TW: mentions of mental illness (depression)
I always believed in the importance of time in our lives. In its definitive part in everyone’s existence and in how uniquely it combines objectivity and subjectivity. How many days have we felt like they had 30 hours and how many felt like just a moment? And how many times have wished for time to stop on a particular moment, without realizing at that moment that time is our entire existence, and if it stops, so will we? Time heals, it’s a thought and it familiarizes us with certain people and situations. Time is a blessing and a curse. The most important thing, though, is that we don’t control time, it controls us. Time changes us without realizing it, and it shapes us inevitably of our own choices.
When time is combined with human relations, a magic blend emerges. A characteristic example are long-lasting friendships. These special relationships that arise when people share their lives. Undoubtedly, friendship is precious, and whoever enjoys it is lucky, but whoever manages to guard this gift for years is even luckier. Nowadays, due to our fast-paced reality and the usual migration for professional or educational reasons, friendship has come of age as something rare, which renders it even more precious. Friends that met in school and imagined their parallel lives many times followed different pathways. Even under these circumstances, however, there are many brilliant examples of relationships that were maintained no matter the unpropitious conditions. Long-lasting friendships have this unique function that makes people feel certain and safe just with one text.
Many claim that the amount of years of friendship isn’t important, but the developed bond is. Definitely, though, the more years a friendship is kept, the stronger the bond. Because years are made up of moments.
Many things have been written about long-lasting friendship. Obviously, TED couldn’t omit friendship-oriented talks in its list. Besides, friendship is, by definition, an idea worth spreading!
Below can be found certain TED and TEDx talks that help us realize the importance of long-lasting friendship in modern.
At TEDxLondon, childhood friends William Young and Christopher Sweeney share their own story and present a new dimension to friendship, which helps us see it through a different, more hopeful point of view.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmJyWreER7A
In this talk, Shasta Nelson reveals the secrets, according to her, for a healthy friendship in the era of alienation and technological isolation.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-8tQ\_TYLgk
Because friendship isn’t proven in happy moments but in difficult ones, the last talk is related to the ways in which we can communicate with our friends with tendency towards depression. In order to be able to comment on long-lasting friendships we definitely need primarily to mutually overcome any obstacles encountered.
Speaking then, about long-lasting friendships, we must disconnect our minds from social media and our thousands of virtual friends, and focus on those few childhood friends, and all the memories that connect us with them. This article can be the excuse to communicate with an old friend and remember with them the best and the worst highlights of our friendship, investing in a way in the years to come.
Photography by: Simeon Maniatis (@simos_maniatis)
Giota Amanatidou (@yiota.amanatidou)
