how do you know when a relationship is over, or when you should stop trying to invest in it? mostly, friendships fulfill a specific role in one’s life, but it’s also about those specific people. so when the roles change, or those people stop being a part of one’s daily life, or the people themselves change, what is it that keeps a friendship going? for what purpose is it to be perpetuated, or at what point does it just become nostalgia? what is the point of friendship anyway?
we (especially Christians) talk about guarding our hearts when entering a relationship (especially romantic ones). this does make sense, since investing too much up front is risky if there is a high probability of the relationship breaking apart. and yet, it is impossible to have a genuine friendship without any emotional investment. such a thing would be fake, or at best just going through the motions of friendship without any of the purpose or fulfillment of one. like that C.S. Lewis quote. so how do you balance your emotional investment? how much do you risk to pursue something that may not last long?
(this is why the idea of “lasting friendships” is hard. a romantic relationship “lasting” implies that the couple ends up married and committed for a lifetime. but other friendships have no such covenant, and few are really expected to last for a lifetime (though that may be the hope), so how do you know if your investment has “paid off”? is that even a good way to look at it?)
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