Sometimes we get so busy with our lives that we don't realize the people we have inadvertently left behind or what they meant to us. When someone forgets about you, or ends what may have been a lifelong friendship, you don't exactly feel too good about yourself. Friendships aren't designed to fade. Each connection you make with someone, whether they be a stranger on the train or the person who sits in the cube next to yours, is unique and significant. It is a means of relating to another human being, drawing inspiration from them, receiving support, and reciprocating those same things back to them.
Many years ago, when I was living in the early teen years of angst, I lived by this quote that would help me get through the copious amounts of friends I was making and losing – I moved a lot as a kid, and need I remind you again, teen angst – "The only people you need in your life are the ones that need you in theirs.” The equivalent of not making someone a priority in your life if you are only an option in theirs. These days, however, I find this mentality to be backwards. You don't only need the people that supposedly need you back. Sometimes you long for the attention of someone you have lost touch with, someone you haven't talked to in months, or years. If we spent our whole lives taking the back seat in a relationship just because we didn’t feel like a ‘priority’ I am sure that it would lead to regrets. Sometimes you have to step up and make the first move, try to reconnect with that person, bring that friendship (or whatever kind of -ship it is) back to life.
Change is inevitable and always will be, but sometimes we find that special person who survives those changes and is there through thick and thin. And sometimes we don't. Sometimes we are lucky enough to have many friends that care about us and support us in our decisions. And then sometimes we come across certain people that are part of our lives for some amount of time, only to get lost in their own problems and realities. Whatever the case may be, the time you spent with those people (whether it was a thread of messages on Facebook or a series of phone conversations) was a life-changer, an eye-opener. You lost touch with those people. You miss those people. You want to reconnect with those people. So do it.
The truth of the matter is that life as we know it is changing. Things are always changing, almost as fast as everything stays the same. Time is running out, that is no secret. The secret is how to utilize that time to its fullest, how not to waste it. The only time we waste is the time we spend thinking we are alone. But we are not alone. No matter what, there is always that one person, the one you lost touch with, waiting for your call, text, message. It feels good to be remembered. Someone you haven't talked to in a while was thinking about you. Or maybe you are thinking about someone with whom you would like to be friends with again, someone you miss. Well, we don't miss what we don't care about, so go and reconnect with that person. See how they're doing, tell them you've been thinking about them, and see what it does for you. If worse comes to worst, you might get a lifelong friendship out of it ;)
