What is a true friendship?

Loyalty, Honesty and support.

These are considered as pillars of a true friendship. Loyalty is essential as it means you are not betraying a friend even in the absence of him or her. Honesty Is being truthful and transparent in your actions all the time. And support when a friend is in need. These are universal features of a true friendship, and if we question anyone "What is a true friendship means to you?" You will get answers related to these. But these are not the only features which define a true friendship. There are less commonly known, but these set of features can harbour more meaning and value to a true friendship.

Friendships

Persistance over time.

Imagine you have a friend, true loyal, honest and supporting one. And this friend is suportive and true loyat for a month. In the next month, he is not, act strange. Even chose to laugh at you from a distance. We cannot consider this person a true friend anymore. As he has failed to persist those qualities over time. This has major consequence. Which means, a true friendship can only be known as the time goes on. If you have friends in the past, you may have noticed some of them failed to persist over time.

Persistance over geography.

How about you travelling abroad. Changing your residence and moving to the city. What happens to your friends. Most of the friendships would not last, and fail to carry on with your life. Geography has a marked implications about our life as we are locked in different time zones by geography even family relationships will fail if we change our place on earth. This is inevitable. But a true friendship would not break. Today with starlinked internet, it is easier than ever. So, place is another test to those loyal, trustworthy friends.

Persistance over silence.

Above two aspects can be summarised as persistance over silence. In life we take different routes. This is essential unavoidable part of life. When this happens, often frendships have no means to persist, and will be tested by time and place differences. Sometimes years can separate two friends and it can be considered as a period of silence. Sometimes they might not have spoken in years! yet when they get together, the honesty loyalty and willingness to support remains the same. In other words the door of the heart would remain open, even if they do not meet each other. And this gives a different meaning to a friendship.

Someone who wishes good for you

What is A true friendship?

Someone would not agree. They would think that frendship means remaining close, tolerating everything and helping all the time. They would even fail to understand a silent friendship. Imagine someone living in isolation in a mountain cave by choice. Although separated by human contact, he is honest, loyal and willing to help any being which comes into his relatively isolated life. I consider this person a true friend to mine. Although I have never met him. Often we encounter these individuals, heavenly creatures in unexpected places in life. Have you?

When I think about this phenomenon of friendship in mindfulness I realise, it is not an interaction between two people. That is why a true friendship can survive a period of silence. It is a quality of the mind. Infact the other person does not matter at all. If you are honest loyal and willing to help anyone you are a true friend to all human beings. I wonder this is the easy ticket to heaven. What do you think about true friendships?