To get friendships: What's important?
ChroniquesDuVasteMonde: What makes a good friend?
Beate Weingardt: A good friend is a person whom I can trust. Someone who is there for me and has an open ear for what moves me. And she should be reliable.
Many women would like to be a good friend, but have less and less time for it: job, partner, children ... How to make friends in the evening or at the weekend?
You have to set priorities. Of course that also means that you have to do without something elsewhere. A friendship is like a garden. If I do not take care of him, someday he will not look the way I would like him to. For example, I live in Tübingen and we have a great cultural offer in the city, which I really appreciate. But I also have to decide: Do I go to an event or do I meet with a friend?
Often, certain things are set: job, partner, family. Should I get away from friendships due to lack of time?
I think you can not avoid a certain amount of choice. You can have many acquaintances running side by side, but you have to invest in friendships. Affinity and reliability can not be created alongside. I believe that many today make the mistake of indiscriminately dedicating their time to any person or gathering, asking in hindsight if it was truly rewarding and rewarding.
The 54-year-old is a psychologist and theologian. She gives lectures, gives seminars and writes books, among other things friendship makes you happy - why we need companions
(Publisher SCM R. Brockhaus, 96 pages, 8.95 euros). Beate Weingardt lives in Tübingen. More information on your website www.beate-weingardt.de.
Is not it possible to keep a friendship alive with SMS or e-mails?
This can be used to create a sense of connectedness. But I believe that this form of attachment is not very sustainable. Imagine an emergency: you left your car in the middle of the night. Can you really ask such friends if they pick you up? Or if you get the diagnosis tomorrow, to be seriously ill. Surely you can rely on your family, but it would be nice if there were other people. One day, a woman told me that she had told her friends that she was seriously ill. The reaction was, "Then call me back when you feel better." That was a terrible disappointment to this woman. Because friendships also mean that you make sacrifices for each other.
But good friendships are also characterized by the fact that everything is the same as before, even if you have not reported for half a year.
Yes, but the rare contact will change the friendship. Because the energy that I invest in the relationship is less. When you look back, you remember old intimacy. But the relationship is different because you do not hear much about the everyday life of the other person.
Are there life stages in which friends have less space?
Many working women actually save on "luxury goods" friendships. I believe that this is a wrong course setting. I've just read an article by an aging researcher who said, "Loneliness is the cancer of old age". You can not, if you suddenly have time, for example, retired, friends like mushrooms breed. In it I see a danger - that the priority setting in the highly active phase of life takes a bitter revenge. I strongly advise that you do not focus only on the family, because it is often overloaded with expectations.
Friends not?
Not so strong. You have more freedom in friendships, after all you have chosen your friends. It automatically stays a certain distance, both spatially and emotionally. I can control how I want to get involved. On the other hand, we usually have to meet high expectations of relatives, children, partners or parents.
There are times when a friend needs a lot of support - for example after a breakup. But at some point the other is exhausted. How to get back into balance?
With openness. You could say that I spend so much time and energy, but unfortunately I can not offer more. This honesty should be possible in a friendship. Friends who do not tolerate or respect that would be very self-centered. This is not a good base. In this case, one may demarcate, even if this could lead to the end of a friendship.
If a friendship licks me, can not it be a good friendship?
Then I failed to draw boundaries. It is not the fault of the other who claims you, but your own responsibility. I have to signal in time what I want to give.
So it's about a middle ground between "investing in friendships" and "setting boundaries"?
Yes, fortunately, this is often easier in friendships than in family relationships, because in the family the emotional closeness is much greater and rejecting it is harder.
How many good friends do you need?
In any case, more than one or two, because otherwise the dependence on these two is too big. If one can not do it for different reasons, the other has to catch everything. I would say that an optimal number is between four to six, a maximum of seven. You can not afford more than that emotionally. Of course, you can have more acquaintances with whom you meet every now and then. But I advise you to take the topic of friendships seriously. Many say that friends are important to them, but they do little for it. Even a good friendship succeeds, like everything valuable in life, not effortlessly. But the effort is worth it.
