The great thing about friendship is that it’s like family- except you get to choose your friends. Being at UVA means being able to meet a lot of different, amazing kinds of people in the most unexpected places; these include club meetings, recycling events or conversations bonding over daily struggles.
One thing that a lot of people forget is that friendship isn’t a one-way street; both sides need to put in effort so that the bonds can remain strong. Communication and time need to be invested in order for the friendship to be preserved.
I get that everyone is super busy with school, building resumes with thousands of clubs and memberships, the gym, and whatever else- but there needs to be an effort to make time for people (other than at 2 a.m. while running into them at a party and saying “OMG we totally need to catch up!”). So, here are a couple tips on how to make time for friends in order to really appreciate (and be appreciated by) the people around you.
1. Make the time you see each other, productive!
Why don’t you start taking a Zumba class together? Or go for a hike Sunday morning? Going to the library together and taking a study break every two hours or practicing *insert choice of foreign language here* for class is also a good way to create a productive way to hang out. These kinds of ideas make you feel like you’re not “wasting” time because you’re accomplishing things while hanging out with the people you love!
2. Take one day a week to organize a social outing (hint: not one where you’re surrounded by loud music and drunk people)
I’m all about going out with my friends, but can you realllllly have meaningful conversations while you’re jamming to Rihanna’s new song? I’m too busy killin’ it on the dance floor (lol) to really care about how your day went (sorry not sorry). But seriously: take one day a week to go out to dinner, have coffee, etc. with a friend!
3. Take a couple minutes a day to reach out to people.
How long does it take to send a “Hey! How’s life?” text to people? If people haven’t heard from you in a while, they’ll be touched to see that you’re thinking of them! In this day and age we really have no excuse to lose contact with people, so make sure you’re putting a little effort by checking in with them.
4. Involve friends in your daily life!
One of my best friends and I hadn’t talked in a long time so we decided to make it a thing that we would start watching the same show so every time I’d watch another episode of “New Girl”, I’d think of her and end up calling or texting her! It was a way of being close while not really putting in that much effort. You can do this by watching the same show, exchanging recipes, sharing music choices, etc.
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Honestly, I think my middle school idol (because who didn’t love all her books), Sarah Dessen, said it best: “Life is an awful, ugly place to not have a best friend”… or great friends in general!