Why women NEED friends

Part 1 in the Friendship series

The Lord made us for relationship :

The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone.”

Genesis 2:18a (NIV)

We see illustrations of the importance of friendship all through the Bible, and epitomised by Jesus himself who calls himself our friend:

You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 

John 15:14-15 (NIV)

Women seem to have been designed to function more fully and live a more satisfied life when living closely connected to other women. Many studies have been done, and interesting research carried out, which explore exactly this.

What have researchers discovered about women and friendships?

Gale Berkowitz has summarised a UCLA Study On Friendship Among Women and you can read the full article here : https://womensbrainhealth.org/think-tank/think-twice/ucla-study-on-friendship-among-women

I will highlight some excerpts which are very interesting:

“A landmark UCLA study suggests friendships between women are special. They shape who we are and who we are yet to be. They soothe our tumultuous inner world, fill the emotional gaps in our marriage, and help us remember who we really are. By the way, they may do even more.Scientists now suspect that hanging out with our friends can actually counteract the kind of stomach-quivering stress most of us experience on a daily basis. A landmark UCLA study suggests that women respond to stress with a cascade of brain chemicals that cause us to make and maintain friendships with other women.It’s a stunning find that has turned five decades of stress research—most of it on men—upside down.” 

“…the researchers suspect that women have a larger behavioral repertoire than just fight or flight; In fact, says Dr. Klein, it seems that when the hormone oxytocin is release as part of the stress responses in a woman, it buffers the fight or flight response and encourages her to tend children and gather with other women instead. When she actually engages in this tending or befriending, studies suggest that more oxytocin is released, which further counters stress and produces a calming effect. “

So because we have been designed by God to gather and tend in times of stress, we find calm in the presence of our friends, rather than on our own. We counter stress by being together, in fellowship.

Not only that, but our friendships improve our general health and well being. As Gail Berkowitz summarises:

“Friends are also helping us live better. The famed Nurses’ Health Study from Harvard Medical School found that the more friends women had, the less likely they were to develop physical impairments as they aged, and the more likely they were to be leading a joyful life. In fact, the results were so significant, the researchers concluded, that not having close friends or confidants was as detrimental to your health as smoking or carrying extra weight.And that’s not all. When the researchers looked at how well the women functioned after the death of their spouse, they found that even in the face of this biggest stressor of all, those women who had a close friend and confidante were more likely to survive the experience without any new physical impairments or permanent loss of vitality. Those without friends were not always so fortunate.”

Cultivate Friendship

It’s scriptural. It’s scientific. And we know from experience, that after time spent with a few good women friends, we feel buoyed and energised. So why don’t we spend time and effort cultivating relationships and nurturing good friendships?

Ruthellen Josselson, Ph.D., co-author of Best Friends: The Pleasures and Perils of Girls’ and Women’s Friendships (Three Rivers Press, 1998) writes that:

“Every time we get overly busy with work and family, the first thing we do is let go of friendships with other women. We push them right to the back burner. That’s really a mistake because women are such a source of strength to each other. We nurture one another. And we need to have unpressured space in which we can do the special kind of talk that women do when they’re with other women. It’s a very healing experience.”

If you have longstanding, close relationships with women friends, I hope this has motivated you to prioritise those relationships a little more. Appreciate and value them and don’t put them on the back burner.

If you don’t have good friends

Having moved from one side of the world to another, and leaving established friendships across the vast ocean, I have been in a place of having no friends for a season, and no close friends for a number of years. If you are in this place, I get you.

You also might be going through some things in life that are hard and have caused you to withdraw from relationships. You don’t really want to be “known” right now. It feels safer at home away from everyone.

Perhaps you have lost friendships and are afraid to get too close to anyone for fear of being hurt again.

Or maybe you just haven’t really connected with anyone.

I plan to write a series of practical blog posts over the next few weeks to help each of you take steps towards connecting with other women in meaningful, life giving ways. But you can start right now with the most important friendship ever.

A friend of Jesus

You have a friend in Jesus. He is your Lord. Your Master. King of Kings. But he is also your friend and He lay His life down for you, so great is His love for you.

Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 

John 15:13 (NIV)

Make Jesus your first and most important friend.

• Get to know Him (read His Word)
• Let Him get to know you (Confess and bring everything into the light – there is no hiding from Jesus)
• Spend time communicating with Him (pray and …LISTEN)
• Do life together (Jesus is with you always)
• Ask Him for advice, direction and correction and trust what He answers
• Let Him be your “All in All” – your “Everything”

Jesus is sufficient. If He is and remains your only friend, you have everything you need. He affirms you, sees you and loves you always and unconditionally. Not one single other person can ever fulfil this kind of friendship in your life. Only He is perfect. All others (including me and you) fall short. You will be let down by people and you will let people down. It is imperative that you, and every need you have, are fulfilled by Jesus. Only Jesus. First and foremost, Jesus.

Once we have established this kind of relationship with our Lord, we are in a position to have healthy friendships with other women. We can give freely and receive freely. With no unhealthy dependency or expectations. We can have realistic expectations that release those around us to be themselves and to trust us.

This is the foundational key to successful, healthy, life-giving friendships. And you can start pursuing this friendship right now!

Prayer

Lord Jesus,

Thank you for each woman who is reading this right now. May you pour out your blessings on her, and draw her into an intimate relationship with you. May she know love like she has never known love before. May she feel affirmed by her Creator, and accepted for the person you created her to be. May she turn to you to meet her every need, to voice her every concern, to seek wisdom and understanding. May she learn to seek you first. May you fill her cup with your living water so that as she forms and maintains friendships, she can pour into them from a full and healthy place.

We pray this in the name of Jesus,

AMEN