Does friendship have a purpose?

Friendship. It shouldn't have a purpose, but should just be a connection between two people, right?

Many of us associate the idea of a purpose when it comes to people as being either too utilitarian, or in some way manipulative. Isn't having a purpose in a friendship akin to using someone to gain something beneficial?

According to The School of Life, no. This website states that, "the more we define what a friendship might be for, the more we can focus in on what we should be doing with every person in our lives – or indeed the more we can helpfully conclude that we shouldn’t be with them at all."

Furthermore, they identify five possible purposes we might subconsciously or consciously be trying to accomplish with various friendships.

The first is networking. In this vast world, we need collaborators. And they need us. In the ancient Greek story, The Argonauts, for example, Jason, the heroic captain, networked in order to assemble a band of friends to set sail with him on the Argo in search of the Golden Fleece. Networking indeed can serve a valiant purpose. It permitted the captain to accomplish his goal of setting forth in search, and gave his sailing companions a sense of some important mission.

Second, friendship can often serve the purpose of offering reassurance. Acquaintances and people whom we only know superficially or in their capacity in certain roles, do not allow us to fully reveal our humanness--fears, doubts, disappointments, confusion. A reassuring friend can provide that much needed sounding board and confirm that we are no better or worse than other humans in this regard of experiencing life's less than positive thoughts. Note, though, that the role of the friend is to lift up, not add to the worries and doubts and negativity.

Third, friendship can serve the purpose of providing us with good old fun! All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, as the adage goes. With whom can you be absolutely silly? I have a group of friends who get together once a month just to play a raucous game of Shanghai Rummy. We smack talk and laugh ourselves silly, and it certainly isn't about the game or who wins. We grumble about the cards not going our way, or give a hard time to the person who seems to have bought too many cards, and we leave feeling uplifted because we've had such a silly time together. I wouldn't be nearly as whole a person without this kind of an outlet in my life.

Fourth, a friend can often assist with clarification. We feel anxious, but aren't sure what's going on. Or perhaps we are trying to think through a complex issue. A good friend can help us think more clearly. They aren't invested in the outcome, so they can help us see more logically and less emotionally about things, as well as more positively! At these times, we don't need a Debbie Downer trying to warn us about how awful things might get!

The fifth purpose that School of Life states is about holding onto the past. Old school chums, friends from places where we used to live, things of this nature can serve as reminders of important past events.  However, this kind of friend serves a much more limited role in our lives.

School of Life proposes that we get clear on the purpose(s) of our various friendships, because, in their words, "One side-effect of getting a bit more precise about what we’re trying to do with our social lives is that we’re likely to conclude that, in many cases, we are spending time with people for no truly identifiable reason. These proto-friends share none of our professional ambitions or interests; they aren’t reassuring and may indeed be secretly really very excited by the possibility of our failure; we can’t be cathartically silly around them and they aren’t in the least bit interested in furthering our or their path to self-knowledge. They are – like so many of the people in our social lives – simply in our orbit as a result of an unhappy accident we have been too sentimental to correct."

While this might seem a bit harsh, in these days of social media where "friending" and "unfriending" someone is clicking on a button on the computer, I think it is a valid point. I know too many people who think they have friends on social media, but are any of them people you could call in the middle of the night to help weather a crisis? Do any of them actually care beyond clicking a "like" or thumbs up button?

School of Life concludes, "We should dare to be a little ruthless. Culling acquaintances isn’t a sign that we have lost belief in friendship. It’s evidence that we are getting clearer and more demanding about what a friendship could be."

Perhaps someone you have considered to be a friend for a long time has done this culling recently, and you find yourself on their editing cutting floor. Or perhaps you have done this to someone. Rather than despair at the loss, be grateful that you are now free to move on and stop wasting time in a friendship that no longer serves a good purpose for both of you. And rest assured that there are others who will come into your life, and now you will have the time and energy to spend on a mutually beneficial relationship.

Soon, in our Torah, we will be reminded to choose life and not death. This isn't just a literal command concerning physical life and death; it also pertains to choosing positivity rather than a view which steeps in constant gloom, despair, and negativity.

In this week's Torah portion, V'etchanan, we find Moses continuing his review of the Torah story, describing the exodus from Egypt and the giving of the Torah on Har Sinai. He declares these as unprecedented events in human history. Moses says, “Has there ever occurred this great thing, or has the likes of it ever been heard? Did ever a people hear the voice of G!d speaking out of the midst of the fire . . . and live? . . . You were shown...”

This is the ultimate story of a relationship with a positive purpose. The Hebrews parted ways with a life of hardship in Egypt that did not serve their higher purpose. Only by severing that relationship and striking out into the unknown could they find their truer, deeper, more meaningful life purpose as a people. They stumbled and wandered aimlessly at times, questioned, grumbled, and often lost their joy and their vision. It was all a part of their learning process. At the end of the day, they were better for having made the break and moving on.