The Interrelation between Friends, Family, and Life.

This is our first collaborative essay that we’ve written “together”. The idea comes from my personal experience, but Mimi started to gather it into words first, and I just added bits and pieces here and there. So basically, it supposed to be that it’s Mimi’s first collaborative essay that she has written with me. Hahaha… In the process of making this article, it actually really made me think, reflect, and look back to what I’ve done in my life. As the result, here it is, the essay that has been written by two persons who have a different personality but live in the same thoughts and look at the magnificence in life from the same perspective. =)

Maintaining friendship and your relationship with family is not an easy thing to do. Especially, when you're studying somewhere away from your "comfort zone"... You tend to either always hang around with your buddies, or staying at home with mommy and daddy as much as possible when you get home. Creating a comfort zone is not an easy thing to do either, it takes months for you to be able to adapt and put some effort to trust and get to know new people. And if you already have created another comfort zone in your life, how could you easily give it up just for ridiculous reasons. I mean, isn’t that supposed to be that you’re not jumping from one zone to the other but try to maintain all of them so you could sense a “home atmosphere” wherever you go?

Some people say, Family is the greatest treasure in your life, some other says Friends are the greatest treasure in life.. Well.. they both are true.. We can't live without family and friends, but how are you going to balance them out? And talking about balance, it is important to balance everything in life, isn’t it? Balance your body and soul as well as your mind and your conscience. I mean, how can you say a person is mature when he even cannot show his mental and emotional maturity to the world? From my view, when the time for you to live alone has come, it’s time for you to be able to keep up with life. It’s like applying the “theories” of what you’ve learnt so far from your family to your own life and how you behave towards your surroundings.

Sometimes, at some parts in our life, we get carried on with our friends and forgetting our family, it happens most of the time, even though on some cases it was the other way around... So which one do you think is better to put on your priorities to? Friends, family, or both? Well, ideally it supposed to be both, but how could you really balance them both when the situation demands you to weight your friends more than your family or even the other way around? Does that mean that you are a defector for your family or friends? Or a betrayer for that matter? Well, I don’t think so. I think it’s just the matter of understanding and knowing which one is worth more in what situation since both of them are precious.

One of my friend told me that she has a friend who has given up on his friends for his family.. I mean, it’s just crazy. It’s ridiculous. How come you just give up on your friends just like that? Hello, family won't be around forever as well… and one day, you will just have to live your life alone without your family around… I hate to say this, but I know someday the time will come. And when it has come, how you will carry on living without having your friends beside you? Come on... Even my mom said it was crazy to give up on your friends… I know that family is important; they have a deep relationship and huge influences in your life. You wouldn't be wherever you are now if it was not because of your family. Family prepares you to interact with other people in order to survive in the world, while friends ARE the people whom you interact with in the world… For me, friends are like family too. The difference is just that Family is the family that God has given me without allowing me to choose who will be the member of my family. But friends are my “family” that God allows me to choose who’s going to be mine… so they both are priceless. How could I give up one thing for the other when they both have the same significant role in my life? Somebody once told me that friends will always come and go, but it’s not gonna happen if you can maintain it… as long as you can maintain the friendship that you’ve created, they will just simply stay forever in your life. I mean, how could you let go of something that is precious to you because of some silly and immature reasons? Come on…grow up kiddo..

On the other hand.. Like i said before, sometimes we get carried on with friends and forget our family. Have you ever feel like you are embarrassed to be around with your family and your friends at the same time?.. Well I felt it too… From my view, friends and family can't be put together at the same time, and I haven't figured it out why until now. However, just remember, family made you who you are now. They support you and they teach you how to affiliate and survive in the social community with different kind of people in it.. There is no reason you should be embarrassed of them. We can spend some quality times with them and appreciate them as the group of people who have known you since you were just a fetus… haha.. *exaggerate dikit*.. and take care of you.

It’s true that family has an important role in our life. It moulds us to become a person who has a characteristic that life demands. And I guess, the way we behave and interact with others will always reflect to how we have been brought up by our surroundings, especially family. It’s really interesting that some people have a different way of thinking, the way they “see” things, and interpret the things that happen in their life. For example, some people see life as a really interesting gift that God has given them, and it’s beautiful. Although sometimes it’s a bit tough, they take it as a challenge. But on the other hand, some others think that life is such a big pain in the ass that even God has worsen it by giving obstacles in life to make life even harder. The way these people think will affect their surroundings and their future. And I believe the people who are really demanding and have a high expectation in life beyond what they could possibly get are the people who don’t know how to be grateful to what they already have and they just simply will never be satisfied regarding to what they have achieved. And therefore, they will give up something precious easily because they don’t know which one is priceless and which one is worthless; giving up their friends or family for one another as an instance? *me being nasty.. =P* apropos to that, seems like they have less abilities to see life from its different perspectives. Pity.

Now, its’ your decision regarding to how you are going to balance out your family and friends in your life. Both of them have great influences in your life, and personally, I think it is best for us to keep both of them as close as possible. Friends and family are different, yet very similar in some kind of way. Friends and family will always make us feel like we’re home and we’re belong to the world. We’re not outsiders. And it’s such a delight and comfortable feeling to know that we belong to a certain community. Without one of them, it would have been like half of me is missing. Therefore, I will treasure both of them in my life. How about you? =)

Written by:
Mimi dan Pigi, November ‘07