'Lebaran': A time to build and revive friendship

'Lebaran': A time to build and revive friendship

By Santi W.E. Soekanto

JAKARTA (JP): For many people, Lebaran, a holiday which marks the end of the fasting month of Ramadhan, is mainly about forgiveness and friendship.

Moslems here cherish the day for its religious significance, and see it as a time for relief and spiritual liberation after a month of self-denial and purification.

This condition then enables them to "advance" and help others achieve similar liberation; thus, they forgive and seek forgiveness in the traditional rite of halal bihalal.

Still other Moslems see it as the best time to show love for a beloved, and to revive familial relationships and friendships.

As the Koran points out, innamal mu'minuuna ihwah or "the believers are but a single brotherhood," (Sura Al Hujurat 49;10). Lebaran, popularly known also as Idul Fitri, is indeed the best time to contemplate on friendship.

For busy Jakartans, especially those trapped in the professional rat-race, this should also be a good time to pause and even redefine what friendship is.

It's no secret that many adults, after they become engaged in various competitions, forget what it's like to have close friends.

We pigeonhole the people we encounter into distant colleagues, stiff competitors, mere acquaintances and people who can help us get ahead.

But we forget about friends, much less best friends.

Cahyono, an engineer who has been working in an environmental assessment agency for seven years, took a long time to digest the question "who's your best friend now?"

"There's Luki, a fellow engineer. We go on assignments together," Cahyono explained. He was stupefied, however, when asked to describe his friendship with Luki.

The two men have never engaged in light banter, never back- slapped, or even gone to a football game together. They are usually restricted to discussions about the office.

For people who think that gender is the reason why Cahyono could not describe any emotional exchange going on between him and his supposed best friend, there's Runi.

The legal officer of a major holding company in Jakarta admitted she left behind warm, friendly girl talks and close friends, when she left college.

"I used to have this best friend, who cried with me every time I hurt...now, I'm afraid of being that close to people because I don't want them to see that I have weaknesses," she said.

"I can't break down in front of someone at work, no matter how long we have been working together," she said. "That would amount to career suicide."

So Runi endures self-imposed loneliness and alienation because she can't risk opening up and being vulnerable.

This Lebaran, however, Runi plans to visit her former best friend and to find out whether they can revive their friendship, despite changes brought about by growth and development.

Pillars of friendship

Many experts have recognized gender differences in a person's experience of friendship. Studies found that men's friendship more commonly tend to be "thing" or "activity-oriented", built around doing things together.

Friendship between women, in contrast, involves more affectionate behavior and more disclosure of confidences. They are more "person-oriented".

But why limit ourselves? Regardless of our sex, every one of us should be able to experience the rich, satisfying friendship at any stage of our life.

Most experts pointed out that certain factors or needs are basic to our functioning if we are to achieve mental and emotional good health. They form some of the pillars of friendship, and friends can help each other achieve these basic needs.

* The first need is acceptance. In order to have good self- esteem and function well, we must first accept ourselves as we are, not as we think we should be.

It also involves loving ourselves unconditionally. If we are to grow and move toward reaching our potential as human beings, then unconditional love is essential.

While we need to accept ourselves "warts and all", we need to also have that kind of acceptance from our friend. In addition, we also need to ask ourselves, how well do we accept our friend? How well do we encourage our friend to accept himself?

* The second need is affirmation. It is a means of building ourselves up in a constructive way, and giving ourselves positive input. We must first accept and then affirm ourselves, thus undoing a lot of damage we have accumulated through life.

By being positive we can begin to feel differently about ourselves and begin to act differently. We can then help our friend to progress too.

* The third need is appreciation. Boy, do we need to be appreciated!

Each one of us needs to learn to appreciate all the positive qualities, gifts, strengths and inner resources we have. "To acknowledge a strength is to give ourselves permission to use it, and ultimately to make it grow," a writer once said.

Appreciation of oneself and other people leads to a deeper appreciation of life itself, including the universe and all that it contains. So, how much do we appreciate ourselves and our friends?

* The fourth pillar is attitude which helps to shape feelings and actions.

Remember the story of two people with a glass which is either "half empty" or "half full"? A positive attitude leads to constructive actions, and worrying is replaced by "a problem to be solved". Difficulties become "challenges to be overcome", failures become "growth steps to learn from" and life itself becomes "a source of never-ending chances to reach one's potential".

What is our attitude toward our friend? Is it positive? Do we create the right climate in our friendship in which it is easy for our friend to have a positive attitude?

Listening

The need for friends to listen to one another is very important. Writer Michael Ende, who is famous for his book The Neverending Story, wrote in another book of his, Momo, about the beauty of a person's listening skills.

Ende's Momo is a small vagrant who suddenly appeared in a deserted amphitheater and soon became the center of the village's life because she listened when most people rushed in and only wanted to talk.

She listens so carefully that she can hear the songs of the sky, the chimes of the bell of "time", and the seemingly meaningless babbles of babies and old people.

She once even made a bird, which had been silent for weeks, sing again simply by sitting next to its cage while listening to its silence.

Momo, the paragon of life's supreme values, is rich because she has time to patiently explore all the richness of life together with her friends.

In this hectic life, we don't have enough time to listen to everyone's sorrow and misery, and share their laughter and happiness.

But a friend deserves just that from us this, and we deserve it from a friend.

Santi W.E. Soekanto is a graduate of the School of Psychology, University of Indonesia.