Classmates Friendship Quotes

So from now on, screw "perfect." Forget for a while about what kind of person you want to be, and just be the best version of the person you are. Figure out which of your classmates you genuinely like (not who you want to like you), and get to know them by telling your own stories and listening to theirs. Hang out with the people you think are cool, not the people you'd like to be considered cool by. Do things because they interest you, not because they make you look interesting... and then, take stock in a month and see whether you're not happier, healthier, and working on some actual friendships with other imperfect-but-lovely humans.

You're not like a lot of your classmates. Friendships mean more to you. And so will your relationships. I'm not worried about the speed. I'm worried about the intensity... I actually know you, believe it or not. You're the type that can get completely swept away. And you'll stay loyal to the people you love, no matter what. Loyalty isn't a bad thing, but it is when you're fifteen and you have no experience.

JB's friends were poets and performance artists and academics and modern dancers and philosophers -- he had, Malcolm once observed, befriended everyone at their college who was least likely to make money -- and their lives were grants and residencies and fellowships and awards. Success, among JB's Hood Hall assortment, wasn't defined by your box-office numbers (as it was for his agent and manager) or your costars or your reviews (as it was by his grad-school classmates): it was defined simply and only by how good your work was, and whether you were proud of it.

When introducing someone to another person, use words like acquaintance, wife/husband, fiance/fiancee, half/step-sibling, best friend, schoolmate, flatmate, classmate, In-law, cousin, nephew, neighbor, colleague and client to normalize the situation. Everyone is not your friend.

When he got out, I rolled my window down. “You look like you’re going to throw up.” He grimaced, pressing a hand to his stomach. “I don’t know if it’s from this, or if I actually am sick. I think Avery got sick from the weekend. She was puking this morning when I left.” “Avery, huh? At your place?” He rolled his eyes. “Don’t even start.” “But you see, I have to. I have to start. Avery’s my friend. I’m hanging out with your brother. You and I are classmates. I think we can develop our friendship to the stage where I give you shit. We should even start sitting next to each other in class.” “Don’t press your luck.” I kept going, “It’s a natural progression. Don’t fight it, Marcus. It’s like evolution. Don’t fight evolution. You’ll never win. Mother nature is a bitch. She’s always going to win.” “What the fuck are you talking about?” “How I get to give you shit. It’s an amazing experience in life, like giving birth. It’s painful for one person, but breathtaking for another. I’m the baby here. I get to feel air for the first time on my skin. Let me breathe, Marcus. Let me put my baby lungs to work and scream.” “I swear you’re making me even sicker.” “If you gotta puke, don’t suppress. It’s a natural body process.” He eyed me a moment. “Did you rhyme that on purpose?” “Maybe. Or I might be crazy?” I winked. “Or just a classy lady?” “Stop. I’m really going to puke now.” He groaned, pressing his arm against his forehead. “I was going to tease you back about Caden, but forget it. I don’t think I have the energy to deal with your rhyming.” “I’ve been told I’m amazing like that.” “Who told you that?” “Who hasn’t is the real question.” “You’re not making sense.” “I do that too. That’s very true.” I wondered if I should find him a bag, in case he actually was going to upchuck.

Teenagers without strong family ties can become so dependent on their peer group that they will do anything to be accepted by it. About twenty years ago in Tucson, Arizona, the entire senior class of a large high school knew for several months that an older dropout from the school, who had kept up a “friendship” with the younger students, had been killing their classmates, and burying their corpses in the desert. Yet none of them reported the crimes to the authorities, who discovered them by chance. The students, all nice middle-class suburban kids, claimed that they could not divulge the murders for fear of being cut by their friends.

It wasn't only my friends who suffered from female rivalry. I remember when I was just sixteen years old, during spring vacation, being whisked off to an early lunch by my best friend's brother, only to discover, to my astonishment and hurt, that she was expecting some college boys to drop by and didn't want me there to compete with her. When I started college at Sarah Lawrence, I soon noticed that while some of my classmates were indeed true friends, others seemed to resent that I had a boyfriend. It didn't help that Sarah Lawrence, a former girls' school, included very few straight men among its student body--an early lesson in how competing for items in short supply often brings out the worst in women. In graduate school, the stakes got higher, and the competition got stiffer, a trend that continued when I went on to vie for a limited number of academic jobs. I always had friends and colleagues with whom I could have trusted my life--but I also found women who seemed to view not only me but all other female academics as their rivals. This sense of rivalry became more painful when I divorced my first husband. Many of my friends I depended on for comfort and support suddenly began to view me as a threat. Some took me out to lunch to get the dirt, then dropped me soon after. I think they found it disturbing that I left my unhappy marriage while they were still committed to theirs. For other women, the threat seemed more immediate--twice I was told in no uncertain terms that I had better stay away from someone's husband, despite my protests that I would no more go after a friend's husband than I would stay friends with a woman who went after mine. Thankfully, I also had some true friends who remained loyal and supportive during one of the most difficult times of my life. To this day I trust them implicitly, with the kind of faith you reserve for people who have proved themselves under fire. But I've also never forgotten the shock and disappointment of discovering how quickly those other friendships turned to rivalries.

To listen to children dissect one another in public and respond with weak words is not helpful. Wait for an opportunity, catch the malefactors in the act, and then label their behavior for what it is: “That’s cruel.” If it continues, you may have to stop the car and declare, “I have to ask you to stop talking about Isabel that way. It is unbearably cruel and I cannot tolerate it.” Your child and your child’s classmates should know that you do not condone their horrible treatment of one another and will not collude silently with it.

Neither Every Friend is your Classmates nor Every Classmate is your Friend.

When I was a kid, no one knew that I was autistic. Everyone—including myself—knew that I was weird and unlike my neighbors, friends, classmates, and peers. But without the label of autism, I wasn’t segregated. I went to school and was mostly placed in regular classes, where I sometimes did very well and sometimes was bored and well below average, despite being hyper intelligent. I met all kinds of kids and lived in a neighborhood where I made friends, most of whom I’m still in touch with 40 years later. These relationships could be confusing and weird. Some of my “friends” teased me for saying the wrong things, wearing the “wrong” clothes, or liking different music than they did. When I responded by teasing them about their music, clothes, or statements, they got angry and defensive with me. The same rules did not apply. If I stared at someone out of curiosity, that was rude. If someone stared at me because I was weird, that was somehow okay. I came to learn that there was a social pecking order and some people did try to be my friend because they saw me as less than and able to be dominated. Others saw me as an equal or recognized that I wasn’t going to attempt to dominate them. When I asked people out on dates, I was often laughed at but sometimes—to my delight—I was accepted. Of course, I’d still be heartbroken when my date cheated on me or otherwise hurt my feelings. The idea that autistic people don’t have feelings is pathologized and projected onto us so furiously that periodic reminders that we do have feelings and that it is okay are important.

had known all evening that beneath my former schoolmate’s “Good for you” platitudes resided this resentment that epitomized his true feeling. While my wary, even suspicious nature was no doubt responsible for blocking out opportunities for friendship and intimacy, there was no denying that I also possessed a vigilant third eye that was perceptive in the ways of falsehood. During this phase and beyond, I used experiences such as my classmate’s floor spitting as proof of people’s insincerity. I used it to further isolate myself—to my own detriment. It

But in real life, anger is the reaction that incinerates marriages and disintegrates families. It energizes gossip and guns down classmates. It divides churches, turns friendship into enmity, and erupts in road rage.

Most of the people I met in college take everything seriously and have experienced things like love and friendship as slightly worse versions of what's portrayed in comic books. I describe my past like they do when I talk about it. I never say anything like, "My best friend was killed by one of our classmates." Basically, I try not to ruin the mood.

The initiation of a friendship may be a mystery. Someone comes into your life, and you are attracted to him, to how he sees the world, or perhaps to how he is, how he comports himself, how he acts in the world. A classmate, an office worker, a barista, someone who goes to your church: it can happen in any part of life, the recognition that here is a person you'd like to get to know better. This person and I might be able to become friends. The development of a friendship is different. Development doesn't 'just happen'; you must choose to spend time together doing various things and talking.... Friendship takes time and a certain measure of deliberation. One seeks opportunities to meet fact to face; between meetings, one tries to talk, or write, or email, or text. The physical meeting needs to happen: from the ancients to today, those who think about friendship realize the irreplaceability of being in the same space, breathing the same atmosphere.

Because you are reading this book, you probably know that social anxiety has a large impact on your life. It creates problems in school, at work, and in your social life. It hurts your relationships with your classmates, teachers, family, friends, and coworkers. Social anxiety also makes it hard to have fulfilling friendships. You probably find it difficult to meet new people and may feel as though you aren’t very close to the friends you do have. You may think that social anxiety will improve once you graduate from high school, go to college, or get a full-time job. Unfortunately, in most cases, a change in circumstances will not change your social anxiety. A study done by developmental psychologists shows that decisions made by socially anxious teens set patterns for the rest of their lives. Adolescents who are reluctant to enter social situations will have difficulty with the activities required to become spouses, parents, and members of the working world.