my journey in finding my people and maintaining close relationships

friendships in the twenty-first century can be tricky, let's look at some of mine :)

Mar 02, 2025

Growing up, it was difficult for me to find my people, the ones I wanted to share life with. I used to think that I was just bad at finding meaningful connections because I was picky. In childhood, I think that part of the problem was that I, along with most of my generation, spent way too much time inside. I will speak for myself here, but I didn't go outside or play with the neighbors whenever I wanted. This could be attributed to the safety concerns of this day and age, or perhaps, simply to the allure of digital entertainment. I just had other things to do like play on my magical iPad mini, watch Justice League cartoons on the TV, and spend hours watching YouTube origami tutorials.

I went to a tiny, preschool through eighth grade, private school with about three hundred students. For years, I was surrounded by the same faces, in class, at sports events, and on weekends at competitions. I didn't experience much hardship. I got used to my little bubble, and that's where my story began.

stepping out of my comfort zone(s)

While my time at that school ended after fifth grade, it was a period of significant personal growth. I thrived in that environment. My confidence was high due to my familiarity with everything and everyone. Academic success was easy, and our sports teams consistently won games and meets. Little did I know how unprepared I was for public school academics, sports, and everything that followed.

This may contain: three young people standing next to each other in front of snow covered trees and evergreens — *Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, 2004*

Middle school hit me like a ton of bricks. Everything was pretty difficult at first. My confidence tanked, classes were a grind, and even though I made my team, I sat on the bench. My old friendships fell apart, and making new ones was seemingly impossible. I was always floating and never really there. Getting out of my comfort zone was a bit difficult, but I figured out that it wasn't just about where I was, it was about who I was. I was just as uncomfortable on the inside as I was on the outside. This was a vicious cycle sort of thing, and I needed to get over my insecurities in order to have any personal growth. I learned that friendships are often a reflection of how you are doing on the inside, and this was why I didn’t have any real ones.

It wasn't until my second year that I became best friends with three girls. We had lots of fun together, but I later realized that all of us were going separate ways. I did not want to experience the same difficulties transitioning into high school that I did transitioning into middle school. Ultimately, I cut ties with them for a variety of reasons, but I just didn't think it was meant to be. It is important to be comfortable with making new friends but also with losing them. Not every relationship is meant to last forever. Though, maybe breaking ties shouldn’t have been as easy as it was for me at the time, and I later learned why that was.

the generational impact of social media

I joined social media when I was young, way before I understood its impact. Instagram and Snapchat made connections feel instant but also disposable. It became so easy to ghost, unfollow, or even send a hey, I don’t think we should be friends anymore text like it was nothing. (Yeah, sh*tty of me, I know.)

During COVID, my only interaction with friends were through the phone, and I didn't care to keep those relationships going because replying to DMs and making sure that I commented on their photos felt more like an obligation than a friendship. It is so easy to judge people online and to make assumptions about them through their curated posts without ever even speaking or crossing paths.

Authenticity is the number one thing I look for in people, yet online, it feels impossible to be fully real. So many photos are filtered, edited, and photoshopped. I can’t even begin to talk about how damaging this is—especially for young girls. And I don’t say that to dismiss anyone else’s struggles but because I saw it firsthand. It’s heartbreaking to witness anyone, let alone friends and teammates skipping meals, obsessing over their bodies, or comparing themselves to an unrealistic standard.

As a younger person, I often looked at social media as people trying to stay nuanced and insightful, but in reality, our profiles don’t display our most important qualities. I feel that one of my best qualities happens to be emotional intelligence. How am I supposed to portray this based on some photos of me standing next to Big Ben?

though, everything has its pros

I would classify Sina and Hugo as two of my closest friends. Though social media has made some of my relationships challenging, it has definitely kept the spark going in my connection to these two.

Sina and I met during her exchange year at my high school. We try and see each other a few times a year because we are on opposite sides of the world, but it does, in some ways, make our time together more special. When you see a person everyday, it’s easy to take all of the moments you have together for granted until you no longer have them.

Hugo and I found each other online. It’s a crazy thing for me to say because online friendships do have their stereotypes, and I never thought that I would be so close to someone who I couldn't have known entirely. Both of us are very much into reading, so we connected over the Bookstagram community. We clicked and talked about life, and eventually we took the risk in meeting each other and hoping that the other person isn’t somehow a total weirdo or catfish in real life.

None of this would be possible without social media connecting us, sharing our interests through messaging, or video chatting about what has been happening in our lives. And with Sina, we most likely would have gone separate ways and probably not made the effort to write each other by mail. I am grateful to technology and media for keeping me connected to these wonderful people amongst many hundreds of others, even with all of its flaws.

how i learned to be a better friend

For a long time, I thought friendships were supposed to be easy. If I clicked with someone, I figured that everything would just fall into place. But I’ve learned that good friendships—real ones—take effort, and it can also be difficult for the other party. People get wrapped up in their own lives, and communicating wants and needs especially in friendships is challenging. The truth is, every friendship requires work. It’s not about forcing something that isn’t there but about recognizing when a person is worth it. I stopped seeing friendships as something that happened to me and started treating them as a gift that I have a role in shaping.

I won’t pretend I’ve figured it all out, but I do know this: friendships don’t survive on shared interests or history alone. They last when both people show up, put in the effort, and choose to stay connected—even when life gets busy, even when distance makes it hard, even when it’s easier to let go than to hold on.

the tempest written

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