I Love You, Best Friend

Valentine’s Day – the day filled with love. Don’t get me wrong, I am not a bitter single girl who despises everything about romance. I enjoy the cute Hallmark cards, the heart-shaped chocolates, and all the cheesy celebrations. But with the holiday right around the corner, I think now is a better time than any to talk about the big, scary line that everyone seems to be terrified of. Three words, eight letters. Yup, you guessed it! I Love You.

I have never been one to throw “I love you” around. Every time I say it, I try to ensure that I truly mean it. “I love you” is such a loaded phrase and has so much meaning to it. So much so that I have never been comfortable with using it casually. And at large, most people also watch themselves when they say it, but solely in romantic relationships. In any other circumstance, people are no longer fazed to say “I love you.” You can know your friends for just a couple of months, and you’ll be saying it within seconds. But why? Why do we have such a hard time saying it to our significant others, but never to our best friends? 

People are nervous about letting the phrase slip to their significant other and are even cautious about saying it when they truly mean it. There is this internal conflict: “Do I say it now? Should I wait? Should I see if my partner will say it first? How will they react?” We put so much thought and effort into saying meaningful words to a significant other. We do so because we value that person so much and want to express our feelings in a purposeful way. We hold these individuals in the highest regard and because of that, we save those three words for the right moment, for when we are confident that we mean it. 

We should value our friendships like we do in our romantic relationships. We like to say that our friends are our ride-or-dies, always have our backs, and are forever friends that will always be there for us. We’ve all imagined our current friends being by our side through life’s biggest moments, whether it be taking graduation pictures together, being our bridesmaids at our weddings, or visiting each other when we are living our successful lives. Even though we claim that our friends are basically our lifelines, we don’t give them the same respect with regards to saying “I love you.” We don’t even flinch saying it. We say it with little thought and throw the phrase around so casually throughout conversation with any and all of our friends. You can barely even know this person, and it is so easy for them to say “OMG, I love you!!!” We hold our friends so close to our hearts, probably even closer than our partners at times, that they deserve to be valued. Friendships deserve just as much attention as a romantic relationship. Friends should be appreciated for caring for you throughout countless experiences, for being your safe space, and for every other reason you call them your ‘friend’ to begin with.

We should stop normalizing saying “I love you” to our friends so fast and so easily. Instead, we should intend for the phrase to mean just as much when we say it to our best friends as we do when we say it to our partners. Though we may not realize it, friendships are what define our ideas of care and love. The people we surround ourselves with have qualities and values that we hope to find within our significant others. Show your friendships how much they mean to you by putting in just as much thought into saying the phrase as you would any romantic relationship. 

So take this Valentine’s Day (or Galentine’s Day) to appreciate all the people you love. Not just your significant others, but your friends who have been there for it all, through the thick and thin. Do something special for your best friends, and who knows, maybe even drop the bomb and say “I love you.” 

• friends
• friendship
• Galentine’s Day
• love
• Valentine's Day