Fitz: Concentric Circles

There are over six billion people on Earth today. Each of those people has countless relationships, which extend further into an immense network of relations among thousands of individuals. These relations can be romantic, professional, unconditional, mutual, or the strongest of all, friendship. Friendship is a term used to denote co-operative and supportive behavior between two or more beings. In this sense, the term connotes a relationship which involves mutual knowledge, esteem, and affection and respect along with a degree of rendering service to friends in times of need or crisis. Friends will welcome each other's company and exhibit loyalty towards each other, often to the point of altruism.

Despite the numerous different theories consisting of different stages of friendship they all contain certain aspects of relationships going through stages of increasing familiarity. They all show how we select friends through a stage model and how relationships also break down in stages. They provide Factors that increase friendship like after helping another person we like them more due to feelings and emotions such as empathy, or a decline in a relationship by the need for too much help and support that can cause stress and anxieties. If we feel empathy we are likely to help, and there are several factors that increase chances of friendship,

As a survivor of a residential school, Theodore Fontaine withstood the ultimate extent of the human condition. In his book, Broken Circle: The Dark Legacy of Indian Residential Schools (Fontaine, 2010), Theodore narrates the horrific abusive exploitation he encountered at the residential school; his dark emotional plight for freedom; and his spiritual journey into light (Fontaine, 2010).

People of the same social class tend to be friends. People of the same level of attractiveness tend to be drawn to each other. Athletes that play the same sports flock to each other. I feel as if often times, we fall ignorant to the real world. Sometimes, I think we close our minds off to possibilities and opportunities just because we don't expand our network and step out of our comfort zones. Everyone has a story. Growing up and going to a private Catholic school, I’ve seen this happen my whole life. The rich kids are friends with the rich kids, and everybody else just kind of coexists. My mom always told me to not be friends with someone just because you share similarities. I have carried this value on through life. By closing yourself off to one group people, you limit your exposure to different experiences. Through meeting other people and people that are different from yourself, you can expand your

Oscar Thompson, the original author of Concentric Circles of Concern, was a pastor for twenty years before teaching personal evangelism at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. He also served as the president of the Oscar Thompson Evangelical Association. After being diagnosed with cancer, Thompson served as pastoral consultant of the Cancer Counseling and Research Foundation, as well as pastoral consultant

They engulf us for a short period and then they fade... We cultivate a colleague in the field or a contact outside of it in the hope that it will advance our career or enhance out status. When it does, we feel a sence of personal success,” (May). He is addressing the two types of friendship of most common and most easily established. Friendships of pleasure are often short, because people take entertainment from one thing, then move on to the next when it becomes dull.

In emerging adulthood, many people experience the need to share their personal life with someone else. Erikson name for this crisis is intimacy versus isolation and emerging adults and many older adults know this feeling very well (Berger, 2014, p. 551). As emerging adults begin feeling the need for human connection, friendships and intimate relationships deepen for this reason (Berger, 2014, p. 551). As a senior in high school my friends became an extremely important part of my life, we told each other everything and the need for human connection was evident as I always wanted to be with my friends and share my personal life with them. I had, and currently have, the same 2 friends that I would confide in about boy problems, health

In the journal entry, "What Makes a Good Friend", by Alex Lickerman, he explains the qualities that he considers ideal in a true friend. He references the Japanese culture and their term called 'kenzoku', which translates to our version of family. In order to have this sacred bond that is kenzoku there are certain traits that must be present. Two individuals need to be drawn together, commonly by similar interests.

There are certain types of companions you should associate yourself with. That is with fellows that have the same common goal as you do, which is to be successful. In the article, “11 Secrets to Choosing the Right Friends” by Stacia Pierce, she clarifies, “The people you associate with have a major impact and influence on your personal success. You can tell where most people are going to end up in life simply based on who they hang around.“ Pierce is explaining that by choosing the correct friends, it can lead you in the correct lane for your future. Just by looking at who you’re with and what habits they have can tell you what your future life could look like. “Choose friends with common goals - When you have friends with common goals, [...] you can push each other. You can work on your goals together and encourage each other in reaching them. [...] You want friends that celebrate you, not just tolerate you! They will be genuinely happy to see you succeed and be the first to say “Congratulations.” When you choose friends that have a common specialized area to accomplish that you are trying to achieve as well, it helps predict your success because you are surrounding yourself the people who are motivating you; you are surrounding yourself by the people who aren’t going to be mad or jealous of what you achieve. They will be a fan of yours and support you all the way until you and your friends achieve the goal you have been wanting to accomplish all

Growing up in Minnesota, I spent extensive time fishing amongst the states’ ten thousand lakes, inquisitively examining how the environment influenced aquatic organisms. By examination, my understanding of the underlying biology behind nature greatly increased, and likewise did my ability to catch fish. However, many environmental factors influenced the ecosystem, inexplicably creating great fishing one day but failure the next. In disbelief of my bad luck, I contended with explaining such unpredictability in the ecosystem. After combining bathymetry, weather, and GPS data into a geographic information system application , my next fishing trip was wildly successful. Ever since, I became fascinated by exploring how elements relate within a

Today in our lives, we are surrounded by many people. Some of these people we are surrounded by are either people we do not care for, or they are the people that we cannot spend enough time with. These people we enjoy the most of, are either our family or our closest friends. You may think that friends and family are just a like, but they do differ from each other, and without either of them our life would feel incomplete.

In life there are many changes that can cause a true friendship to go wary such as marriage, divorce, birth of children, new careers, and sickness. However, through each of those events the two must remember to keep the intimacy, the letting down of emotional barriers and the expression of innermost thoughts and feelings, “that which makes friendships thrive must be an enjoyable one” and to “always interact” (Karbo 3). Although psychologists continue to research the formation of friendships the great philosopher Aristotle knew exactly how friendships formed and how the lasted.

For every person that exists, there is at least one other person with whom they will laugh with, love with, and live life with. These are the people who will support the decisions you make, encourage you to keep going after massive failures and love you despite all your flaws. We cherish the relationships we build and the friendships we have because without friends, we would be alone.

Interestingly, it is via Borges, a well-known master in the creation of literary labyrinths, that we are able to find several possible explanations for these inner circularities, for instance, through his recurrent references to the trope of the sphere. Take some of the short fictions that constitute his 1941 volume The Garden of Forking Paths, namely ‘Lottery in Babylon’ and ‘The Library of Babel’. Not only does Borges tell us that the Babylonians ‘obey the dictates of chance, surrender their lives, their hopes, their nameless terror to it, but it never occurs to them to delve into its labyrinthine laws or the revolving spheres that manifest its workings’ (Borges 1998: 104; emphasis added), but also his Library of Babel ‘is a sphere whose exact center is any hexagon and whose circumference is unattainable’ (113). Moreover, the trope of the sphere ‘whose center is everywhere and its circumference nowhere’ would be later analysed by Borges in an essay titled ‘Pascal’s Sphere’ [1951]. In it, the significance of the sphere as a double paradox of time/infinity and of unity/multiplicity becomes clearer, by means of a line that he draws from Xenophanes of Colophon to Pascal in order to

In the film, “The Emotional Life” there was a very interesting episode called “Family, Friends and Lovers”. “Family, Friends and Lovers” reminded me of situations that I have experienced in the past. I can honestly relate to this episode in so many ways, such as my outlook on family and friends. The first few people that babies ever know are their family. Infants value their mother/caregiver more than anyone. From birth they tend to form a bond with their caregiver, in which is known as attachment. Due to their family members being the first people they interact with they learn how to relate with people at home. Family relationship is practice to what is next; meaning the relationships people gain with their family helps them prepare for future relationship with others. Friendships can be very helpful because no one wants to be lonely. It is quite nice to have someone else to hang and interact with besides family. It is great to have a friend that you can connect with.