There's No Such Thing As A Bad Friend

March 27, 2004

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	"All we need is just a little patience."

Hear me out. Ever been in a situation where you think someone is a bad friend? Now, for the most part, when I thought this, something usually happened that caused me to say, "he's not a good friend because..." Recently, I realized that there is almost nothing I could end that sentence with to justify it (I say almost nothing only in case I need an out).

If someone maliciously hurts me, emotionally or physically, I wouldn't classify them as a friend. If there is any intent, I think that precludes a person from that "friend" description.

Now if that reasoning factors those people out, then the rest of the "bad" friends were people that have just done things to upset you without the intention. In most of these cases, or at least the ones I'm used to, the "bad" friend in question usually didn't keep in touch, or was consistently flaky, or constantly forgot birthdays, etc. The list really is endless but almost always filled with trivial items. The reason these items stand out is because of their large disparity if I switched places with the other party. I do keep in touch. I am not flaky (well not really). I don't forget birthdays. It's this disparity that usually upset me.

	They weren't just super heros, they were super friends

The reason it upset me and the reason that the other person was "bad" is that it all came to down to valuation. The other person didn't value the friendship as highly as I valued the friendship. I'm serious. The thing is, this doesn't make him/her a bad friend.

The key to most friendships is finding a balance. My best friends are not only the ones that I like the most and have the most stuff in common with, they are also the ones I value the most.

But, I also have a lot of great friendships with others, not because we have lot of things in common, but mainly because we value each other at similar levels; some high, some low.

It's tough to accept and it's hard to actually think that a person doesn't value your friendship as much as you value theirs. But it's true.

More than once I remember thinking that a few of them were bad friends. In hindsight, they weren't bad at all. It's just that they didn't value my friendship as much as I valued theirs. At the time, it wasn't a matter of accepting that, it was more of a matter of trying to understand why they were being assholes. To make this easier to picture, think of a person you know who called you, maybe often, who you didn't called back. Maybe it took 3 calls before you called them back? Are you a bad friend? No. It's just that you valued other things more than you did that person. Odds are if that was one of your better friends, you would have called back right away.

	"As long as there's a record deal we'll always be friends."

Since this epiphany, when situations happen that would have caused me to think a person was a bad friend, I now just devalue the friendship until I reached their same level of valuation (in my opinion).

How did this whole idea come about? Well, I was hanging out with a good friend of mine, Andy. Andy was talking about how he was going back to Atlanta but that he only told a few people. Andy only told a few people since his time in the A-T-L would be short and he wanted maximum club one-tweezy time with the few people he did tell. Andy did nothing wrong, it's merely that he valued those 5 or 6 people more than his other friends in Atlanta, so he told them. On the other hand, if you're one of the friends he didn't tell, there's a good chance you'd be upset that Andy was back in Atlanta and didn't tell you. If you look at it from this perspective, then Andy was a bad friend, but from Andy's perspective, he did nothing wrong.

Bottom line: It's all about realizing that different people will value the same friendship differently and accepting that others may not value the friendship as highly as you do.

	Milhouse probably understood this valuation theory of friendships

Comments from Andy: A Thought on Theory
Relationships survive due to equilibrium. this equilibrium is a function of each person's current valuation, desired valuation, and the valuations of all the other people in their lives. If i have 8 hours available, then i will seek to divide it proportionately based on current and desired valuations. Of course, i've spent the last two weeks studying biological evolution for the purposes of my research so i'm sorta obsessed with that concept.

Now if you are the lower end of this scale, then you need to decide if you can accept the fact that you will not be as high a priority to that other person as they would be to you.

	If only these two understood this, maybe they'd still be BFFs

Now if you are on the upper end of this scale, then you need to decide if you need to value that person more because at some point the may decide that it's not worth being a low priority.

Regardless of which side you are on in a friendship, it's all about realizing that people will value a friendship differently; it's all about accepting the fact that friendships can devolve just as quickly as they evolve, but either way, the person is still your friend, and that's all that matters.

Cue montage of friends scenes.

Please note: I have no friends so everything above could be wrong.

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