▶ Your Answer :
Some people might say that we can be
happier when we make many new friends easily than we maintain friendships with
a few number of people in the long term. They believe that we can improve a quality
of our lives with a variety of people. However, in my opinion, the ability to
keep friendships with a small number of people over long time is more important
than one of making a lot of new friends easily. There are two reasons for my statement.
First of all, friends over a long period of
time can understand each of us much better than strangers. To be more specific,
they can listen our stories that are not easy to say to other people and give
us some advices in easier ways. As an example, I will refer to my personal
experience. When I was a high school student before entering university, I failed
in getting admission to a university where I really wanted to go. I felt so
complicated emotions at those moments and I had difficulty in talking about the
matter to other people. However, I have a friend who has been my friend since I
was an elementary school students. He was the only one for me to talk about my
matter and I had overcome my complex emotions in talking with him. In this
regard, old friend can contribute more to our happiness than new strangers.
Also, most people are likely to get stress
when they are in situations with new and unfamiliar people. This is because
they should be more considerate and thoughtful in building relationships with
others at the beginning. Korean Psychology Institute surveyed 1,000 adults in
order to determine whether or not they feel any negative emotions in situations
with new and unfamiliar people. 576 of them were seen to feel nervous in
unconscious ways and other 328 adults were also under stresses. 92% of participants
answered that they couldn’t act as they are when they were with other
unfamiliar people. Therefore, we would be better to be with old friends rather
than new people in order to be happy.
To sum up, old friends can understand us
better than new people and most people get stresses when they are with new
people. For these reasons, to maintain friendships with a few number of people
over a long time is more necessary to be happy than to make many new friends
easily.
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