all run into this from time to time, then laugh about it later (usually).

Today, guest columnist Peter Vajda zeros in on the meanings of friend and friendship, and how those meanings may have shifted while most of us were looking the other way. In fact, he invites us to think more closely…

About Friendship and Burgers
By Peter Vajda, Ph.D, C.P.C.

The New Oxford American Dictionary has announced its 2009 Word of the Year: unfriend. If you’re not familiar with the Ins and Outs of social networking, or don’t have children, it means: “to remove someone as a ‘friend’ on a social networking site such as Facebook.” The dictionary offers the example: “I decided to unfriend my roommate on Facebook after we had a fight.”

The etymologists and lexicographers can argue the merits of unfriend vs. de-friend, or the verb vs. adjectival form. I’m curious about the deeper psycho-emotional-spiritual experience of “unfriending.”

When you unfriend someone, there’s no dialogue, no conversation and no discussion. You choose their name, click on a command and – poof! – your friend(ship) is instantaneously deleted. As for how your “friend” reacts when they find out, I guess that’s their problem. Such is the nature of online friendship. In and out – quick and easy. As for connection, trust and intimacy? Those seem to be superfluous.

So, here we go again. The arguments supporting how one can so easily create community, connection and communion in social networks, where deep trust and intimacy become the glue that binds one’s friendships again appear specious – arguments proffered by those who have some underlying emotional/egoic need to offer them.

Intimacy Vs. the Mundane

From what I read, hear and observe on social networks, true and real intimacy, connection and communion are the exception that prove the rule. Friendship for most is, at best, casual. The banal, desultory, and mundane exchanges, or the rehashing and back-and-forth of everyday ideas and information in an effort to
….. (1) connect,
….. (2) feel seen and appreciated,
….. (3) massage one’s ego,
….. (4) feel secure and un-abandoned or
….. (5) disengage from what one should really be engaged in,
are not the stuff of True and Real Friendship.

How and why would I choose to delete a “friend” in the blink of an eye? And what is that friendship like in the first place? What’s the foundation on which I’ve built such a friendship? Intimacy, trust, and connection? Doubtful.

As loudly as one argues, True and Real Friendship cannot be created over the ethers. The appearance and perhaps momentary “connection” that one feels with an online “relationship” is no different from a real-time “long-distance” relationship. And we know that many if not most long distance relationships don’t work out in the long run, especially when the two partners eventually come face to face for the long term. Why?

Personal-ness

In a word – personal-ness. The one most-important building block of a conscious, healthy and strong relationship is emotional connection – the emotional connection that kicks in when two folks are sitting face-to-face, knee-to-knee, eye-to-eye and heart-to-heart. An emotional connection – the good, the bad and the ugly – that arises when “physical space and contact” are the ground of connection – a ground that, for all intents and purposes, is lacking in social networking.

That’s not to say a “feel-good” emotional substitute is impossible; it’s not; but it is a substitute – the type of “feel-good” feeling one might experience in the initial throes of an affair, or when ensconced in an alcohol or drug “high.” But it’s not the True and Real interpersonal-ness that occurs in personal connection – thus, one major reason one experiences little to no remorse or discomfort in “unfriending” someone. The “void” makes it easy. There is no True and Real emotional or “human” connection in a “void.” In fact, there is no True and Real Friendship with the “friend” one is “unfriending.” Imaginary or superficial friendship, perhaps; but that’s all.

Oh, and the Kicker?

Burger King has just unveiled its new offering – the Angry Whopper. BK has aligned with Facebook, creating an application to help promote its new burger. Instead of encouraging folks to join Facebook, and create new “friends,” Burger King’s new Whopper Sacrifice Application offers you a free Whopper if you “defriend” ten folks from your friend list. Friends and friendship – so elusive, ephemeral and expendable.

The spiritualist Joan Borysenko writes: “We cannot serve at a distance. We can only serve that to which we are profoundly connected, that which we are willing to touch.”

Without heart-felt, intimate and True and Real emotional connection, friends and friendship will continue to erode into superficial, casual contacts – “friends” that we would just as easily “defriend” for a burger! Pass the ketchup, please.

How sad!

So, some questions for self-reflection are:

• How do you generally communicate with folks at work? In person or electronically (even when in-person is very do-able)? How about with your partner/spouse or children during the day?
• How do you differentiate between True and Real friends and casual friends?
• Do you have trust issues with any of your friends?
• Are you usually emotionally available when folks need you? Are your friends emotionally there for you?
• Have you “dropped” a friend, or been “dropped”  by a friend recently? Why? What was that like for you?
• Do you ever feel lonely, isolated or depressed?
• All things being equal, if you had the chance, would you tell your online friends when you’re coming to their city or town and ask to see them in person? If they came to your town, would you invite them to dine with your family? If not, why not?
• Do you avoid face-to-face conversations?
• In what other ways do you avoid emotional connection with others?
• Are you addicted to Twitter, Facebook or other social networking sites?
• Do you have more online friends than “real-time” friends? If so, why?

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Back to Charles:
So it may be that all this casual electronic “friending and unfriending” is simply a symptom of what’s going on at the face-to-face level. Go back over those final questions and see if the way you relate to friends personally is significantly different from how you relate to online acquaintences.

If your two modes – offline and online – are not different, which way is it? Are you a long-term friend maker or a short-term one? In all honestly, I don’t know if there’s a right or a wrong answer here, because for as long as I can remember, I’ve seen some people consistently make short-term friends while others tended to hang on to their friends for the long haul. My father was a short-termer and my mom was a long-termer.

Their typical descriptions of each other were: “She’s clingy and needy” (not particularly true), and “He doesn’t give a damn about anybody” (also not entirely accurate). They just had differing expectations and needs.

When I first moved to Japan, I had a best friend, John, who was always telling fascinating stories about his experiences traveling the world. He’d had many friends over the years and could keep us spellbound with his tales. One day I asked about one of those friends who featured in many of his stories. “Where is he now?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” John shrugged, “I haven’t seen him in years.”

I became curious, so over the next few weeks, as John told his adventures, I casually asked about each of the friends he mentioned. He didn’t know where any of them were. He’d lost touch with every one of them.

Later, John moved to a new place across Tokyo, but didn’t give anybody his new address. I managed to track him down, contacted him, and went to see him. As we talked, he casually said, “Oh I never contact the old crowd. I figure if they want to keep knowing me, they’ll do what you did and find me.” This was before the Internet, so the throwaway friends attitude is not really all that new.

If you’re a short-term friendship kind of person, there are probably reasons you don’t form deep, lasting relationships, and those reasons probably make perfect sense to you. They may or may not be keeping you from greater satisfaction, but until you examine what’s happening in your mind and in your life, you won’t ever feel a need to change anything.

On the other side of the relationship, maybe you’ve had someone abruptly disappear from your life with no explanation. If you tend to form deep emotional ties, this can feel like betrayal. It can even trigger a period of grieving as your emotions adjust to the void their passing leaves in your life.

What’s changed the most these days seems to be the casual, almost jaunty way this discarding is encouraged, with Burger King’s angry burger being a particularly insensitive case.

Again, I’m not saying either way is right or wrong, but it sure helps to understand that the other person’s definition of friendship can differ wildly from yours.

That way, if you’re a friend keeper, the next time you find yourself dealing with someone who may discard friends easily, at least you can be prepared and not be crushed when they abruptly unfriend you and disappear forever.

Cheers from warm and smiling Thailand,
Charles