Real Talk: What does Grief, Friendships, and Elevators Have in Common?
Right now, in both my life and the lives of others, I have noticed a theme of loss. Loss, not in the sense of death but instead loss of friendship. We constantly evolve and so do our friends. We change independently with our goals, interests, energy level, health, and time. And we change together as a unit. Some friendships stay intact and flow together, while others dissolve and separate, ebbing in different directions.
For teens this can be a difficult concept to understand. The other day I heard a wonderful analogy to relate to this occurrence. As we change it is like we step onto an elevator. The top floor is our destination, our goals. We make stops at each floor as we make our way up. Each floor being a new stage of life or life event (e.g. middle school, puberty, highschool, first job, etc). Inside our elevator we have our support system. Maybe we started with a packed elevator full of friends, but as we stop at each floor some friends make their exit. As we move through life and move toward the goal, the elevator may get weighted down. Instead of the elevator moving up smooth and steady there are jerks and little movement to the next floor. Maybe the elevator even gets cold and dark.
Notice the people in your elevator. Is anyone holding you back from moving up? It may be time for those people to exit the elevator and make room for new friends to enter. Sometimes new people enter our elevator and the elevator feels light and warm. Notice the shifts. When we are young, we believe everyone to be our friend. We run to the playground and everyone there has become our bestie. Our 5 year birthday party consists of everyone in kindergarten and you rent out the entire party room. As you age, that group becomes smaller and sometimes teens can feel a great sense of loss and sadness as they notice this change.
But what happens when you have a jam packed elevator? It's slow and heavy; it's uncomfortable and stuffy. Sometimes a smaller group of friends can help the elevator move faster and more efficiently.
