Promoting Friendship
"Friendship makes prosperity more shining, and lessens adversity by dividing and sharing it."
The Roman author, Cicero, had no way of knowing that 2,000 years after he expressed those words, science would find solid evidence that friendship is indeed a key ingredient in the lives of the happiest — and healthiest — people.
And yet, surveys over recent decades have found that people have fewer friends than they used to, and seem to feel less close to those they have. Perhaps it's the over-scheduled, over-worked, overly-plugged-in lifestyles that squeeze friendship from busy days. Does this mean our children have fewer opportunities to learn about the importance of friendship through the example we set?
In the same way that we're often burning the candle at both ends, our kids are doing the same. Overscheduled children — homework, lessons, extra-curricular activities — enjoy fewer moments of casual friendship. Those may not be resume-building moments, but the social and developmental value is enormous when youngsters sit around with pals, chatting and laughing and developing relationships skills.
From I Just Want My Kids To Be Happy! (Late August Press, 2008) come these tips for promoting your children's friendships:
"Teach the value of friendship by welcoming your kids' friends into your home. Encourage sleepovers. When possible, include their friends in your family outings and vacations. Do more than just take the friends along: show interest in their lives and in their families and share of yourself with them ... Teach your kids that the quality of friendships matters more than the quantity; friendships with less conflict and more mutuality — shared interests, reciprocal caring, empathy, good communication — contribute to greater happiness and health than friendships rife with tension."
Two thousand years later and friendship remains a central ingredient in healthy, happy lives.