Built to Last: How To Stay Friends

From young adulthood onward, our notion of that makes a good friendship changes very little, but our capacity to maintain one does. It's poignant reality; we know what it means to be aand have friends, but after we graduate from college and go our separate ways-launching our careers, getting married, having children, getting divorced, caring for aging parents-we're often unable to muster the time and energy to maintain friendships we profess to value. Like anything else in life, if we want to remain friends with someone, it requires a little work. Simply put, we must show up.

According to psychologist who studied the nature and complexity of high school "best" friends, there are four basic behaviors necessary to maintain the bond. And they hold true whether we're 17 or 70.

Communication facilitates the first two essential behaviors: self disclosure and supportiveness, both necessary for intimacy. We must be willing to extend ourselves, to share our lives with our friends, to keep them abreast of what's going on with us. Likewise, we need to listen to them and offer support.

Fortunately, studies show that physical proximity has little effect on the ability to keep a friendship in working order. Moving to another state is not the friendship death knell it once was, thanks to the web. Between email and cellphones with free long distance, we're able to stay close. Maintaining a lively email correspondence may often be as good as being there.

Interaction is the third essential in tending to a friendship. You've got to write, you've got to call, you've got to visit. Find the nearest starbucks and take time to catch up. The specific activity doesn't matter, the important thing is to interact.

The last and most elusive behavior necessary for keeping friends is being positive. Social psychologist tout the necessity of self disclosure, but that doesn't mean an unrestricted license to vent. At the end of the day, the intimacy that makes a friendship thrive must be an enjoyable one, for the more rewarding a friendship, the more we feel good about it, the more we're willing to expend the energy it takes to keep it alive.