Old friends we never hear from for years, they get in touch and we wonder why it is that we start up where we left off. Its as if years and years have gone missing and we don't even realise they have been away or missing. We don't even wonder why they are in touch or why we forgot them for so long. Well maybe we never forget them, and their familiar feel and their demeanour open our minds and trust them as they are. Old friends are confounding that way.

It happened today, an old friend in touch. Strange to be connected without distance of time or place, just as if we had talked moments before, the connection is complete.

No motive beyond what we see, no intrusion or disturbance made as air wafts and disturbs not one hair. And as if no enquiry needed we connect and tell our truth as truth flows without worry or judgment, old friends see our souls and we see theirs.

And as if by contrast recent friendships seem to hold less familiar promise although they are with me now, and why so hard to make sense these new and active connections in my life? Seems motives are less than obvious and less of what we might know to be friendships which carry so much trust only expiration would undo them.

Tense times if we go looking for the hidden connections in the people we meet, and harsh times if we disconnect in ways which leave us isolated.

Our dilemma of trust, the fine line between openness and being aware that open means trust is accepted and hurt can follow. Do we get more cautious as we get older. Do we get wiser in our understanding of people, or do we have preferences which prejudice our outlook without us even realising what is happening.

We all have automatic thinking. We forget about automatic feeling. Feeling comes first in all our lives, yet we forget our feelings much of the time, it is as if we switch off our feelings as we move along, to actually acknowledge our feelings means we often stop doing what we are doing, simply because our gut reaction says no. We leave ourselves open when we ignore our gut feeling because we think there is some value in persevering with some friends.

We are taught to grin and bare it, to mask our true nature and so keep others away from how we feel about them. In simpler times, when the world was less populated and complicated, showing feelings made us able to show our true nature and be able to express our true intent. These days are long gone, for as we became more and more careful about what we showed to the world, we made our lives infinitely more complex.

And in our desire for friendship and intimate relationships, there is always some pain. There is pain because what we feel for others is not matched by their feeling for us. The same is true of friends, some like us equally and some like us less or more than we do. Now that is hard and we all play the game of guessing until we develop trust in our own judgment and the evidence from experience of others we may hope to be our friends.

And so to conventions as our family and society and culture enable us to get on, have friends and relationships. We think we need to be social, because we learn its better to be in a group than outside it. We want to belong, yet we might not want to belong to groups we are given by circumstance. We want our own group, we want to be involved as leader or player, or part time, or any combination. We develop our selective skills in order to fit in and fit out for another group.

When we are growing and developing, we know the ignominy of rejection and we might stay connected too long to some friends we make, or we just move on as if a wisp in time, never really touched by others needs and wants from us.

Lurking inside all of us a worry somewhere that we might find ourselves alone and then without friendship. We might place too much emphasis on desire to belong and desire for connection and end up with entirely the wrong group. And we might worry we are mistaken and we should be able to fit in with where we are. We get stuck in worry and imagine life without friends, when sometimes we are better off moving on and on.

Confidence is important, to develop an understanding with ourselves and our desires and needs. We need not form friendship simply because it seems to be the right thing to do. Others are very likely to drag us into their worlds, and we are better served using our good judgment and the judgment of trusted friends to help us on our way.

In life, friendships are important, we develop them and some stick and some we loose simply because the basis of connection changes. We need not worry our old friends who accept our changes, we need not be so certain of others who would hang on for no good reason other than a notion of connection. We learn our path, sometimes an abundance of friends who will be there forever, and other times where friendship may well have been circumstantial and have no real longevity. We still care, we don't connect, we still admire, we don't keep in touch. And we may still love, and that love is gone in the present. And with emotions we grieve their loss and their passing. We have nostalgia.

So when we look to our connections, they change through life, some partnerships endure all elements over time and some just fade away. We can accept where friendships are, as long as we accept ourselves. We need not be harmed or hurting others if we keep trust with ourselves and integrity in our doings with those we encounter.

Never assume friendships and their nature, for one persons friendship is anothers whole life or no part of their life. We don't know until its explicit and we might be best served be open and honest inside our heads and equally with anyone we encounter. Tough choices, that's the truth, for we let go more than we might feel comfortable, and until we do we stop, letting in others is impossible until there is room to do so. Make room in our lives for ourselves, we are our best or worst friend so other friendships can go where life takes us and them..