Friendship

True friends are like books, stay till the end of your life.

Sanjeev Prasad Mazoomdar

“Great friends are hard to find, difficult to leave, and impossible to forget”

We have aunts, uncles, grandparents and a host of relatives, none of whom are part of our lives due to our choice. But our friends are the ones we choose to include in our lives. Friendship is considered to be a true blessing for everyone and a person with good friends will have a support system for sharing each and every moment of their life whether it is happy or sad. Friends are an extremely important part of our life and everyone feels the need for a companion at some point or the other in their life.

Friendship is based on love, sacrifice, trust and consideration of mutual welfare. True friendship is a solace and a boon. Those men are fortunate indeed who have got really true and sincere friends.

According to the great Roman Statesman Cicero “Friendship increases happiness and diminishes misery by doubling our joy and dividing our grief”. Friends are needed in every stage of life. Friendship has no age limit. Every group of people- children, youth, elders, very elderly people, etc. have their friends.

According to Bernard Meltzer, A true friend is someone who thinks that you are a good egg even though he knows that you are slightly cracked. A true friend is one who knows us, but loves us anyway even with our flaws. A friend is one of the extraordinary gifts of man's life. Friendship is a sensation of admire and affection of one person for another.  

A true friend is one who stands by another and not a summer companion who fades away in the frosty days of winter. He is one who overlooks your failures and tolerates your success.  He is not a soft-spoken sycophant who says what will give pleasure only. He is not afraid to speak out the honest truth, however indigestible it may be. He is always a sincere well-wisher, never a honey-tongued flatterer. True friendship is a rare treasure that needs to be cherished. A true friend is the one who brings out the best in a person, so if you have at least one true friend in your life you should feel grateful for that. 

True friendship is marked by a sense of honesty and unselfishness. A true friend is one who is prepared even to sacrifice his life for the sake of his friend and prepared to meet all kinds of dangers and difficulties. There should be no disbelief, no suspicion in friendship.

Good friends exercise good influence and are like stars-you don't always see them, but you know they are always there. They always help their friends, in distress and inspire them to walk on the right path. But evil friends ruin us completely.

True Friendship is one of the great virtues that sustain life. It has been said that a true friend is a friend indeed. There are so many false friends that it is difficult to distinguish between the two types.

A true friend is one who never deserts you. He sticks to all the time whether it is the time of happiness or sorrow. He is an inseparable companion even in the midst of great distress, in poverty and in other forms of misfortune.

False friends are fair weather companions. They always knock at your door when you are rich or affluent and have enough and to spare. They are with our intimates of good fortune marked by lavish and prosperity and desert in rough weather.

One should capable enough to differentiate between flatterer and friend. Flatterer is more dangerous than declared enemies. By telling soft words they bring enormous ruin to us. We should have few friends, but they must be our true friend, who can share our joys and sorrows. It is adversity that tests friendship. If a man is in trouble or in need and his friend stands by him that is a true friend. A good friend will never desert a man in his hour of danger. A true friend never exploits. It is very painful when a friends turn to traitors.

We need to select our friends very carefully. We have to remember the maxim “All that glitters is not gold”. In the same manner, we must not be moved by apparent show of friendship. Many remain with us in the guise of good friends and lead us to the wrong path. Today, many youngsters have become social nuisance mainly due to wrong company and bad friends.

Lord Krishna & Sudama's friendship is known to all and their friendship doesn't distinguish between high & low status or between riches & poverty. It was a friendship totally based on true and pure love. Today, even after thousands of years, the friendship of Lord Krishna & Sudama is remembered all over the world as a symbol of true love.

In this modern age, the meaning of friendship has changed. There are many fair-weathered friends. They cease their friendly bind as soon as their interests are fulfilled. It is very difficult to find a true friend today. It is better to establish true friendship with either a dog or an elephant. Both these beasts will remain faithful to their human friends. Today, friendship between two persons is short-lived. So, before making a friend one should be very careful because new friendship is like an un-ripened fruit - it may become either an orange or a lemon.

To make friends is a science; to preserve it is an art. Friendship is like money, it is easier to make than to keep. In other words, there must be no intention on one side or the other to make friendship a matter of gain or convenience. It has been said that a friend is a person who not only shows us the way but walks paces of the road with us.  

The spirit of friendship can be realized with this approach “If all my friends were to jump off a bridge, I wouldn’t jump with them; I would be there at the bottom to catch them”.

In 1935, American administration killed a man on 1^st Saturday of the August month. After hearing the news, his best friend committed suicide the following day. So in his memory, 1^st Sunday of August was officially declared as Friendship Day.