Friends

ignorance is best described as the act of willfully disengaging in truth.
you are not ignorant because you don't know something. you can always learn or you can always reach toward that moment when you learn something new or can see something in a different light.

i have been ignorant about certain things for a long while.

my major ignorance has been in my relationships.
i have always thought my role was to make sure the other person was happy. i never thought about myself.

i did it in my intimate relationships
i did it in my personal friendships
hell i even did it in my working relationships.

what i always did was elevate the other person. i called them my husband
i called them my best friend
i called them my work friends

what i neglected to realize was that elevating a person to the monikers, i gave them power over me.

take fore instance best friend. i have many friend and it is rare that a person finds them self in my best friend category. a person who i call a best friend was put in a position where so much more is expected of them. when they succeeded i cheered through them. when they failed, i shook my head in disgust. when we argued, i took it personally.

that is not the way i treat my friends so why would i treat a best friend that way?

the solution to this problem is to not have best friends. i have many friends people who i might not talk to for months, but we are always cool with things. that is how it should be with all friends. there is no reason to be more committed to or more intimate with a friend than all the others.
the amount of respect given to a "best friend" is usually less than what is given to general friends. you look to them for so much more and they are human and should be given the same amount of breathing room as everyone else.

the best way to maintain friendships is to not give so much to one person defined as a "best friend" .
just a regular old friend with whom you share many interests. something has obviously brought friends together. should be taken as just that and not as anything so special that you single them out by placing them on a pedestal leaving them able to fall farther, hit harder, and take longer to climb back up.

g