A man of many talents, I am going to take a crack at a non-political article for once and attempt to write about personal matters. This came out of the necessity because I got into a fight with a friend of mine. This was something I wasn't ready for.

People do love talking about the complex aspects of teenage romance. And I have had my share of interesting stories in that department.

But nothing really prepared me for how difficult friends could be.

The hardest thing for me is finding people I can be myself with; I have often seen myself as someone who is forced to change their personality based on the people I'm with. This is due to a variety of reasons, mainly because I am insecure to the point of being afraid that the person I really am is not interesting.

However, when I do find someone that I spend enough time with I do end up becoming who I normally am, where I can open up about my real interests, and the two of us can talk for hours without getting bored... that makes me feel alive.

And then, it doesn't take long for me to screw it up.

A big reason for my loneliness is my own insecurities which cause me to alienate people I do choose to open up to. It doesn't matter how long we've been friends, I worry too much. Does he think I'm boring? Does she think I'm ugly? Does this person consider me part of their group or am I just a guest?

And as flawed as I am, other people are not perfect either. Sometimes I am right to worry about the degree of care with which a person feels about me. My "best" friends have yet to read one of my Odyssey articles despite me sharing them all the time.

And little things like that do add up, and they hurt. But one of the most important lessons I learned is that nobody will act the way you want them to, even if they are your best friends.

You have to recognize yourself as a flawed, imperfect person. Nobody is truly perfect. And understand that your friends have learned to look past your flaws, they love you in spite of them. So it's only fair to pay it forward and love them back, in spite of their flaws.

Accept that you will fight, accept that things may get bad, but love.

Love is at the root of everything, love or the absence of love is what drives each of our decisions.

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