Friendship is an illusion created to help us find people who have enough mutual things with us to bond with us and form a faction that is seemingly based on emotions and intersecting thought processes, hence creating a mini-society that insures the survival of our social instincts.
We are social species by design, and we always crave to build a grand territory that we call civilization.
Every civilization constitutes its legends, heroes, traditions, and beliefs in order to separate itself from others and fortify its bonds within itself.
Friendship works the same way on a smaller scale.
You collect those who share thoughts, emotions, desires, and possessions (Not necessarily the complete set of each thing, but enough to assure yourself of compatibility) and you create a "faction" that shares handshakes, jokes, hangouts, news, and interests that are partially unique to them...that is to separate them from other groups and make them "besties" within.
Every once in a while, an opportunity to merge two or more groups of friends presents itself.
The exchanging of questions and answers about trends, knowledge, likes and dislikes determines the success rate of the merger.
The merger has an unspoken law that the big group might be friends, but each small group can't share everything with the other.
The same concept is applied on a smaller scale when one individual wishes to enter a group...but in a simpler yet more picky fashion.
An individual can be an intersection point of two or more groups, and that can sometimes jeopardize the position of that individual in the groups as a whole.
And since competition is one of the main characteristics of a social species, a group will always try to be more "socially shiny" than the other.
Nowadays (due to our superior emotional intellect resulting from evolution), we can't notice ourselves doing that in action, but sometimes we actually plan it.
Both ways, and intersecting individual will always have to make a choice...To choose to cut his attachments short.
Which ones to cut?
This move occurs when you are at school, university, and even work...anywhere, anytime.
That is what we define now as "Losing social weight".
Anyone or any group that forms an obstacle to social and psychological upgrades is usually deleted.
Presently (again due to our emotional intellect), our minds create an automated plan that contains a sequence of actions and thoughts that create a devastation that results in the inevitable conclusion of cutting strings off with a group or an individual.
You think that you never did that? You think it was never done to you?
Okay..
When was the last time someone close "changed"?
When was the last time someone told you "You changed"?
When was the last time you felt like a stranger with a "close friend"?
When was the last time you didn't feel normal or good with a friend?
When was the last time you didn't feel comfortable talking to or seeing someone who you consider a friend?
When was the last time you stopped returning calls, texts, and hangout invitations?
When was the last time a close someone/group ignored you for a long while?
We call it "maturing", and we make it sound like a big deal...but it is just developing and rooting into society and the social game.
Friendship is a social and psychological remedy to aid in reducing the chances of negative insanity.
The voice in your head won't be a satisfying companion all the time.
Your preoccupations won't immerse you long enough.
Your mind created friendship just for that.
Your mind made it so real that -to you- it is undoubtedly authentic and true.
The truth is, if you grind your relationships to fine dust...you won't find a speck of it that has no component of social and/or psychological advantage or benefit.
The only friends that can develop with you through life with minimal chances of needing to separate to find a better suit are the ones you bond with before any of you develop real and/or long term desires, interests, and/or societal aspirations...this period is usually the period before puberty.
After that period you have sexual desires, social desires, materialistic desires, romantic desires, amplified anger, amplified need for ecstasy, amplified sense of purpose, amplified need for certainty, amplified selfishness, and the longing to be in control of yourself and everything (and usually everyone).
With all that in the equation, forming an authentic bond is all about smoke and mirrors.
Why am I writing this?
It's a message of what you call "hope".
I'm assuring you that you are not worthless, that you aren't determined by your friends, that you were/are/will be an important step for a lot of people.
Sometimes they climb the ladder through you in a brief day, sometimes in a week, sometimes in a year, sometimes in a decade.
They needed your existence for some time.
You enjoyed it.
You enjoyed that they seemingly enjoyed it.
You felt how real it is. (you have your mind to thank for that)
You fantasized about possibilities that kept your quality of life relatively prosperous.
You now know that it's okay to feel the need to cut someone off, and you know that you can be cut by anyone at any given point...neither situations should break you.
I'm not immune to this system, hence I can't shield myself from it except if I refrain from contacting human beings.
I'm not ready for that yet.
I'm only armed with the ability to understand the consequences of playing the social game, which is why I try as much as possible not to play it..but I'm only human.
P.S: Romantic bonds operate under a very similar, yet more powerful system of mind tricks and decisions...So don't be harsh on yourself or others.
Thank you for reading all of this; I hope I have provoked your thought more than your indifference, boredom, discontent, and/or anger.