Tag Archives: Friendship

Gratitude

Friendship Thing

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grateful for friendship
I have known this guy for over forty years and he still makes me laugh by ignoring signs and being funny. (he is trespassing)

It should not be difficult to look at one’s friends and to feel an overwhelming gratitude.  For me, that is certainly the case.  Friendship isn’t a relationship that you can buy or force anyone to participate in, it is a connection over a shared experience that binds you to that other person in a positive way.   I think that the right positive friendships in life can enhance your life.  At this point, I have come to realize that all friends are not created equal, but all friendships are a valuable thing, and here are my thoughts on why.

Laughter is the Best Medicine

Life is too short to go without laughter, and a good friend can usually bring about a laughing fit about almost anything.  It doesn’t matter how long you have been friends, looking at life in a humorous way is going to allow your friendship to grow.   I have always been drawn toward the people who can snicker at the day to day events we are faced with.  If you can’t laugh about it then you are probably going to be spending a lot of time crying.  Think about your friends and how many have been centered around laughter.  I am having a hard time thinking of one person that I have enjoyed spending time with that didn’t involve laughter and joking of some kind.   I am sure it is possible to be friends if you don’t laugh but it would seem to me a much more dour prospect.

Think about your friends and how many have been centered around laughter.  I am having a hard time thinking of one person that I have enjoyed spending time with that didn’t involve laughter and joking of some kind.   I am sure it is possible to be friends if you don’t laugh but it would seem to me a much more dour prospect.

Old Friends, Always Friends

grateful for friends
All friends are valuable and don’t need to be labeled.

I was blessed to grow up in a small town in Maine, where I went to school with the same group of kids until the seventh grade.  The neat thing about these people, is that now almost forty years later when I run into one of these people, the time that has passed does not matter at all.

With some, it is as if no time has passed at all, the conversation is a bit different but the relationship is still the same as it was back in the old days.  The shared experience of growing up like that apparently builds a bond that isn’t easily broken or forgotten.

 I am grateful for these relationships because no matter what is happening in my life, those people know who you are and always accept you the way you are.  I am grateful for these connections.

Some Come and Go and That is OK

In life, I think friendship is often like the tide, inevitably moving in and out.  It has become a belief of mine, that people enter your life for a reason, most often to teach you something.  Friendship is no different.

Maybe it is how to do something or how you look at things, but the more you allow people into your lives the greater your personal growth is.  Unfortunately once the lesson is learned, these people often move out of your life.

This is OK because you will have to grow, be open to new experiences and new lessons that friends yet unmet will teach you.  The value of the old friends is not lessened by the fact that you have to move on for now.  You can keep in touch and when you see each other later in life, you will always have that shared experience.

Since new friends are a great path to growth, you always have to be willing to greet and make new friends, which can be difficult.   My advice is to take them wherever you can get them from.  I have learned much more from the friends I have made over the past year than they could ever imagine.

Toxic Friends

Not everything in friendship is a bowl of cherries.  Sometimes, there are people you are drawn to who initially are great, but after awhile you realize that all they do is talk about other people in a derogatory manner.   Sometimes it is as blatant as making a comment as soon as someone is out of earshot.

If they are doing this, what do they say when you are out of earshot?   Probably nothing good.  I am grateful that I haven’t had to deal with too many of these, but the ones I did have to deal with, taught me a lot.

I think there are only two choices here, change the dynamic of the friendship or move away from it.  The people that you choose to spend your time with will not only define you to the world but will impact how you feel and how you react in it.

Changing the dynamic is nearly impossible but give it a try.  When something negative is said about somebody, immediately say something nice about them.  I have done this twice and in both cases, the person found reasons not to discuss other people with me again.    Life is too short for negative thoughts and feelings, I am grateful to keep most negativity out of my life.

Thank You Friends

Friendship is one of the most important factors that makes this human experience worthwhile.  There is something about sharing, thoughts, ideas, laughs or good times that is bonding to all of us.   The educational experience, the work experience, the life experience, all of them are grounds for bonding through friendship and through friendship we are able to grow exponentially further than we could by ourselves.  Isn’t that the basis for blogging?  Putting your ideas out there and seeing if there are like minded people who can appreciate what you are thinking, feeling or doing?

Personally I am grateful for all of the friends that have entered my life, either for a season or a lifetime and I look forward to meeting those that come into my life in the future.  Friends are the measuring stick of Your reality.

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Life Lessons

Friendship Quotes for Everyday Friends

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Some of My Favorite Friendship Quotes

friendship quotes for you
Friendship is ImportantMy Favorite Friendship Quotes

I wanted to publish some friendship quotes that will help you value your friends and enjoy being one.  As you move through life, it can be easy to overlook the value of a true friend. Relationships, move apart, come together and dissolve, and if you are not careful, those friendships will slip away into what used to be.  Often the factors of life, a spouse, children, career, can all combine to make that friendship that you once cherished, fall out of your consciousness and into a memory.  As time moves on, the relationship with that friend will move further into the past.  Eventually, there are so many that you long to see, but alas it is too late to retravel those roads, you took a turn years ago away from that friendship and it seems there is no way that you can’t get back from it. Friendship quotes always remind you that there is a path back.

“True friendship is like sound health; the value of it is seldom known until it be lost.” 
– Charles Caleb Colton

Today I am remembering all of the friendships that I have let fade over time.  Thinking of all of the very good people I have known, but no longer see, I think that the simple relationship of friendship is as powerful as anything in the world.  It has the ability to make you laugh, feel good, feel accepted and feel understood.  You belong, and there is no fee to pay other than to be yourself, and you are  accepted for that.

I also am truly grateful for the friendships that I am blessed with today.  Hopefully the wisdom of age will allow me to maintain these links to the soul that we call friends.

Friendship Quotes I Like

In the spiritual life nowhere do our ideals meet the actual more truly than in how we relate to each other, in how we make, sustain and are friends.

  • James Ishmael Ford

Shared joy is double joy; shared sorrow is half a sorrow.

-Swedish proverb

Remember, we all stumble, every one of us. That’s why it’s a comfort to go hand in hand.

-Emily Kimbrough

 Man is a knot into which relationships are tied.

-Antoine de Saint-Exupery

 No road is long with good company.

-Turkish Proverb

Some more great Friendship Quotes

You cannot be lonely if you like the person you are alone with.

-Wayne Dyer

 To know when to go away and when to come closer is the key to any lasting relationship.

-Domenico Cieri Estrada

 

 Trouble is part of your life, and if you don’t share it, you don’t give the person who loves you enough chance to love you enough.

-Dinah Shore

 It is the friends you can call up at 4 a.m. that matter.

-Marlene Dietrich

 A true friend is one who thinks you are good egg even if you are half-cracked.

-Anonymous

 Friendship isn’t a big thing — it’s a million little things.

-Anonymous

 A friend knows the song in my heart and sings it to me when memory fails.

-Donna Roberts

 A friend is the one who comes in when the whole world has gone out.

-Grace Pulpit

 It takes a long time to grow an old friend

-John Leonard

Even more Friendship quotes

Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive.

-Anais Nin

 Friends are the sailors who guide your rickety boat safely across the dangerous waters of life.

-Sare and Cate

 Nothing but heaven itself is better than a friend who is really a friend.

-Plautus

 The friend who holds your hand and says the wrong thing is made of dearer stuff than the one who stays away.

-Barbara Kingsolver

 In my friend, I find a second self.

-Isabel Norton

 Let us be grateful to people who makes us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.

-Marcel Proust

 

“My friends are my estate.”
– Emily Dickinson

“A real friend is one who walks in when the rest of the world walks out.”

“A friend is one who walks in when others walk out” 
-Walter Winchell

“A friend is someone who is there for you when he’d rather be anywhere else.” 
– Len Wein – Sent by Paulo Louro

“A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart, and can sing it back to you when you have forgotten the words.” 
– Sent by Donna Roberts

“A friend is one who believes in you when you have ceased to believe in yourself.” 

“Don’t walk in front of me, I may not follow.
Don’t walk behind me, I may not lead.
Walk beside me and be my friend.” 
– Albert Camus 

“A hug is worth a thousand words. A friend is worth more.”

“Everyone is a friend, until they prove otherwise.”
– sent by Steve

“Every person is a new door to a different world.”
– from movie “Six Degrees of Seperation”

We need old friends to help us grow old and new friends to help us stay young.

  • Letty Cottin Pogrebin

The worst solitude is to be destitute of sincere friendship.

  • Francis Bacon

The most beautiful discovery true friends make is that they can grow separately without growing apart.

  • Elizabeth Foley

Some Final Friendship Quotes

We must reach out our hand in friendship and dignity both to those who would befriend us and those who would be our enemy.

  • Arthur Ashe

Don’t believe your friends when they ask you to be honest with them. All they really want is to be maintained in the good opinion they have of themselves.

  • Albert Camus

I hope you enjoyed the friendship quotes and they make you appreciate those friends that are continually aroud you.

Articles

My Advice to Me

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My freshman year of college on the b-ball team. Didn't have a clue.
My freshman year of college on the b-ball team. Didn’t have a clue.

 

Hey Young Jonathan, it is time to put the toys away. Put down the beer bottle and pay attention, I have to send you a message that will change your life.  It will make you more successful, happier and in the end me.

This is a post I have often seen and wanted to do.  I have been endowed with the incredible talent to send this back in time to myself at 18 years old, I can only tell myself five things or it would be a book, not a blog.  I have gone a lot of miles in the last 29 years and I should have a lot of good advice for me.  You can be the judge of the value, I can only provide what I have.

 

YOU ARE SMART

Hey Jonathan, for much of the last five years or so, people have kindbeen telling you that you are not that intelligent.   And the worst part is that you believe them.  People are making judgments about you because you had a hard time with the system.

 

Homework is not your thing, and yes you could have tried harder, but I know that most of that time you were a walking ball of hormones and being in school was just a social occasion for you.  It didn’t mark your intelligence, that is inside you.  Start to believe in this now, college gets easier for you and by the time you are an adult, you realize how easy learning is, particularly when it is on your terms and about things you like.  You are smart, you have always known it, don’t hide who you are because it is easy!

Be Yourself

0-0-namka15Much of your life is going to be spent worrying about what others think for some reason.  It is a silly waste of time, because you will only be happy, really happy when you accept who you are and do what makes you happy.

You like to write and create, but for much of your life you will be scared to be creative.  Fear is just a thought Jonathan and you need to face the world with the love that is in your heart.  Be accepting of others and they will be accepting of you.  BE Yourself, because the one thing I have learned, that I am absolutely sure of is that the person that you are is OK.

Understand Friendship

imagesFriendship is a crazy thing.  Understand that all friendships are formed around a shared experience with someone else.  Do not hesitate to open the door to more shared experiences and more friends.  Don’t judge others too harshly because you will notice that you can only criticize in others, what you know is inside yourself.   Rather than judge, open your heart and accept all people as friends when you have the chance.

 

Understanding the nature of friendship is to realize that people will come into and fall out of your life.  Some may enter again later and some you may never see again.  When the shared experience that makes you friends is gone, most often so are the friends.  Work is a shared experience, a hobby is a shared experience and life can be.  Don’t expect too much of a friendship, because in many cases they will let you down.

 

But understand that when your eyes are open, there are new friends and experiences coming down the road.  Most often they are going to teach you just what you need to know, and help you survive the shared experience you are having right now.   Follow your nature Jonathan, make more friends, and let them move in and out of your life without judgment or expectation.

It isn’t All About YOU

Jonathan, there is one aspect of your life that I want you to change, centeroftheuniverseand that is to be less selfish.  You put yourself first in too many situations and that is no way to live.  As you only worry about yourself and what you have.  The focus of your life is your existence and eventually the only thing in your life will be you.

 

One of the secrets of life I have learned is that the more you give, the more you get.  It is a simple thing, but when you are acting self-centered you can’t see it.  Give to others freely and without expectation of reward and…………………..you are rewarded.  Life has quite a sense of humor.  This is true in relationships, jobs, money and every aspect of life.  Giving always allows you to receive.

Read more, Open Your Mind

It will take a long time for you to really start to grasp how the world works Jonathan.  I have run across people who are in their 20’s and have their shit together, so I know it is possible.  Read some books and pay attention to the ideas they share.

 

Read “The Game of Life and How to Play It” by Florence Scovel Shinn and really think about it.   Understand that each thought that you have in your head matters. Those you entertain really matter and will affect your experience in life.  You have the ability to decide which thoughts are entertained in your mind, and your thoughts will dictate how you act in life, treat other people and what comes into your life.

 

This is important.  More important than playing golf, more important than the time you waste doing nothing, and certainly more important than any of the television you watch.  Once you read this book, follow the progression and read what seems natural, my suggestion is Believe in Yourself by Joseph Murphy.   As you read, your mind will expand, and we can start making good decisions earlier on in life.  Then as I write this I will be president or at least I will be rich.  You can’t be stopped once the light of intellect is sparked and you look at the world with an open heart and mind.

 

So there it is, a long message to myself.  If I knew myself from the past, you will stop reading after the first paragraph.  But don’t worry I included plenty of pictures so you will be entertained. Like most people, I don’t really want you to change a thing, because I think we have ended up in a good place and the future is wide open.

 

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Questions

The End of The World

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If you knew the world was ending tomorrow, who would you make sure you visited today?

end of the world
The Mayans thought it was going to happen in 2012, yet here we are!

by Jonathan Hilton  Day 54

Knowing the world would end tomorrow would make me want to see a lot of people today, for a number of reasons, but I think that this question is good motivation to look at how we value people and how we let relationships drift away into indifference for a multitude of reasons.

So I am going to split the people into categories and explain the reasons for each.  One thing is for sure it would be one busy day.

Family First

First of course there would be family that I would want to see, so that I could make sure that they were ready for the impending destruction.  I would want to say thank you for all that you did in my life and that I am very grateful for the kindness and that I love them all very much, ask if there was anything I could do for them on that last day.

Each relationship in that familial web is important and I would hope that I could get to them all.  I know how much I miss the ones that are gone already, they are with me every day and I am not sure about what would happen if the world ended, but as long as I was able I would be carrying them with me.

Forgiveness
I have a clear conscience in this area

Friendship Is Important

Second I would want to visit all of the friends that I have met over the years to say good bye and reminisce about good times shared, and all of the funny memories we had, so that I could tell them how much I appreciated spending some time on this journey with them.

There are many friends from all of the different phases of my life and I guess I would have to use Skype to talk with some of them, but if I could I would talk to them.

The people I grew up with are as dear to me today as anyone, because there is a shared experience of childhood that could not be faked or manipulated.  We knew each other, both the good and the bad, and there was a support and caring there that still exists today.  My high school friends shared a different time with me, but still significant.  The ties you make as a youth are strong even if you don’t see each other on a regular basis.  They don’t break easy.

I went to two different colleges and there are two distinct groups of friends there but they are the people that I really grew up finally with and started to learn about the world.   I have nothing but smiles and great times to share just one more time before the world ends.

Then of course as an adult, there were a lot of people I met through the jobs I have had, but not a lot of them were friends, they were coworkers for the most part.  These “friendships” were clearly only for a short time and they did teach me something, but it is the past where I have found my true friends.

This One Goes Out To You

Next I would find the three people who I was ever in love with in my life.  It might be awkward because I haven’t seen any of them in years.  but I would want to tell each of them that regardless of my actions, I take responsibility for them.  They had an impact

peaceful lake
A nice peaceful place for the end of the world

on me and I have carried it with me for my entire life.  Not the bad things but the good times the memories that made me a better person. They still are making me better today.  I am grateful that we shared whatever we shared.

Forgive Everyone

Time is getting short so I would want to at least call some people I feel like there are unresolved issues with.  To tell them that I forgive them and am sorry for my part in any pain they experienced.

Life is full situations that provide you with a choice, I made some that were universally good and some that might be construed as bad for everyone.  Whenever the end does come these petty things are not going to be on my mind. I send best wishes to those who are angry and hope they find happiness before their ending.  I forgive them for anything they did to me.

Finally

That being done, if I had any time left I would go to a spot that was special to me, there are several and await the end of the world with anticipation, and not be afraid in the least bit. What good would that do? The world is ending and there isn’t anything you can do about it, might as well enjoy the spectacle.

Is there any other song appropriate for this post?

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People

The Forty one Year Fight

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Mike Martin and I have been friends for forty one years.  There are not many people in the

41 year fight
Even though Mike is always wrong, he still argues with me all the time. He is so stubborn.

world outside of your family that you have known your entire life, and still call them your friend. I am fortunate to have had a friend for most of my life, who is cantankerous, stubborn and is often not right about anything! He would tell you the same thing about me.  We work together right now and that leads to many conflicts about virtually every subject.  When I started this new Picture Project I was in between two of these conflicts, so it only made sense that the first picture should be a symbol of the fights we have on most days.  These “fights” are more philosophical battles, where we do not agree on much of anything.  But when the chips are down, I know I can count on him and he on me.

The core of our conflict has boiled down to the essence of our philosophies, and all of our conflicts stem from this premise:

My Philosohpy: That there is a right and a wrong, that everyone deep down knows it and that morality is definite and binding.  (he refers to this as black and white)

Mike Martin Philosophy:  That life is lived on a continuum of gray area, sometimes things are right, sometimes wrong depending on the circumstances.  (I refer to this as the whatever way the wind blows philosophy)

I could go into each of he specific debates that we have had over the years but when I write about it I seem to be even more clearly right than when the original argument occurred.  Needless to say that we have argued over philosophy, thought, morals, honesty, choices, how to stop drug addiction, and even judgments of others.

Needless to say these arguments have traveled with us from Belgrade all over the State of Maine as we have gone to different locations for work related stuff.  There are a few things we do agree on though.

*Greenville was a great place to grow up

*Our parents were pretty good people

*The Patriots and Red Sox are awesome

Having had some experience with people that are friendly to you face, but not really a friend it is good to know that even though we argue all the time, it is good to have at least one friend that I can count on, no matter what happens.

So this argument has been going on for 41 years and even though I am always right, it still continues, some day he may even get the last word.

But not today because as usual I am right!!!!!

fortyoneyearfight
Always appreciate your real friends.
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