As we get older, relationships, especially friendships, become a bit more complex. Instead of wondering why your friend didn’t share their snack with you at recess or why your best friend broke your favorite crayon, we now have to worry if our friends like us, or if we are in the right relationships with the right people.
Relationships are meant to be this complex, because if that wasn’t the case, everyone would be in a good mood all the time, and that, quite frankly, won’t ever happen. So, drawing back to my previous statement, why are relationships so complex as we get older?
To start off, friendships cannot happen if morals are not aligned. If you are someone who doesn’t value honesty as much as your friend, then the relationship might not work out as well as you had hoped. This is because our morals shape who we are as individuals. They are what makes us each unique to ourselves. Friendships can end up very complicated and messy if you don’t value the same traits as someone else.
One of the biggest factors that contributes to complicated friendships is the intense shift in proximity. When you are in K-12 education, friendships are created because students are forced into daily proximity through their classes or extracurriculars. However, after you head home for the day, you have the option to hang out with friends outside of school. In college, that idea shifts dramatically. In college, you live with friends, dine with friends, and take classes with them. Being in close contact with them all the time can lead to more conflicts. Sometimes, the closeness can be too much and you need to divert back to yourself.
Not only is there a dramatic shift in proximity, but there is also a sense of decreased structure. For many college students, this is the first time in their life where they are not under parental supervision. There is no one telling them where they need to be and what they need to do. This makes structure within one’s life more loose, meaning that college students need to be more deliberate about scheduling time with friends. In K-12, this was so much easier because our parents were helping us make plans with friends. Now, we need to deliberately set up time to hang out with them.
Friendships can end up being more complex due to academic and life stressors. Once you enter college, there are more academic stressors than in K-12, like having to write ten page papers or do 50 pages of reading per night. This can put a strain on friendships, because stress affects our emotions in intense ways. This also makes people more distant because of constantly needing to catch up on work or resting throughout the day to gain motivation. This is completely normal for most individuals, and just requires taking breaks and distancing yourself to get your life back together.
People also come to college expecting to form “tight knit” bonds and communities, however, sometimes that is over-glorified, especially in Hollywood movies. This is known to be such an unrealistic standard and can cause many anxieties when people’s real life experiences don’t match that vision. It is totally normal to only have a few close friends. Trying to form close bonds with many people will only overwhelm you and cause you to make connections that are complex and don’t make sense.
Overall, there are many more reasons why relationships can be more complex as we get older, especially when in college. However, I think the biggest thing to take away from this is to find people that lift you up and support you through everything. Other solutions are to keep your circle small and morally aligned. Once you do these things, your relationships with friends will improve and you’ll end up being the best version of yourself.
