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"Friendly Fire"

Recently my friend and I had a terrible fight. Well, less of a fight and more of a difficult dialogue. Words were said that may or may not have been what each of us meant. Thoughts were shared that were deep and painful and overly truthful. Feelings were hurt. And the relationship seemed at an impasse.

I hate it when this happens.

To me, in a simplified form of hope, friendships symbolize getting beyond the difficulties of life and finding comfort between others. And we all are others to everyone. As much as we may be tied to one another in family, friendship, work, community, and other forms of relationships, we are all someone other to someone else. Relationships therefore are built upon, and sometimes rendered apart, by allowing ourselves to communicate beyond the most simplistic of communications and delve deeper into each others' humanity.

So when a friendship, or other type of relationship, becomes difficult, it can cut deep into our everyday soul. When my friend and I were arguing back and forth and neither was really hearing the other, try as we might, my soul was breaking. There were parts of me that wanted to retaliate in negative ways; there were other parts of me that wanted to walk away and never have contact again; and there were others parts of me that wanted to make an effort that went beyond what I might think I would do for or with anyone else. To keep this friendship I was going to have to let down my secure walls, let my friend inside my soul even more than ever, allow myself to be completely vulnerable, and trust that this friendship was worth more to me than petty differences of the day.

This wasn't easy. And it never is. What I've learned over the years is that friendships come and go. Although when I was younger I used to believe in friendships that lasted all of my life, the reality is that most of them do have a beginning, middle, and an end. People move away; they change; they grow; sometimes they die; sometimes they live differently than could have been imagined. And so it comes with experience that I've learned that friendships really only continue when we work on them. Not just working on the friendship itself, or trying to get the other person to understand or change behaviors, but also by working on ourselves and offering more to the other and the friendship than previously thought possible.

After much heated discussion, my friend and I took some important time out and then planned to meet up. When we did, we were each ready to confront the friendship's problems head on, while also each acknowledging that we had work to do. We laid our souls barer than each thought we could or would. We didn't necessarily resolve all of our differences; and, frankly, we can't because we will always be different people, just like we all are an other to one another. But we worked on overcoming those differences, and each decided that our friendship was important enough to keep it going and to keep working on it and see it through.

In politics, we often have situations that arise where we end up fighting among friends and colleagues. This can occur even when we each have the same goal in the long run. There is always an election around every corner, or an issue at City Hall, or a controversy in a community; and we will never have the same response or attitude or thoughts towards the best outcome and the easiest way to get there. Democracy is all about recognizing that there are differences of opinion and finding the resolution that suits the most of the full group. Our American democracy also takes great strides to hear from those who don't have the majority thought in popularity, but who still have important thoughts to share. It's all very hard to do, and takes a great deal of work, compromise, hope, civility, and many difficult dialogues.

We can all get very angry and upset over our differences of opinion. We can fight hard for our beliefs and often end up saying things that we may have not meant or mean things that we didn't say. As with friendships, politics itself is full of complications and decisions on whether to keep working on our relationships with each other. We can try our best to delve deep into ourselves and bring out the best in us and each other; or we can do something inherently different. There is no particular right answer for what comes next in friendship or politics. But the path we lead, and the growth we strive for, as individuals and a community, serve as a model for how we deal with the difficulties associated with bridging the differences between each other.