"E" Is For Encouragement: Friendship Is Encouragement

Wisdom Nugget: "Correction does much, but encouragement does more." - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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In the Greek, the word "encourage" means "to call to one's side, to comfort, to console, to strengthen." To encourage is to inspire another with courage. Words of encouragement have a way of working as a panacea for someone hurting, depressed or going through pain. The way it feels if one takes a pain reliever when he/she has a headache or feels pain in any part of the body and after a while, relief from the pain comes is the same way FRIENDSHIP should make us feel. It may seem irrelevant  at the time but a while later, the effect is felt. It may just be the solution to a dying soul.

Encouragement is crucial to edify and nurture others because life can be discouraging at times. So are you a source of encouragement to your friends, family, spouse, children, colleagues etc?

William Arthur Ward said, "Flatter me, and I may not believe you. Criticize me, and I may not like you. Ignore me, and I may not forgive you. Encourage me, and I will not forget you." Encouragement acknowledges the fears that people have as real, and emboldens them despite those fears. A single word of encouragement can illuminate one's life.

During a practice session for the Green Bay Packers, things were not going well for Vince Lombardi's team. Lombardi singled out one big guard for his failure to "put out". It was a hot, muggy day when the coach called his guard aside and levelled his awesome vocal guns on him, as only Lombardi could. "Son, you are a lousy football player. You're not blocking, you're not tackling, and you're not putting out. As a matter of fact, it's all over for you today, go take a shower." The big guard dropped his head and walked into the dressing room. 45 minutes later, when Lombardi walked in, he saw the big guard sitting in front of his locker still wearing his uniform. His head was bowed and he was sobbing quietly. Vince, ever the changeable but always the compassionate warrior, did something of an about face that was also typical of him. He walked over to his football player and put his arms around his shoulder. "Son," he said, "I told you the truth. You are a lousy football player. You're not blocking, you're not tackling, and you're not putting out. However, in all fairness to you, I should have finished the story. Inside of you, son, there is a great football player, and I'm going to stick by your side until the great football player inside of you has a chance to come out and assert himself." With these words, Jerry Kramer straightened up and felt a great deal better. As a matter of fact, he felt so much better he went on to become one of the all-time greats in football and was recently voted the all-time guard in the first 50 years of professional football.

It's okay to correct and point out errors to people; but, it will amaze you how just one act of encouragement can change one's life  for good. Jerry would have become so depressed at what his coach said to him, his sense of confidence could have been shattered and he may have gone on to committing suicide. He must have felt worthless. The things we say or do to our friends, can spur them on to greatness, fulfill destiny or make them give up altogether.We must see the essence of encouraging even the smallest efforts. It could be a smile, a hug,  a note, or even a pat on the back or just saying well done! Encourage someone today. Let your action take the noose off someone's neck.

Wisdom Nugget: And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works,...but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.

"I" Is For Influence: Your Friends Influence You

Wisdom Nugget: "Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity."

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"The first time you say something, it's heard. The second time, it's recognized, and the third time it's learned" - John C. Maxwell

Influence is the capacity to have an effect on the character, development, or behavior of someone or something, or the effect itself. Someone said once that, "your life will be a sum total of the books you read and the friends you keep."

In any relationship you experience either of the following:
(a) CORRUPTION: "Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners, and  "...a companion of fools shall be destroyed."  Or,
(b)  PROMOTION: "He that walks with wise men shall be wise."

If you do not desire the influence someone will bring into your life, then do not make them your friend because, like it or not, FRIENDSHIP IS INFLUENCE. Have you noticed how an individual enters a new neighborhood and after sometime he begins to speak with their accent? That is called "Influence". As long as you fraternize with people, you must gradually begin to dress like them, talk like them, behave like them, and think like him.

As a young boy I grew up in a  poor neighborhood in Warri. Violence, crime and drugs were a very common sight. It was therefore only natural for me to very early in life find myself lost in alcohol and smoking. I knew it was a very dangerous path to follow in life, but it was my reality and I did not know any better. I particularly wondered then why people loved smoking. That stuff was so bitter in my mouth that each time I smoked it was horrible. But I needed to belong and all my friends smoked so who am I to change the rules? How would I flow with my guys if I didn't do what they did? It took a lot for me to be delivered from that gory past.

It was John C. Maxwell that said, "We choose what attitudes we have right now. And it's a continuing choice." It's a choice to influence or be influenced by other peoples attitudes. Every single character we display today are as a result of our interaction at different points in our lives with the so many people we have come across; our parents, siblings, friends, classmates, co-workers etc.

What kind of influence do you want to have on your friends, CORRUPTION or PROMOTION? Understand first that you can only give what you have. So, it behoves on us to conciously and deliberately decide to influence people positively...There are no accidental successes, decide TODAY!

Let some someone be able to make references years after you've parted ways and testify how their lives improved after they met you.

Good Friendships Are Inspiring

Wisdom Nugget: A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.

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According to Charles Spurgeon, there are 4 kinds of friends in your life : those who subtract, those who divide, those who add and those who multiply you. On a broader scale, there are two kinds of friends, those who inspire you and those who expire you.

In the School of Relationship , Lesson 101 says, "Wealth will bring you many friends, but become poor and your friends will leave you. Many people are nice to a generous person. Everyone wants to be friends with someone who gives gifts."

Summary is "Most people will befriend you because of what they hope to gain, not because of what they can give."

These are called "fair weather friends". However Lesson 201 adds that, "Real Friends love through all kinds of weather, and families stick together in all kinds of trouble(adversity)."
Have you been there ?

In fact  CS Lewis submits that, "Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another, 'What! You too? I thought I was the only one !"

Truth is, life often deals us blows such that we feel like failures. At such times, you feel your efforts have been in vain and that you have wasted your time. What does the future hold? You wonder. There is no future, it's so dark you can't see a single ray of hope ... And David said "when my heart is overwhelmed: lead me to the rock that is higher than I." i.e. at such time you do not need sinking sand; you don't need to sink down the pits of despair. You need a rock (an inspiring friend) that is higher than you (at that time) that can lift you up from your miry clay and "talk you through the storm". Real friends inspire you to do what you, otherwise cannot do. They challenge your possibilities and bring out the best in you. They are quick to say "Yes you can !"
 "I'm so depressed and I can't get any dates," the 300-pound man told his minister. "I've tried everything to lose weight."
"I think I can help," said the minister. "Be dressed and ready to go tomorrow at 8 a.m."
Next morning, a beautiful woman in a skin-tight exercise suit knocked on the man's door. "If you can catch me, you can have me," she said, as she took off. He huffed and puffed after her. This routine went on every day for the next five months. The man lost 115 pounds and felt confident that he would catch the woman the next day. That morning he whipped open his front door and found a 300-pound woman in a jogging suit waiting for him. "The minister said to tell you," she began, "that if I can catch you, I can have you."

Gloria Naylor wrote: "we cannot tell the exact moment a friendship is formed; as in filling a vessel drop by drop, there is at last a drop which makes it run over; so in a series of kindnesses, there is at last one that makes the heart run over.

Remember: "A friend loveth at all times, and a brother is born for adversity."

A Friend Knows All, And Loves You Still

Wisdom Nugget: "One who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother."

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Using F.R.I.E.N.D.S.H.I.P as an acronym in the next couple of days let me share with you on the Laws of friendship.

F= FOCUS: FOCUS ON WHAT YOU CAN GIVE TO THE FRIENDSHIP, NOT ON WHAT THE FRIENDSHIP CAN GIVE TO YOU. The first law of love is GIVE, not TAKE.

As humans we are all naturally selfish. We all need someone to love us, care for us, encourage us and fight for us. And quite honestly there is nothing wrong with desiring all these, except that, imagine that both you and your friend came into the relationship to TAKE all these and more from the other. Naturally, you will soon be tearing at each other's throat demanding for your own portion of love, care etc. But imagine that you both came to GIVE all that and more. Soon there will be abundance of love, care etc. and because both of you are trying to out give the other, the relationship is constantly enriched and overflowing in love, care etc. The truth, however, is that like life itself, (where to live, you must GIVE OUT carbon dioxide and TAKE IN oxygen) so in friendship we must both give and RECEIVE (not DEMAND) whilst we FOCUS on our  primary responsibility on what we BRING  to the table. To enter a relationship with the goal to TAKE is the almighty formula for disappointments, heart breaks and self pity. You are hanging your joy on a man like you and the arms of flesh will fail you.

Jackie Robinson was the first black to play major league baseball. Breaking baseball's colour barrier, he faced jeering crowds in every stadium. While playing one day in his home stadium in Brooklyn, he committed an error. The fans began to ridicule him. He stood at second base, humiliated, while the fans jeered. Then, shortstop Pee Wee Reese came over and stood next to him. He put his arm around Jackie Robinson and faced the crowd. The fans grew quiet. Robinson later said that arm around his shoulder saved his career. The gesture spoke more eloquently than the words: This man is my friend.

As Elbert Hubbard puts it, "A friend is one who knows you and loves you just the same." And Albert Camus adds, "Don't walk behind me; I may not lead. Don't walk in front of me; I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend."

Why Some Have No Friends

Wisdom Nugget:  "A man that hath friends must show himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother."

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A British publication once offered a prize for the best definition of a friend. Among the thousands of answers received were the following:
"One who multiplies joys, divides grief, and whose honesty is inviolable."
"One who understands our silence."
"A volume of sympathy bound in cloth."
"A watch that beats true for all time and never runs down."

The winning definition read: "A friend is the one who comes in when the whole world has gone out."
Looking at the above definitions I am sure you already have an idea why some people don't have friends. Our text says "A man that has friends must show himself friendly..."

Friendship is like a mirror, it reflects back to you what you give to it. Before you accuse others of not being friendly, are you friendly yourself? If you notice your neighbours have not been greeting you lately, ask yourself, "Have I been greeting them lately ?"

 If because of your problems, your face always looks like the Book of Lamentations then you will hope for friends for a long time.
During his days as President, Thomas Jefferson and a group of companions were traveling across the country on horseback. They came to a river which had overflowed its banks because of a recent downpour. The swollen river had washed the bridge away. Each rider was forced to ford the river on horseback, fighting for his life against the rapid currents. The very real possibility of death threatened each rider, which caused a traveler who was not part of their group to step aside and watch. After several had plunged in and made it to the other side, the stranger asked President Jefferson if he would ferry him across the river. The president agreed without hesitation. The man climbed on, and shortly thereafter the two of them made it safely to the other side. As the stranger slid off the back of the saddle onto dry ground, one in the group asked him, "Tell me, why did you select the president to ask this favor of?" The man was shocked, admitting he had no idea it was the president who had helped him. "All I know," he said, "Is that on some of your faces was written the answer 'No,' and on some of them was the answer 'yes.' His was a 'Yes' face."

Please get friendly with someone; we all need somebody. There is no need practicing "ALONENESS" today. There will be plenty of time for that when one day we are finally trapped in our own little coffin, 6 feet below the earth. Lets enjoy the gift of friendship whilst we can.

 Remember "Friends are like good health; you don't realize what a gift they are until you lose them."

THE GIFT OF FRIENDSHIP

Wisdom Nugget:  "A man that hath friends must show himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother."

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One of the greatest gifts given to mankind is, The Gift of Friends. We are all products of relationships and as the popular sage goes, "No man is an Island". You cannot be friends with everybody but you must be a friend to somebody. 

Rodney Dangerfield wrote: "Once I told my old man, 'Nobody likes me.' He said, 'Don't say that - everybody hasn't met you yet."

Leonard Syme, a professor of epidemiology at the University of California at Berkeley, indicates the importance of social ties and social support systems in relationship to mortality and disease rates. He points to Japan as being number one in the world with respect to health and then discusses the close social, cultural, and traditional ties in that country as the reason. He believes that the more social ties, the better the health and the lower the death rate. Conversely, he indicates that the more isolated the person, the poorer the health and the higher the chances of dying. Social ties are good preventative medicines for physical problems and for mental-emotional-behavior problems.

Who therefore is a friend? Friends are people with whom you dare to be yourself. Your soul can be naked with them. They ask you to put on nothing, only to be what you are. They do not want you to be better or worse. When you are with them, you feel as a prisoner feels who has been declared innocent. You do not have to be on your guard. You can say what you think, as long as it is genuinely you. Friends understand those contradictions in your nature that lead others to misjudge you. With them you breathe freely. You can avow your little vanities and envies and hates and vicious sparks, your meannesses and absurdities, and in opening them up to friends, they are lost, dissolved on the white ocean of their loyalty. They understand. You do not have to be careful. You can abuse them, neglect them, tolerate them. Best of all, you can keep still with them. It makes no matter. They like you. They are like fire that purges to the bone. They understand. You can weep with them, sing with them, laugh with them, pray with them. Through it all - and underneath - they see, know, and love you. A friend? What is a friend? Just one, I repeat, with whom you dare to be yourself. (C. Raymond Beran, in Bits & Pieces, September 19, 1991, p. 3-4.)

George Eliot said "Oh, the comfort, the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person, having neither to weigh thoughts, nor measure words, but to pour them all out just as they are, chaff and grain together knowing that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping, and then, with the breath of kindness blow the rest away."

Friendship is reciprocal and you will find a true friend more useful to you in life than your biological brother.

Two men were out hunting in Northern U.S.A. Suddenly one yelled and the other looked up to see a grizzly charging at  them. The first started to frantically put on his tennis shoes and his friend anxiously asked, "What are you doing? Don't you know you can't outrun a grizzly bear?" "I don't have to outrun a grizzly bear. I just have to outrun you".