FRIENDSHIP GOALS
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Happy New Year!
At this point in January, most people are preparing their goals and resolutions for the new year, and some have even started them already. So what’s typically on the list?
Health? Absolutely. We have to take care of ourselves physically and mentally.
Finances? Yep! We gotta secure the bag and become debt free.
Relationships? No doubt. We have to pour into our partners or prepare ourselves to receive who God has for us in this new season.
And all of that is fine and dandy, but…
what about your friendssssss?
What are our friendship goals for the new year?
I don’t mean like when you search #FriendGoals on TikTok, and it returns with mostly dance videos of two best friends.
Don’t get it twisted, we love those! And we want more fun like that in the new year with our besties, but I’m digging a little deeper here.
What goal are we setting to intentionally grow closer to our friends this year?
There are two ways that I think about this:
1| Individual goals that I want to set to be a better friend.
2| Shared goals that we want to set to improve our friendship.
As we discuss both of these perspectives, I encourage you to reflect on the last year with your friends and ask yourself:
Did I show up like I should have/could have last year for my girls?
Afterward, ask yourself:
Was there something more that I needed in my friendship?
Keep these answers in mind, or jot them down to refer back to as we set you and your friends up for success with some real #FriendshipGoals!
Why Do We Need Goals For Friendship?
If you’re wondering why you need friendship goals, that mindset is partially the problem.
We don’t ever second guess why we need to give our significant others more energy, but will pump the brakes at the thought of having to do more in our friendships.
Why? Because we the people treat friends like they are products and assume that once we acquire them, they will be ours forever, or until they break.
When instead, friendships are more like plants that require attention and care.
Now if you know anything about plants (I’m no expert — I only know the little my friend teaches me) you know that some are low maintenance, while others require more consideration.
In either case, they still need to be taken care of, and here are 3 reasons why.
1| Friends add value to our lives
If you need advice, you call a friend.
If you need a shoulder to cry on, you have a friend’s shoulder.
If you want to have some fun, you get together with your friends.
If you are in need, you have a friend who is ready and willing to help.
You have a person, or a group of people, to go through life with and that you enjoy being around. Some people don’t even have family members like that, think about it.
2| Having healthy friendships can help you achieve goals in other areas of your life
Unless you have a circle of people around you who are exactly like you, then you likely have a friend group of women who bring different perspectives, experiences, skillsets, and gifts that you benefit from (as they benefit from yours as well).
You may have a friend who is good with finances, and this year you have a goal to save more money, they could help you come up with a budget.
Or maybe you’re the person who is all about health and wellness, and your friend wants to get back in the gym, you could help them with their fitness goals.
At any rate, the connections, encouragement, and accountability a friend offers to help you be successful and achieve your goals are priceless.
3| If you don’t water a plant, it will die
Hate to sound morbid here, but I want the imagery to really set in.
If you don’t put effort into a friendship that you say you care about, that friendship will come to an end. It will descend into associates, then acquaintances, and eventually strangers.
Someone you use to share your life with will feel like someone you no longer know.
And I don’t care how tough everyone pretends to be when a friendship ends, there is real grief in that loss whether people like to admit it or not.
But you’re not going to have that issue, because having even one friendship goal can keep your relationships thriving!
Individual Friendship Goals
Individual friendship goals are the things you believe you could do better or do more of in the new year.
Below are a few ideas to help you out:
Checking in with them more frequently to see how they are doing.
Planning a thoughtful gesture for them in advance.
Celebrating their wins, big or small.
Being more present when you spend time together.
Paying more attention to them and remembering important information.
Inviting a friend to hang out more.
Answering the phone a little more for your friend via call or text.
Praying for them more often.
Individual Friendship Goal Examples
Your friend is a teacher and in just a couple weeks it will be the first day of school, send them an encouraging gift like this cute mug from Amazon.
Invite your friends to join you in a running challenge or a book club.
Your friend has an important interview coming up, and you give them a call the night before to pray together.
We overlook the value of making more of an effort in our friendships, when it doesn’t take much to pour into them.
Shared Friendship Goals
Shared friendship goals are things you both agree you could be doing better or doing more of in your friendship. Let’s talk about a few.
1| Staying Connected
I don’t think I have to do a deep dive here, this is simply finding ways to talk or hang out with your friends.
Whether it’s being more active in the group chat, scheduling calls, hosting an activity, using the Marco Polo app, planning a girls trip, or meeting for a monthly brunch, it’s finding a way to be a part of each other’s lives.
It’s making a conscious effort together to say, we’re not going to let too much time pass without talking to one another.
2| Improved Conflict Resolution
I love my friends, but that doesn’t mean we don’t get on each other’s nerves or bump heads. We definitely do, and I am sure you and your girls do as well.
I’ve talked about healthy conflict resolution in depth in this post here, but the synopsis is that you have these disagreements with love, respect, and empathy.
The best time to discuss how you all should handle conflict with one another is when you’re not in the midst of conflict! So there’s no better time than now when it’s a season of new beginnings.
Now, maybe you really don’t have disagreements (or worse, arguments) with your friends and you don’t see the need for this one. If nothing else, that makes it even easier to have a conversation about it, leaving an opportunity to learn how you and your friend like to handle conflict with loved ones in general.
3| More Honesty and Vulnerability
Over the years, something has happened that has made us more guarded and somewhat secretive, even with our best friends.
We stopped sharing our lives outside of what we post on social media, stopped communicating when something was wrong, and even stopped disclosing if something really amazing happened.
I believe many reasons have caused this change, but two that stick out to me are not wanting your friends to worry about you or wanting to go through a process privately in the event it’s unsuccessful.
Somewhere down the line, you or your friend stopped believing the other person was a safe space, and that you could no longer be your authentic selves with one another, and decided to go at it alone.
But we have not been designed to go through life alone.
If something happened that broke the trust that has caused either of you to become more reserved, then the goal there would be to do the work to restore it.
But if nothing transpired, and the anxieties of life have caused you to create an untrue narrative about your friend, then the goal is to be honest with yourself and your friend about it.
Being honest about our regular human experiences creates a deep bond among friends because of the relatability, the support, and the trust you cultivate with one another.
Okay, so you get it now. We need goals for our friendships for them to grow, elevate, and thrive.
We need to find a way to show up better in our friendships and express our love in action.
We need to work together to keep our relationships genuine and ensure it honors both individuals in the friendship.
And we need to be intentional about placing the proper value on the friends who add so much goodness to our lives.
In this new year, what is one goal you believe will benefit your friendships? I’d 🫶🏽 to hear it in the comment box below!
