Are You Really My Friend?

I think in most cases, the online acqaintances we make can later mature into friendships. But I also have people who call themselves my real friends in my physical life who haven't been there for me, nurtured me or sent me help and support the way some people I have never met in person have. I believe that all friendships take time and care to mature. Time online has taught me not to discount people because of the medium where I first encountered them, though.

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Hi Shonali

I, too, really enjoyed bdorman264 's guest post on lorigosselin 's lifeforinstance tackling How Does Your Friendship Grow? The comments both on that post and over here have been thought provoking and I just loved your post today. I have just a couple of very best friends and a larger circle of casual friends that have stayed with me over the years and on Bill's post, I labeled myself a farmer in that I would much rather nurture and tend to those valued few friends than to hunt and bag large numbers of people that I only know superficially. It's just not my nature. However, there is something interesting about the sociology of friendships that I would like to bring up. Historically, our friendships have been primarily friendships of convenience. In other words, being the social beings that we are, we would create bonds of friendship where ever we settled and claimed our homestead. Before the phrase "global community" ever existed, we usually stayed put in one location and made our friends based on the convenience of location. As the world became more mobile, we modified the friendships of convenience to include friends that we made when we went away to college, when we studied abroad, when we did volunteer work during the summer in another state, when we moved for our career, etc. But, they were still friends that we typically met IRL and whom we shared a common/convenience with. We made friends with our children's friend's parents. We made friends with people in places we share our spirituality. We made friends at the dog park. These were friends but they were borne of convenience. NOW, there is a game changer in how we can choose our friends. We have SoMe. WIth SoMe we meet like minded people...people on the same career track, people with similar hobbies, people that can teach us things we crave to understand, people that we can teach. The permutations are almost limitless and I find that for me personally, these friendships have matured and blossomed in a completely new way. I have been fortunate to meet quite a few of the online friends that I have made via SoMe and the comfort level is there almost immediately. Through SoMe, we share so much, support each other so sincerely and, we are perhaps better able to "weed out" the SoMe "friends" that just aren't working out for us.

I apologize, Shonali, for the length of this comment. And I thank you for having such a fun place to stop by!

Claudia

Great post, Shonali. I was going to talk to you about Thanksgiving. Me and MY dogs will see you soon. Ha ! No, this is such an interesting topic. I have always been a person who had to meet you IRL to make the determination, if you were a REAL friend. Today, I am so grateful for the friends I have met on line. Truly remarkable people, who continue to help me to this day. I am still amazed at the kindness and willingness of so many people to show support and help others on line. It is a Beautiful thing.

I think you can get a feel for who is "Real" and who is not. It is what it is. I would love to have a yearly get together with ALL the people I have met on line and have a chance to talk to them in person. Now, that would be cool.

I have a couple best friends back home in Ft. Lauderdale. We talk all the time, especially with football season approaching. i miss my boys.

Thanks Shonali, for this post. May you continue to prosper, my "friend".

Al

I think we also need to be careful about gossip. Each of us is eager to learn more scoopage about that Twitter "friend" and share it with the rest. Guilty? Uh-huh, me, too. Human nature to be interested in others who hide behind the @? Probably...

Regardless, I have developed an amazing network of new friends. Not BFFs, and they don't need to be. It's up to each peep to define what that relationship means and nurture it more than just with tweets and FB posts.

Anyone who starts their post with 'fabulous guest Bill Dorman' deserves and accolade :) and a Houra!

Since I'm a foodie I look at social media friendships as two categories, fast-food drive-by relationships (you know the ones who pop in and out and don't really take the time to engage) and the better, sit-down, long dinner with friends.

Thanks for launching this discussion, which I'm sure isn't going to be over for a while.

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Long before "social media" was a buzzword and even before the world wide web was launched to the public, I telnetted to internet games hosted on academic servers -- which we collectively called MUDs, or multi-user domains. In the spirit of Tolkein, I created a character name, gained hit points by defeating demons, and gained spell points by practicing to be a wizard. It was all fictitious -- but real people were behind every character, typing commands to enter rooms and attack each other.

We may not have known anything about each other -- and may not have shared anything in common -- but we played on a common game. Is that friendship any different than the friendship Shonali might share with or jenzings or Neicolec?

But here's a question, one I constantly ask myself over and over: How do you define a friend? Is there a universal definition we can all agree? Because it is clear Facebook contorted the definition to be anyone. You send me a friend request, I say yes; and we're friends.

Friendship is beyond the word used to describe a relationship, though; and the question begs to be asked if people connected with each other on a social networking site or on a blog are truly friends -- or merely people connected with each other.

There is a difference between a friendship, a relationship, and a connection; and I am afraid some people (and many companies) confuse the terms.

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I have been astounded at the depth and level of friendships that can come from social media and blogging. While I do think the ones that go to the "next level" are the ones that go a step further than comments and tweets to Skype and in person, as Neicolec said, online friendships are a different type of relationship that allows for different dimensions to develop.

I love this post Shonali because I have written about this on the brand side before. Basing it more on lack of time and other things in our life taking precedence than lack of intent. Trust me there are many many brands we would LOVE to be friends with (thank you KenMueller ) if we truly could and have it reciprocated.

But going beyond brands to people this holds the same. I have people I truly consider my friend from the Twitter even if I haven't met them yet. Some I might broaden into my posse of people I really enjoy interacting with.

But with 'Friendship' so subjective it is definitely something to ponder. I will definitely take your 'one phone call' from the police station (I know the bailbonds system intimately...err..I mean I would call to call his), But I wonder how many people would say that about someone they met via social media.

BTW, you could totally invite yourself over for Thanksgiving dinner at my house. Would love to have you!

I have thought about this quite a bit. During more than seven years of blogging I have met or spoken with a a small number of people. It is not because I am afraid, have problems or any great secrets to protect.

Most of it comes from time constraints and being blessed with a lot of very good friends from the real world.

But I have found that opening myself up has opened new relationships and I think that it is fair to say that friendships are developing. I am grateful for that. But I don't mind doing this friendship building slowly. Feels more natural to me that way.

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I love this post, Shonali . It's nice to hear another woman (and more below) say they have only one best friend. I have lots of good friends, but only one that I really consider my best friend. As with you, she and I are always in synch no matter how long it's been since we talked, and I can always rely on her.

That said, I've also made some great online friends. They really had my back a few weeks ago. People like nemultimedia soulati jennwhinnem ginidietrich markwschaefer and dannybrownI have enjoyed meeting and getting to know these people virtually and sometimes in phone conversations. I don't know them in the same way that I know the people I see regularly in daily life or that I have a long in-person history with. I would not expect the same things from our relationship that I would from some of my off-line friends, partially because of physical proximity. On the other hand, none of my off-line friends could have had my back the way these people did.

I value these online friendships. I see them as a different type of relationship that offers different things than my offline relationships, but not necessarily any less than those. I also see them as having the potential to become deeper and turn into off-line friendships as well, if time and logistics permit. There are some dimensions to relationships that can only develop with shared, physical time together. Others, I'm finding, can only develop with shared online time together. I feel really lucky to have all those dimensions in my life.

Thanks, Shonali !

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I'm pretty sure I met you and nancymyrland about the same time and of course, through Gini. When I was still green as a boog............er, uh green as green can be. Both of you did the Good morning tweets. I responded and you did likewise but that is only half the story.

The other half is my perception of you being very proper and professional; I didn't just cut loose with my silliness right away. However, after running w/ the cricket post and letting me mix it up with my BFF skypulsemedia I knew this was a nice, comfortable, genuine place to be.

I too like to cultivate my friendships and allow them to deepen if possible. Everybody has their own story to tell and I'm genuinely interested in hearing it.

Thanks for mentioning me in your post; August must be my month. I appreciate you very much.

I don't differentiate between "online" and "real" friends. Though I've never met the proprietor of this here blog in person, if I had a personal problem I felt she would be able to hep me with I wouldn't hesitate to reach out to her. That goes for any friend I've made online. My philosophy is pretty simple. There are three types of people in this world. My friends, acquaintances I interact with and friends I haven't met yet.

I don't get in to any relationship to half-ass it. If we're going to be friends, then we're going to be friends. If we're going to be friendly, and nothing more, that's fine. Doesn't matter if it's Twitter, Facebook, or people I see in person every day.