Having and maintaining good friendships is not easy. As well, it’s always better to have a few, or even one solid good friendship, than a hundred bad ones. Be the type of friend that you want. And care about your friendships so they last and stay strong. All friendships need a certain amount of love and dedication. It takes a certain amount of work for anything worthwhile. I decided to write a list of five things that it takes to be a good friend. 

Here’s the list:

1. Effort

As I’ve written before, effort cost nothing, and it’s one of the biggest ways of showing and expressing your love someone. Showing effort doesn’t mean that you have to buy gifts or be a people pleaser. On the contrary, putting effort into things simply means you’re doing whatever you’re doing for someone, but from a good place, and from your heart. You can do the same things for people with effort or without, but you’ll get the maximum results if you put effort into it. For many people, the easier path or way is usually the preferred choice, but it’s not necessarily the choice that will let your partner know how much you care. People can tell the difference of when you’re putting effort into things or not, and if you don’t put enough effort into things, they’ll likely feel as if you didn’t really care about doing them in the first place.

2. Good Communication

When it comes to having a friend or even when it comes to any relationship for that matter, knowing how to communicate your feelings is everything. The lack of communication that many relationships and friendships have is what usually brings turbulence, problems, and arguments. You never have to agree with someone on every subject matter or on anything really. You can have your own opinions and tastes, and they can be very different from even a best friend. What’s important is how you communicate your feelings and your opinions. You should never be controlling or determined to change the way that someone thinks. It’s important to be yourself, and to share your feelings and opinions, but you should be accepting and loving enough to your friend to listen to, and acknowledge their views and opinions as well. Developing better communication would be the best sound advice I’d give to any couple or friendship if they have hopes on improving things.

3. Honesty and Trust

There are a tremendous amount of people that have friends that they lie to on a daily basis. Despite how big those lies are, they’re still lies, even if they’re white lies. I can guarantee you one thing. If lying is a part of your friendship whether on your part or your friend’s, you’re likely not that good of friends. It’s important to be able to trust your friend, and know that they can trust you as well. Trust and honesty are two main foundations for any relationship in life.

4. Being a Good Listener

Being a good listener is a very important quality when it comes to having healthy friendships. No one wants to be around people that dominate the conversations too much, and seem to only want to hear themselves talk. It’s important to listen to what others have to say. When doing so, you’ll learn a lot more than by simply listening to yourself speak over and over. You already have the knowledge within yourself that you want to speak about. It’s important to keep learning and growing by listening to how others feel, and to other people’s views. Half of knowing how to communicate is being a good listener, so you’ll never be a great communicator or develop great communication with someone if you’re the only one doing the talking.

5. Love

Love is the answer to probably every must-have list that’s ever been created. Putting love into anything and everything you do is essential if you want the best outcome. Being understanding, sensitive, and comforting are all qualities provoked by love. Being dedicated, and all of the other things listed in this article are also all involving love. It’s important to do everything in life out of a pure place in your heart, and without having any ulterior motives. Another great quality provoked by love is being selfless, and any person in this world, including a friend or any relationship that you might be in will be better when you’re giving and selfless.

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Anne Cohen

Founder, Owner, Writer, and Editor at Anne Cohen Writes

Anne Cohen is an entrepreneur, as well as a lifestyle and relationship writer based in Los Angeles, CA. She started writing on arcwrites.blogspot.com and shortly after created AnneCohenWrites.com. She has contributed to various publications including The Huffington Post, Elite Daily, and many more. She's passionate about love, living a healthy lifestyle, writing, chess, and more than anything, her two kids.

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