Is it hard to find good company?

Anywhere you go, it is bound to become a bit lonely at times. No matter how good you are at keeping your emotions at bay, something, sometimes, just crosses the threshold. It is at these moments that you need somebody by your side, whether you admit it or not — and if you don’t, I strongly recommend you start doing so. There has to be someone who listens to you — not necessarily a voice that gives you peace, just somebody who lets you speak your heart out. I am not a psychologist; I don’t claim to be a master in the arts of understanding the human mind. All I can do is share my experience through my words, to the best of my abilities.

The question then comes: does it have to be someone from our family? If you ask me, I’m not someone who would suggest you look at your family for that support. Don’t get me wrong — your family is the first line of defence against any problem in life that you may face. But as is the nature of all things, the first line of defence, no matter how strong, cannot withstand everything coming your way. So naturally, there has to be a contingency — put it that way — and that is where this “support” comes into action.

For somebody, this could be in the form of a good friend — somebody who has been with you throughout most of your life, seen the greatest number of emotions you could let out, even more than your family, because there are things you can’t let out in front of them — we all know what that is! This one person holds a great deal of dirt on you. I mean it. It matters a lot to know if that person can be trusted with that sensitive information. You’re probably wondering — if that were the case, we wouldn’t have been sharing so much time with them. But that’s not how it goes; there are times when people realize this only after a long time.

Surrounding yourself with good company doesn’t always mean being around people who make you laugh or make you feel great about yourself but never make it in time for situations where you need them the most — or worse, get you into unasked trouble on their behalf. Having good company can be defined as being surrounded by people who do make you laugh, who do appreciate you — appreciate you being in their surroundings — who value you without asking for anything in return, and most of all, who are there when you need them the most, even if it’s at a time when you need to be reminded of your own mistakes.

When we’re young, it’s the children who have lived around us, along with a few from school, who make our company. At that age, you are not bothered by anything other than play, food, and rest — only a handful of emotions, not a lot to deal with — hence there is no special need to evaluate your company. That phase continues into the mid-teens, I’d say, when things actually start hitting you — emotions surging that you never witnessed before, and emotions that you would feel shy sharing with your parents. But your siblings — they’re the ones you go to for that. You still have most of the same rambunctious lot with you from the earlier days; they’re just not mature enough to address this situation at that moment in time — well, when even are they — so the company you look for is from your siblings.

Then comes a later stage — almost late teens to early adulthood. Now, this lot can be trusted, at least a little. This group of friends, and a couple more in some cases, are the go-to people in this phase of life. You’re pursuing a bachelor’s degree, all of you, spending most of your time with each other — talking more than you ever did or ever will in the future. This is when the support from this lot really develops, and stays on for the rest of your lives — but not without a little drama here and there; it keeps it alive.

What exactly is this feeling? You know the feeling you get when a really long time has passed since you last hung out with your core group of four or five or six — whatever — and you all meet one fine day. No special occasion, nobody’s birthday, nobody did anything worth celebrating, just randomly everybody decided to drop by home at around the same time as others — which is especially hard when you have friends scattered all around the globe (IYKYK). It’s a festival in itself! You may call it an impromptu celebration of… “Finally, we managed to do it.” This one meet turns into a stay through the night — a night you would dread ending. God bless that one guy who volunteers for his house to be that place.

We’re simple. Our emotions are simple — and yet complicated. Or do we complicate our emotions? We have so many needs and wants, which is why we decide to course through a particular path in our lives that inevitably diverges from our friends’ and family’s. And yet, the simplest things make you feel as if nothing has ever gone bad — that whatever’s going to happen in the future will be amazing.

Interesting thought. I’ll let you ponder on that for now.