The Company You Keep

Prepared by Pauline in Canva

You might think that the friends you have reflect who you are. That’s why you’re friends. Right?

I suppose if you are a person who has been in the same town or area since your birth, or at least your formative years, the people you’ve got are the ones you are with, and the bonds you have with them are close.

I grew up as an army brat. That means your family gets moved around a lot. Usually, anyway. Here, there, and asunder. I’ve lived in the South, the North, the Midwest, and the East of the United States. I also lived in Norway and Germany. All before I was 21 years old.

Moving like that meant you left your friends behind. Of course, many of them were in the same boat, so we knew what to expect. Horrible heartache as you waved goodbye, and a short period of adjustment as you were relocated to a new military base. There is a common characteristic among children of military families. They make friends quickly. Lightening fast. Because in another year or two or three, one or the other of you is going to be moving again.

So, I set out in life with no roots other than my family. When I was first married, I got itchy feet after we’d been married for three years. So, that was an adjustment. You’d also think that maybe my husband and I didn’t last. We have been together for 49 years and are quite happy.

The thing is that people change over time. They just do. I sorrow when I hear of people who say the reason they are divorcing is because he or she changed. That they were just not the same person they had married. That’s sad. People change.

I think one of the keys to a successful marriage is to embrace the changes each of you make. You don’t both have to do the same things to stay in love. The love is overall. The changes and the differences between you are what make marriage interesting.

The same can be said about your friends. It took me some time to realize that, and it was a fellow psychic who pointed it out to me.

So, here I was. Normal Jane as opposed to Joe. My jobs into adulthood were mainly clerical. I had jobs in stores, but clerical jobs were more frequent. I was becoming an adult wannabe-writer who was also interested in spiritual things.

I began to read. You can consider the books you read as your friends, too. They will instruct you as a writer.

As time went on, I would read, as I’m figuring all of you did too, the stuff that came my way. I remember as a teenager a fat book, three inches thick, fell off the bottom shelf at my feet in the library. I remember I was taking a shortcut through the Dewey Decimal 200 series of books which is spirituality. In those days, nobody wanted to be caught dead talking about God or spirituality. So, it was a shortcut to some other place in the library. At 15 years old, I figured I’d best take a look at the book. It was “Autobiography of a Yogi” by Parmahansa Yogananda. I was hooked. And so, my spiritual journey began, a journey that has lasted all my life.

So, yes, books have been my friends all along. However, the people aspect, as a child, which also carried over into my time as an adult, was mostly opportunistic. My friends came from the people I hung with. As an adult, most of those friends came from work. As an older person, since I retired, my friends are coming from my neighbors, though I still have friendships from before.

However, here’s where you can be selective based on who your friends support you as a person. People everywhere are neurotic. I had a friend once, still a friend, though he has passed on. I’m a psychic channel. As I get older and more of my friends start to pass away, I can still keep in touch. Just not the same way as before. Anyway, that aside, that one friend I had was a psychotherapist. He told me once that 99% of the population in the United States is neurotic. Being neurotic myself somehow made me feel better.

You will, in your lifetime, run across people who just don’t believe in you anymore. These could be family members or your friends. My best advice? Like on a diet, add food to what you usually eat. The good stuff. The healthy stuff. So, too, with your friends. If the person who doesn’t support you at your present stage of life, because you change and so do they, gets upset with your newfound friend (and they will), you might decide to concentrate your efforts on your new friend. This new friend supports you now. The other one used you, which is okay too. I’m sure you’ve used other people, too, over time.

I think it sounds much like an underdeveloped pre-teen talking here, but it really works.

I don’t know if this is good advice or not. I’m an introvert, and it has worked for me. Oh, and what my fellow psychic friend told me? She said she has friends for all sorts of areas of her life. She has bowling friends. She has travel friends. She has neighborhood friends. She is one of the friendliest people around. She and I only touch base once a year. I treasure her advice, and I know when we talk, I am talking to a friend who understands the voices in my head.

Thanks for reading. Follow me around the internet for more fun.

🌺Pauline Evanosky🌺

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