By African American Novels Writer Denise Turney

Women friendships demonstrate the power of love. As it is with love, the power of female friendship showcases patience, clear communication, flexibility, fun, care, empathy, sharing and deep understanding. If you’re like me, your early friendships started in childhood. Back then, it was fun, play and carefreeness that brought my friends and me together.

Impact of Early Friendships for Women

Shared interests worked like an anchor. The more fun that a girl and I had together, the stronger our friendship became. That’s how my early friendships started. For sure, that’s not how they remained.

In fact, it only took several months for those relationships that were filled with play and laughter to take on a competitiveness. Who had the latest toys? Whose doll was the coolest. After awhile, I started to wonder if a girl I’d previously considered to be my friend really was a friend. Fortunately, this only happened with one playmate.

Never will forget her. Did I ever look up to her. She seemed to have access to the best toys and technology. It was as if she lacked nothing, which is a wonderful way to journey through this world.

On the other hand, my family had a makeshift swing set in the backyard. As kids, we used an old inner tube that our dad tied to the swing set, to play on. Was it ever loads of fun. But it wasn’t new or up-to-date like my (is she really my friend?) playmate.

Adult Women Friendships Barriers

Topping it off was the fact that my playmate had perfect timing. Whenever I got a new toy, she’d stop by and ask to play with it. If I told her that she couldn’t play with the toy, she’d sulk, walk off and tell other kids not to play with me. Took me a minute to catch on to what was happening. Soon that habit created a barrier in our friendship. Before it was over, I no longer considered her a friend.

As unwanted as that experience was, it pales in comparison to barriers that adult friends may navigate. By the time you reach adulthood, you’ve heard people compare women based not only on their possessions (e.g. income, houses, cars, handbags) but also on their backgrounds. You might have even engaged in this behavior yourself.

Keep it up and you could create barriers around women based on their age, skin tone, where they were born and the languages that they speak. Although it might not look like it now, those barriers could keep you from meeting and connecting with awesome women. Those cultural barriers could prevent you from enjoying the most rewarding friendships. After all, how do you know what could become of relationships with women from different cultures you crossed paths with if you never embark on conversations with those women?

Rewarding Women Friendships

You might be passing up on rewarding friendships and not even know it. If you’re one of those fortunate women who hasn’t allowed culture to create barriers between you and other women, you know the blessings inherent in honest, open friendships that are anchored in love.

Additionally, you know how much you’ve learned about your friend’s culture, native language, family traditions, cultural celebrations, festive foods and more. Another thing that you might gain as you develop friendships that cross cultures is never-before-known ways to connect with your parents, children or partner. Other things that you might learn are ways to reduce or eliminate stress, balance work and the pursuit of your passions as you continue to learn.

What Women Friendships Gift You With

What you might not know is just how great an investment you’re making, not only in your friends, but also in yourself. For starters, the power of female friendship gives you a sense of belonging. There’s no way to put a price on the knowledge that you belong. That’s what women friendships gift you with. Other blessings to be gained from getting to know a woman and developing a real friendship include:

• Lower stress
• Strengthen emotional intelligence
• Improve emotional and psychological coping skills
• Support to establish healthy mental and physical fitness
• Springboard to bounce ideas off of, particularly ideas on how to improve close personal relationships
• Comfort while letting go of toxic relationships

The power of women friendships may never be fully known. Women friends build strong bonds. They sit and simply listen to each other during periods of grief. Should a woman experience setbacks, broken romantic relationships or start to believe that her life isn’t worth much, her friend will step in and fill those gaps.

Missing Your Best Friend

If you’ve ever been a friend, you know how easy it is to go thru a gamut of emotions and experiences with a buddy; you also know how much you want to be there for your friend. No one has to twist your arm or beg you to call or visit your friend. Also, you don’t have to be coerced to come up with the best ideas for having fun.

What you might not know is how many friends you could have had. Even if you’re open, steer clear of cultural divisions. If not, you could keep yourself from what could become the best friendship of your life. During hard times, you could experience a period of hopelessness that you wouldn’t have had to endure had you developed more culturally rich women friendships.

Enrich Your Life With Good Friends

To enrich your life with the power of women friendships, consider seeing women as an allay instead of as a competitor. Do this at home, work and school. Gift yourself with the opportunity to develop friendships with women whose cultural background is different from yours. Doing so could open you up to new ways of experiencing life.

Additionally, there might be a multi-pronged advantage to this. Not only could you build powerful adult friendships. You might demonstrate the blessings of developing relationships that cross invisible barriers for your children and extended family. Pull this off and your extended family could start crossing cultural aisles and finding friends they’d never have met.