I used to think finding the perfect friend was like looking in the mirror while looking at another person. Loss has been the best teacher of what friendship truly means. My failed friendships have taught me the most about myself and what it means to be a friend. Finding the perfect friend is not like looking in the mirror while looking at another person because the perfect friend does not exist. We are all flawed. We all have our own unique baggage we carry around with us. Real friendship seeks to understand and support, not judge.
As a freshman in college we often become desperate to find friends. We tolerate toxic behavior because toxic behavior is better than isolation. True friendship has taught me that someone who values you would never put themselves in a position to lose you, and that we can walk away from anything that no longer pleases us. Finding genuine friends provided me with the confidence to leave toxic situations.
Being a girl is really hard sometimes. We have to be pretty enough, smart enough, thin enough, sexy enough (the list goes on and on), but when we learn to support and to understand rather than to judge each other, being a girl gets a little easier. I might never be the skinniest or the prettiest or the smartest, but I will always be positive, compassionate, open and understanding.
Whether we find ourselves in a situation with a boy who cheats on us or in one where we realize the people we call our “friends” were never really our friends, they were just people who liked all of our Instagram pictures, we all deserve to have someone in our lives that gives us the confidence to leave unhappy situations.
Sometimes, as women, we need someone to hold our hand and tell us it will all be okay. Sometimes we just need a true friend to empower us to demand the best life has to offer us.