They are friendly. What does friendship mean and what is it like? Rhetorical question about the existence of female friendship

Types of friendship.

Friendship can be divided into three types by age category: children, youth and adult. Here we will consider only youth and adults.

Youthful friendship.

Youth is the period of the most intense and emotional communication with peers, group life, etc.

At the heart of the youthful craving for friendship is a passionate need for understanding the other and oneself to others and for self-disclosure. "Happiness is when you are understood," says the young hero of the film "We'll Live Until Monday."

One of the main unconscious functions of youthful friendship is maintaining self-esteem. Friendship sometimes acts as a kind of psychotherapy, allowing young people to express their overwhelming feelings and find confirmation that someone shares their doubts, hopes and anxieties.

Youthful friendships are not only confessional, but also extremely emotional. And emotionality is expressed not so much in words and sentences, but in characteristic intonations, accents, reticence, omissions that a teenager, with all the desire, could not translate into concepts, but which convey to his friend-interlocutor the subtlest nuances of his moods, remaining meaningless and incomprehensible for an outside listener. This "empty" conversation is psychologically more important and more significant than a "meaningful" small talk about high matters ... Needing strong emotional attachments, young people sometimes do not notice the real qualities of a partner. For all their exclusivity, friendly relations in such cases are usually short-lived.

The relationship between friendship and love is a difficult problem in adolescence. On the one hand, this relationship seems more or less alternative. The appearance of a beloved girl reduces the emotional intensity of same-sex friendship, the friend becomes rather a kind comrade. On the other hand, love implies a greater degree of intimacy than friendship; it kind of includes friendship.

Friendship of adults.

In adolescence, friendship, as we have seen, occupies a privileged, even monopoly, position in the system of personal relationships and affections. With the emergence of new, "adult" attachments, friendship is gradually losing its privileged position.

Three points are especially important for understanding the psychological differences between friendship between adults and youthful friendship: 1) the relative completion of the formation of self-awareness; 2) expansion and differentiation of the sphere of communication and activity; 3) the emergence of new intimate affections.

The content and structure of friendly communication is also changing. Tolerance of differences is one of the main indicators of the level of culture and intellectual development. This also manifests itself in communication. Childhood friendship can fall apart over a trifle. Young men are already ready to put up with the partial shortcomings of their friends, but friendship itself is still understood as something total.



Types of friendship.

Spiritual friendship is mutual enrichment and complement to each other. Each is admired and fascinated by the superiority of the other. Thus, he gives his friend the opportunity to receive the much-desired recognition: what could be more beautiful if you are appreciated and understood by the one for whom you recognize this right. The most amazing thing is that everyone feels completely different from the other and admires exactly those qualities that he himself does not have.

Creative friendship - both friends retain their distinct individuality. Moreover, friendship helps to creatively complement the personality of each of the friends, to give a complete character to their individuality.

Everyday friendship can exist and develop only under the condition of immediate territorial proximity. Friends must necessarily live nearby, provide each other with services, seek help, go to the movies together, or at least just chat about this and that. As a rule, such friendship is reinforced by some kind of constant occasion for meeting. It can be a regular neighborhood or general work... Doctors, for example, are most often friends with doctors.

Family friendship at first glance it seems to be the complete opposite of creative friendship, but it is not. For the type of friendship we are considering, it is characteristic that our friend, in essence, becomes a friend of the whole family. And if we are talking about a married couple who have children, we can clearly talk about friendship with families.

Types of friendship.

The concept of romantic friendship is highly vague. It sometimes denotes friendship of the era of romanticism, including the period of "storm and onslaught" that preceded it, then it correlates with specific ideas about friendship that were in circulation in the circle of German romantic poets, then it is associated with psychological type"romantic personality".

Aside from the psychological nuances, the romantic canon of friendship meant, firstly, a sharp increase in requirements for its intimacy and expressiveness and, secondly, the association of "true friendship" with that part of a person's life that falls on adolescence.

In erotic friendship, there is no place for seduction and the desire to dispose of the fate of another, to have power over him. True erotic friendship is a disinterested, noble impulse aimed at improving oneself and helping another in this. Without petty calculations of all the pros and cons, without the desire to keep, command, influence, direct. A friend accepts his friend with love and tries to bring him joy. It doesn't matter if he was expecting him, or if he came unexpectedly. A friend gives without asking for anything in return, and receives without asking anything. If erotica manages to master all this, and sometimes she succeeds in it, she can live next to friendship. Otherwise, it destroys it.

The emergence of friendship.

We may have great relationships with neighbors or work colleagues throughout our lives, but none of them will become our friends. And at the same time, we can consider a friend or girlfriend of a person with whom we have met only once or twice and who lives far from us. It turns out, however, that only with him we feel good and want to show the best that we have.

Friendship arises like a rupture in the normal course of events, like a leap. At some point, we suddenly begin to experience a strong surge of sympathy, interest in another person, he becomes close to us. If we have known him for a long time, there is a feeling as if we saw him for the first time in our life. Let's call this a meeting. A meeting is a final event, a clot of time. Only these moments of the highest intensity of life are important for friendship. Everything that happens in between doesn't matter. Such a meeting is always a surprise, always a discovery. For most of our acquaintances, we will never take this first step towards friendship.

Friendship is a complex interweaving of meetings, and each meeting is a test, it can bring success and disappointment. Unlike falling in love, we may not even remember a friend from meeting to meeting.

The interaction of 2 people is conveyed by the scheme of the American psychologist J. Levinger.

Stages of dyadic interaction

Who is a friend?

IN spoken language the word "friend" has many meanings. It means a friend, a person to whom we treat with sympathy, a neighbor, a colleague, in a word, everyone who is close to us. However, now, as in the most distant past, there is another meaning: an intimate friend whom we love and who loves us. This last type of friendship belongs to a narrower category of interpersonal relationships - to relationships built on love. When we think about our close friends, about true friendship, we mean a certain form of love that exists between people.

A friend never lies to us and speaks to us only in the language of truth. We listen to him attentively and impartially, trying to understand and soberly evaluate what he is talking about. No ghosts and no theatricality. His experience carries with it the pathos of feelings and the sobriety of reason. Therefore, it enriches us, uplifting emotionally and intellectually.

A person is familiar to us as much as we know his life at every single moment. Therefore, talking with someone from our acquaintances, we ask about his plans, say, for the summer: "Where are you going on vacation?" The question about the future is complemented by information about the past: "Where did you go in winter? How did you spend Christmas?" If we meet people who are not very close to us and do not know what to talk about, we will talk about the weather. But even here, having talked about today's weather, we will compare it with yesterday and express your wishes about the weather in the coming days.

But friends, having met even after many years of separation, do not ask each other for anything. They will not throw a hurricane of questions on each other to find out what each was doing and restore the past day by day. Moreover, the past does not seem to interest them at all. They immediately begin to talk about what is in their souls in currently... Each of them, without prior preparation, is maximally disposed to perceive the new. Friends who, having met, say to each other: "Now I will tell you everything in order" or "Tell about yourself" are not real friends. There is nothing behind such general phrases.

We don't choose people we don't respect as friends. I will not all the time mentally talk with a person whom I consider a scoundrel, seek advice from a traitor. Friendship is a social space where people relate to each other more morally, more cordially than to those who are outside this space. Here moral norms are observed in the strictest way: as they should ideally be observed by everyone.

There are situations in life when we feel bad, for example. It is at such moments that friends are always there. Friends are those who help us in our quest, who share our anxiety with us, who fight with us for our interests, who have the same objects of love as we have. A true friend stays by our side and helps us when everyone else leaves. A true friend goes through the test of struggle, for struggle forces you to choose. He chooses us instead of someone else. There is no friendship without choice. The situation makes the choice dramatic, makes it irreversible, cuts off the path back. A friend is the one who chooses me along with my problems. But I must go in search of friends myself. In difficult times, I first of all turn to my friends for help. Some dare to go with me, others do not. Any loss situation acts as natural selection: it highlights those relationships that are destined to survive and continue. Helping a friend, we help ourselves, because it may happen that we change roles with him. He will be the victim, and we will rush to his aid. To live side by side, to share all the experiences of the other means to fight losses together, to stand together against the forces of evil. This means that they will eventually acquire common objects of love. They become our loved ones, his loved ones, we are the object of his love, he is the object of our love. This is how friendship is born and grows stronger.

Levinger proposed a formal model of the personal relationship cycle, consisting of five phases:

1. Attraction preceding the origin of the relationship.

2. The period of formation of the relationship.

3. Continuation of the relationship, meaning either:

a) its growth and strengthening,

b) maintaining the achieved level,

c) reducing the level of instability.

4. Weakening or deterioration of the relationship.

5. Termination of the relationship as a result of the death of one of the partners or breakup.

14 have chosen

Today the world celebrates an unofficial, but very important holiday - International Friends Day... In my opinion, this is a great excuse to see your friends or call them, as well as reflect on friendship in general, and oh female friendship- especially. After all, a huge number of people are talking about her. myths and legends... Our expert psychologist helped us to figure out which of them is true and which is fiction. Maria Pugacheva.

The love of a man and a woman is understandable, it is laid down by nature at an instinctive level and is necessary for procreation. Where did friendship come from? Why did people decide to make friends?

“First of all, people, of course, make friends not because of instincts, this is a process that has become social a long time ago. But if you look at friendship through the prism of vital needs, then it may be the need to belong to a group, to a pack, It is purely historically more profitable to be not alone: ​​it is easier to defend oneself, to do some difficult thing, to think of something, to shift one's responsibilities into a difficult period - this is how mutual assistance, mutual assistance, and mutual understanding are born. ", - explained Maria Pugacheva.

In general, it is logical - "there is safety in numbers", alone you will not be able to fill up a mammoth or build a house. Here are the ancient men and got lost in collectives, where another - a friend - will always help and help out. What about women? There are legends about women's friendship, and most often they say that such a phenomenon does not exist in nature at all.

"This opinion exists due to the fact that women are considered rivals and rivals to each other, not friends and assistants. Where do women compete? In personal happiness and personal well-being, and, therefore, they compete in terms of men, beauty, health, offspring, etc. This is due to the psychology of society: at all times it was believed that an unmarried man is a happy enviable bachelor, and the best, most successful, most beautiful unmarried woman is an unhappy old maid. Social stereotypes play a big role. Therefore, it is believed that a woman will always live "at the forefront of the attack" for a man, for an early marriage, for the birth of a child, for well-being. And, accordingly, he will always compare his successes in this area with the successes of her friends, colleagues, sisters. It is easier for men in this regard - one is unlikely to envy the other that he has a child or that he has successfully married. Of course, in modern times, a lot has begun to change, and women feel more independent from men, but the stereotype continues to live on, and there is no getting away from it ", - said the psychologist.

Indeed, there is nowhere to go. How many times have I heard from smart, beautiful modern women the phrase that female friendship exists before the first controversial man. Fortunately, not everyone thinks so, but many. Probably, this is the case when the thought is material: if a woman really thinks so, then her relatives cannot have friends, and if she does not have such a conviction, then she can be really friends with pleasure.

For women with friendship no luck at all, because there is another belief that there can be no real friendship between a woman and a man: they say, in any case, it has an unrealized love background. With whom, in this case, a woman should be friends remains a mystery. And what does the psychologist think on this topic?

"Is there a friendship between a man and a woman or not - the question really eternal... And not a single psychologist, sociologist or philosopher will answer this question exactly, because no one can "feel", truly analyze, understand the motives and content of someone else's friendship - what it is based on, how it began, what unites people. Personally, I think these are very individual moments. Surely there are a lot of examples where a man and a woman are friends just like that, without any sexual connotations and sympathies. And there are also such "friends" where everything is "sewn with white thread" - either someone likes someone, or this friendship was born from a past relationship, or this is just the beginning great love" , - says Maria Pugacheva.

And it seems to me that friendship between a man and a woman may well be based on mutual sympathy. It's just that not all men in the world should be romantically involved. With someone, they are initially meaningless and unpromising, either because of character traits, or because you have already found yours. "halves", or maybe for some other reason. Which does not prevent you from having interesting and attractive men in your good friends.

What do you think, is there a real friendship between women? And between a man and a woman? What are they based on? Tell about your friends and girlfriends.

Apart from love and fulfillment of their own desires, most dream that those who will understand, support, protect, lend a helping hand, listen and do not demand anything instead of and the conversation is not about parents, or about loved ones always stay next to them , but about friends. But real friends are the gift of a share. So what is real friendship and how not to make a mistake so that your friend doesn't turn out to be the wrong person for no reason.

What is real friendship

Friendship is somewhat reminiscent of love. She is so unpredictable, desirable and truly priceless because she is just as rare. In fact, meeting real friends is no less difficult than meeting someone who is happy. After all, friendly relations include not just communication, but also support in the most difficult situations, full acceptance of a friend - for who he is. Unlike amorous relationships, in friendly relations, no one tries to remake anyone for themselves. People communicate because they are great together.

They become friends only when both experience comfort in each other's company. And these relationships do not experience such periods as insane passion, calm love and disappointment. Yes, and they alone do not expect from one something unusual and quarrel very rarely than lovers, between whom feelings are burning. People are friends with those whom they like as a person, with someone who does not arouse their rejection, does not ask for too much and does not take offense for various reasons.

Friendship is a close relationship between people, not burdened with unfounded expectations and hopes. In it, people do not dissolve and do not lose themselves, as is not always the case in love. On the contrary, friendship helps them to feel more secure, more self-confident. Due to the fact that the realization that they will come to your aid instills confidence in your own strength. A person is no longer very scared as when he is alone. He has someone to rely on, someone to ask for advice. He knows that good friend will not add or set its own goals above him.

As the greats say, “we do not so much need friends as in the realization that they will come to our aid when we need it”.

When people talk about friendship, of course, it is necessary to mention its main component - trust. Actually, it determines whether people consider someone else or not. When they cannot trust a person, they will never call him a friend, they will not let him close. Even the one with whom they were friends for a long time, after the betrayal, they will be erased from their own lives. Because friendship is absolute trust between people.

People receive from those whom they trust, the most intimate - consciousness, which they so often lack. They know that a friend will not condemn them, understand, reassure, listen, will not make fun, discuss, humiliate. He will always be on his side, even if everyone turns against him. When people are not sure that they will get this from a person who wants to talk to them very closely, they will not call him a friend. Without trust and decisiveness in him, friendship is not worth talking about.

It can be very different. Children know how to make friends, who are much easier to call other children their own friends, just by playing in the sandbox or by meeting in kindergarten. Children also meet at school, but growing up, they do not communicate at all with all children, but only with those with whom they are interested and who know a lot about them. After school, boys can still maintain their own friendship if after the army they return to their home, where they remain to live. As well as girls, by the way, but more often young people began to go to study and already meet new friends there. Over time, friends become less and less and adults have very few of them, due to the fact that it is not easy to maintain kinship relations with other people when there are so many responsibilities, and it is not easy to meet a person who could be trusted and trusted like yourself. Also, in order to maintain friendship, people must be ready to pay attention not only to themselves, their own family, parents, but also friends, which is not easy to accomplish.

It is much easier for men to make friends, they are united by a lot of interests, they do not have so many responsibilities to maintain the comfort of the house and raise children. It is very difficult for the fair sex to take an extra minute away from themselves in order to just talk with their girlfriends, especially if the spouse is overly jealous or a tyrant. Actually, therefore, male friendship occurs much more often than female, and not, due to the fact that female friendship does not exist.

Signs and qualities of friendship

Before you call someone a friend or become one yourself, you need to understand what qualities are necessary for people to be friends, what signs say that this person is actually a good friend, to whom you can always ask for help and get this help with a guarantee.

  • Friendship does not exist without mutual interest, sympathy, desire to help, worry, common hobbies.
  • She fades without communication, meetings, discussion of her own problems, willingness to spend her own time on another person.
  • Consciousness and a desire to deal with what worries a person almost at any time, a willingness to come to the rescue, no matter how difficult or uncomfortable it may be, are considered its mandatory signs.
  • But even without respect for the personal life of a friend, you can hardly do, even if he or she is always ready to throw everything and come at the first call. Quite quickly, a similar selfish attitude will force them to open their eyes to the fact that they are being used for their own purposes, preventing them from building their own lives the way they want. Real friendship rests on the fact that people care about others as much as about themselves, sometimes even more. But at the same time, the one for whom they are ready to make a sacrifice does everything so that his friends do not suffer because of this.
  • Similar qualities and signs of friendship speak with their own eyes that relatives do not always become friends. Not everyone succeeds in calling close people, siblings, parents, their own friends. For a person to call someone his own friend, he must be confident in him as in himself. And do not demand the impossible from him.
  • It is difficult to call friendship communication with colleagues and acquaintances, even if it is rather narrow, if there is no sincere sympathy, interest and desire to help between people. Even among those who are united by common interests, for example: members of a club or sports fans, there are often no friends, due to the fact that between them there is no trust, devotion to another, not as a member of his group, but as a person. And if the next day their interests change, they will remain only acquaintances, once fascinated by one thing.
  • Friends can have their own interests, but they never influence their communication and attitude towards each other.
  • The relationship with colleagues is based on the fact that people are together for a long time. They are united by work, team, mutual interest, which cannot be called friendship at all. The same can be said about business partners, members of business groups, bosses in the same company. All these are relationships, forced and formed on the personal interest of each. They do not have trust, mutual assistance, if the situation does not affect their interests at all.
  • In natural friendship, mutual assistance is not at all associated with benefits. If one is bad, then everyone else will lend a helping hand or recommend it, even if they did not ask about it. A friend will never refuse a friend.
  • It is not uncommon for a friend to get into trouble, and then they try to help him with the help of bitter truth, or by refusing help, but often this is where the friendship ends, since the one who finds himself in a difficult situation in life considers such behavior of a person to whom he trusted, betrayal. And the one who wants to help in this way does not know a lot about why his friend, instead of trusting him and taking his helping hand, pulls him down with him.
  • Without trust, friendship disappears, as by the way, and without sympathy, the desire to realize and feel the inner world of another. She is also killed by the inability to maintain relationships and communication due to moving to another city, country, the emergence of a new company for communication, marriage, changing interests that united, lack of free time.
  • But we need friendship, thanks to this, the main thing is to protect and appreciate it. After all, it makes it possible to feel that we are priceless and necessary for someone.

Friends do not make many demands and often do not expect anything in return, knowing that they will receive exactly the same support. Without them, what do not say and how do not convince yourself, it is difficult to live. It is possible, but still who will refuse those who are always ready to help? Thanks to this, it is not surprising that friendship is what makes us happy and gives us hope when it's hard and despondency threatens to swallow without a trace.

Tags: what is real friendship,
signs of friendship
qualities of friendship









Friendship rules: Friendship rules: Do not quarrel Do not quarrel Give in Concede Do not be afraid to ask for forgiveness if you have offended a friend Do not be afraid to ask for forgiveness if you have offended a friend Be polite Be polite Do not get angry Do not be angry Do not be greedy Do not be greedy Help your friend Help your friend Be honest Be honest To be attentive









Words about friendship: Words about friendship: A man without friends is like a tree without roots. If you don't have a friend, look for it, but if you find it, take care of it. Friendship is strong not by flattery, but by truth and honor. Friendship is like glass: if you break it, you won't fold it. Tell me who your friend is, and I'll tell you who you are. Not the friend who walks at the feast, but the one who helps in trouble. The friend argues, and the enemy agrees.


And in songs about friendship it is sung ... And in songs about friendship it is sung ... A river begins from a blue stream, Well, friendship begins with a smile. I go and sing about all the good things. And I give my smile to passers-by. Those who are friendly are not afraid of anxiety! Any roads are dear to us! If you are kind, it is always easy, And when, on the contrary, it is difficult. There lived a kind beetle, a good old friend. He never grumbled, did not shout, did not squeak, Loudly cracked his wings, strictly forbade quarrels. If you go out with a friend, the road is more fun. A friend in trouble will not leave, he will not ask too much. This is what a real friend means.


January 25, 2017, 16:16

Throughout the long history of mankind, people have become accustomed to uniting in alliances, which today are commonly called "friendship". But everyone in one way or another wondered: what is friendship? What is behind this simple word? If you endlessly trust another person, respect and share his interests, hobbies, sincerely answer any questions, and if the other person treats you in the same way, then this relationship can most likely be called friendship. We say "probably" because it is impossible to give a precise definition of friendship in scientific and journalistic articles. Each person himself determines the boundaries of friendly relations and separates it from simple communication. And we will only give food for thought, distinguishing the types of friendship, and allow ourselves to put artificial assessments of them.

Male friendship

It is generally accepted that a man's is a real friendship. Honesty, loyalty, trust are the inherent qualities of male relationships. Most follow these rules and principles even when the interests of individuals collide. And this is really very good - trust in such a relationship on high level, so you can rely on such people in any situation. Often a person gets support from friends, even if he is wrong. The idea for men is the main thing, and they faithfully follow this ideal.

The male social circle is also distinguished by the fact that each of the individuals is proud of his affection for others and is glad that he will always find support in the person of his comrades.

Female friendship

Difficulties arise in defining these relationships. Girls who met with the betrayal of their friends claim that real female friendship does not exist; some, on the contrary, tell stories of how they carried a faithful relationship through their whole life. The only thing that can be said for sure is that all women who assert this or that are right in this situation.

Women's friendship can often be compared to the relationship between two states. Like two self-sufficient independent countries, women communicate as long as it suits them. But this does not mean at all that all the girls are scoundrels, ready at any moment to betray and "sell" friendship. They enjoy this relationship; just like men, they support and help each other. Such relationships also have an undoubted right to exist. Here, as nowhere else is recalled the "theory reasonable egoism ", put forward by Chernyshevsky - every person in any business subconsciously seeks benefits first for himself, and then for everyone else.

Women, building friendships, see themselves as allies. They spend time together and from this they get the emotions and support they need. Is it bad?

But, unfortunately, often women's friendship ends in their relationship with men. It happens that women are ready to "fight" for the object of their sympathy, forgetting about moral principles, unlike men: they, in turn, put friendship above love relationships.

Friendship between man and woman

No less controversy goes around the existence of the following relationship - friendship between a man and a woman. Many do not believe in this, because often relationships develop into something more, and it also happens that each of the participants in the communication treats each other differently. In the case when it comes to the so-called "sexless friendship", friendship between a man and a woman is possible, but if the partners seek comfort in each other, then ordinary communication can soon become romantic.

Friendship is really light and a good relationship between people. You can find people with the same views in completely unexpected places. Today, with the development of the Internet, you can search online for dating. After all, what difference does it make where you find your soul mate? More importantly, you will understand and support each other.