Photo by Wade Sullivan

Kaitlyn Fleming

Friendships in your twenties can be hard to navigate.

Everyone is busy making their way in the world and can be consumed with their day to day lives. Some people will stay the same, yet some people will adopt a whole new set of values.

So the question is: how do young people in their twenties handle these changes coming our way?

In an interview with NPR, writer Elizabeth Seagran said, “Be aware of that drop-off. The next step is to figure out the friends that you really want to have in your life for years to come.”

Intentionality in friendships is the key to surviving. In high school, you see your friends every single day. You eat lunch together, take class together and oftentimes hang out after school together.

In your younger years, friendships often come naturally and require less effort to maintain. In your twenties, being intentional about communication and arranging time together is crucial to sustaining your friendships.

On the other hand, as much as being intentional is paramount, facing the reality that some friendships will be outgrown is equally significant.

A tough pill to swallow is that not everyone is going to care as much as you do about preserving these friendships.
Accepting the fact that not all of your friendships will be life-long will bring you some level of peace. Some people are a phase in your life and that is perfectly okay. Desperately clinging to those friendships won’t make them last.

Instead of dwelling on that melancholic feeling of outgrowing certain people, pour your energy into nurturing those relationships with friends who fill your cup as much as you fill theirs.

Fostering relationships in your twenties may look different than what you’ve experienced before. You know you have found true friendship when you find joy in the mundane.

I used to think friendship was meant to be exciting day-to-day. Now, some of my favorite moments with my friends are simply laying together and soaking up each other’s company.

There’s something beautiful about comfortable silence. The lessons friendships in my college years have taught me about quiet love are incomparable.

Seeing your friends every day isn’t necessary for quiet love to exist. Quiet love exists in the small details amongst chaotic everyday life.

Quiet love exists in knowing what book your friend is currently reading.

Quiet love exists in phrases like “You can borrow mine” and “What have you done today?”

Quiet love exists in knowing your friend’s breakfast order, and maybe picking it up for them during a busy time in their life.

It’s also important to note that some friends are not one-size-fits-all. Maybe you have a friend that you go to when you need a laugh, but you wouldn’t necessarily recount your deepest secrets to. That is perfectly okay.

If you’re lucky, you will find one or two people who satisfy all areas of friendship.

Gauging friendships during these early years can be a deeply emotional, exciting and frustrating journey.

Your twenties are filled with self-discovery and life can get messy. Friendships should hold you together, not make you fall apart.

Kaitlyn Fleming can be contacted at [email protected].