Nurturing adult friendships is essential for both emotional well-being and maintaining a strong, healthy relationship.
In today’s fast-paced world, finding and maintaining meaningful friendships can be challenging. Between work, family, and personal commitments, it’s easy for friendships to take a backseat. However, nurturing these connections is vital for our well-being. A true friend brings joy, support, and companionship into our lives, making the effort to cultivate lasting relationships worthwhile.
Friendships are an important part of life. Our friends are our pillars of support, our sounding boards and our anchor. Amazing friendships are a blessing to have, someone you can always count on, have fun with and navigate life with. It is easy to take our friendships for granted, there are so many challenges in maintaining and nurturing friendships in adulthood, that many of them end up neglected and eventually die a natural death. It is often easy to make new friends during childhood or early adulthood, when socializing is effortless. However, building and sustaining beautiful friendships later in life takes intention, effort, and time. So how do we build and sustain these meaningful connections? Here are some key steps to fostering enduring friendships.
1. Be Authentic
Friendships thrive on authenticity. To cultivate meaningful connections, be genuine in your interactions. Share your thoughts, feelings, and experiences honestly. Trying to be someone you’re not only leads to shallow connections. Real friendships are built on trust, and trust grows when both parties are open and authentic.
“I got you.” A friend of mine, Gladys, says this to me, oftentimes when I am lamenting about something or as I am prone to, overthinking on another. And let me tell you, I am an avid overthinker, so this happens a lot more often than I would like.
Still, my point is, she does have my back. I know it, she says it, she says it all the time, she has proven it time and time again, and I believe it. I believe it like I believe the sky is blue. This is a friendship that has spanned more than 20 years. Through our very flighty late teenage years when we thought the world revolved around us and our taut skin. 😅. When we argued, bickered and held grudges over what we now see to be silly things.
It was easy then, easy to ride on the waves and euphoria of the highs that an amazing friendship can bring. As we grew older though, it became harder to sustain, we often neglected to touch base, listen to each other and be there for each other.
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2. Prioritize Time Together
Time is one of the most valuable gifts you can offer a friend. Whether it’s through regular coffee catch-ups, phone calls, or video chats, make time to connect. Busy schedules may make this challenging, but even a small gesture like sending a thoughtful text shows that you care. Friendships require effort, and nurturing them means investing time in each other.
My friendship with her has taught me something. The grass is green where you water it. As cliche as this may sound, it is nothing if it isn’t the truth. If you take care of something, it will likely thrive, if you neglect something, it will likely die.
Friends
I believe people expect friendships to thrive without much effort. There seems to be an expectation to see it just “flow.” There is little or no willingness to give as much effort to our friendships as we do to our romantic relationships. We do not wave our romantic relationships away and think, oh, but we are adults and they will understand if we do not keep in touch for 6 years. Somehow, this is supposed to be okay with friendships.
It is often said that 15 friends can not be friends for 15 years, this simply translates to the fact that life happens. We will not all maintain friendships from childhood, we will not all keep in touch with those we thought were our besties back when we were teenagers. Yep, life happens. As adults though, the number of friends you have often becomes less important than the depth of the relationships you maintain. Having a few close friends who truly understand you is much more fulfilling than having a large circle. Deep, authentic connections provide emotional support, shared joy, shared pain and a deep satisfaction of knowing that you have someone you can always depend on.
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3. Practice Forgiveness
No one is perfect, and even the best of friends can sometimes hurt or disappoint each other. However, holding on to grudges can damage your friendship. Practicing forgiveness, and learning to let go of small grievances, will help you maintain the relationship. When an issue arises, approach it with grace, communicate openly, and work together to resolve conflicts.
Well-nurtured friendships take effort and a lot of intention. While it may be easier to keep a friendship as a child or teenager, sustaining a friendship as an adult can be difficult to navigate because of careers, kids, spouses and so many other responsibilities that come with growing up and getting old.
Miscommunication and disagreements are bound to happen in any relationship. When issues arise, I find that again, it is always easier to forgive a partner in a romantic relationship than it is to forgive a friend. 😊.
We seem to need our friends to be perfect at all times, to do no wrong, to always understand us, to never annoy us. We also seem to not want to have difficult conversations and address issues with empathy and grace the way we would usually do with a romantic partner.
True friendship means accepting that neither of you is perfect, and that mistakes are a part of the journey.
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4. Respect Boundaries
Every friendship is unique, and part of nurturing a meaningful connection is respecting each other’s boundaries. Some friends may need more space than others, and that’s okay. It is important to understand your friend’s limits and be mindful of their personal preferences. Healthy friendships thrive when there is mutual respect for one another’s boundaries and autonomy.
Part of nurturing a friendship is understanding boundaries and respecting them. This includes understanding when a friend needs space, doesn’t respond immediately to a message. This includes a friend backing out of a planned event or outing.
Healthy friendships are based on mutual respect, which means giving people the freedom to manage their time without feeling like they need to walk on eggshells.
Friends
Social media has made it easy to feel connected to people we have never met and may likely never meet, while there is nothing wrong with that, it has also made us neglect to nurture and truly be present in the friendships we have offline. Our “real” friends.
People can often be seen having lunch or being together without even truly being together. The need to engage and communicate with people online while being with our friends physically, often robs us of the opportunity to nurture the true friendships we have.
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5. Listen More Than You Speak
A key element in nurturing friendships is active listening. Being a good listener shows that you value and respect the other person’s thoughts and feelings. Instead of preparing your response while they’re talking, focus entirely on what they’re saying. This will deepen your understanding of their perspective and make them feel truly heard.
Be the friend who offers a listening ear during a job loss or divorce. Be there for a friend and offer a helping hand when you can and how you can. Friendships should transcend dinner dates in fancy restaurants and happy/fun moments.
Life gets busy, and we can’t always be available for every event or conversation. This is why communication is an essential part of preserving a friendship. It is often on the bedrock of miscommunication that so many friendships die. One of the characteristics of a strong friendship is the ability to support each other during hard times and boy, does life throw us a lot of curves. 😊😊😊.
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6. Offer Support
Meaningful friendships are reciprocal. While we often look to friends for support during tough times, it’s equally important to be there for them. Whether it’s offering a shoulder to cry on, celebrating their wins, or simply showing empathy, being a supportive friend strengthens the bond between you. Pay attention to the subtle cues that may indicate your friend needs help, and step in with kindness and encouragement.
Showing up when it matters the most, holding their hand, being there when they are vulnerable, and needing an anchor, is truly the essence of a beautiful friendship.
Life can be tough, it can be hard but good friendships make the journey much easier. One dinner date at a time, one rant session at a time, one “cryfest” at a time. Our friends truly will know us at our best and our worst and I am sure they wouldn’t have it any other way.
The bonds and connections we maintain with our friends make life’s complexities a little easier to bear. I know this firsthand—I have some incredible friends who fill my life with laughter and beauty, and I hope I never take them for granted.
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In conclusion, meaningful friendships don’t happen overnight—they require time, effort, and intention. By being authentic, listening, supporting, and celebrating each other, we can cultivate friendships that bring joy, fulfillment, and lasting connections into our lives. So, take the time to nurture those special friendships; they are the relationships that make life richer and more beautiful.
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Hello, I'm Oby and you're welcome to my blog! I live in beautiful Cascais, Portugal with my husband and 3 kids as well as our cat and dog. I love cooking, baking, homemaking, and travelling. As a Nigerian married to a Portuguese, and living in Portugal, I am happy to share peculiarities of both countries as well as others with you.
Cheers.
Beautiful write-up ❤️. Very informative and educational.
I am glad you enjoyed reading it. Thank you so much!