fading friendships

I’m in San Diego today, heading home after a quick visit to check in on one of my closest friends. We spent the day working at his apartment, walking around in the beautiful weather, getting some dips and pull-ups at a local park, and then more walking. We had a lot of great conversations about our businesses, future, family, life, and more, but one specific talk stood out to me because I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately.

Fading friendships.

Throughout the conversations, we naturally reminisced about memories and experiences from the past, including people we were close with–either individually or mutually. As I’m sure you’ve experienced in your life, some relationships unfortunately fade, and sometimes it’s hard to let go of those relationships because as they fade, there really isn’t a moment that caused the relationship to change; it just fades as individuals continue to grow in different directions.

It would be easier to accept the loss of a friendship if there was a moment that caused the fallout or even a conversation that brought closure to an end (or change)--to be able to look back and know exactly why things changed would make things a lot easier.

But often, especially with meaningful friendships, there is no moment to look back on, and it’s usually one individual who does the pulling away—they don’t proactively reach out, return text messages, or are short on the phone. If you aren’t that person, it can be hard to accept the loss of a good friend.

Eventually though, you have to accept that the friendship ran its course, you each served a purpose in the other’s life, and that it’s time to stop fighting to save the friendship. The energy you are pouring into trying to save the friendship that has run its course is robbing energy from the friendships and relationships that are aligned with where you are.

Once a relationship begins to fade, there probably is little you can do to revive it, and you will be better served to accept, appreciate, and honor the friendship and then clear the space for new relationships and friendships to find you.

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See you tomorrow and keep pursuing,

JC