Constructed Friends: As Real As You Make Them. Friends, enemies, frenemies. Friendly, threatening, not-always-friendly. Your Friends you Trust to do you no harm. Your enemies you Trust to want you to be harmed in some way. Mentally or Physically in some other way. Or you just don't like them. Your frenemies you can't fully trust either way. Maybe they're fair weather friends, nice to you when you're alone, but mean around others. Or they're someone you hate but you keep hanging around just the same. Or it's someone that is your friend but you're in a fierce competition with over something. But to shorten things up, I'm just going to call them all Friends. Substitute at will. If you don't like the idea of me calling your enemy your friend, well... it's just going to get worse for you. But if you're game, let's go! FRIENDS: Who are these people? Where do they come from? What do we *really know* about them? Well, I have a few ideas. 1) Friends are anybody or anything you talk about, think about, and leaves you with some kind of emotional feeling. Your first friend probably your Mom, or whoever you imprinted yourself on after you were born. It only grew in number from there. Maybe not, but likely. 2) Your mom can be your friend. Your brother or sister can be your friend. 3) But your friends aren't just limited to humans you know in your 3D life. Sure, it's people you meet at school or work, or around town, or wherever you happen to find yourself on this wonderful, strange planet. But it goes far further than that. 4) You can be friends with your pet. Your dog, your cat, your snake, your pet panda bear. 5) You can be friends with people on the Internet. You might not even know their real names or what they look like or where they live. And yet... they're your real friends. Or enemies. Or Frenemies. Oh, I said I wasn't going to do that. 6) You can be friends with people on TV or in the movies. You have some favorite actors, or TV shows, or movies, yes? Don't you love them? Like them? Hate them? Have mixed feelings about them? A lot like you do with local friends? 7) You can be friends with people from history. Many people have Jesus as their friend or Einstein, for example. 8) You can be friends with characters on TV shows and movies. This includes cartoon characters. Just like local friends, you laugh with them, cheer them on, hate them. They feel like your friends because they are. 9) You can be friends with your toys and characters in video games. Didn't you have a favorite stuffed animal? Or Legos? Or favorite video game character like Mario or Sonic or feel bad for a sad Minecraft Creeper on a Youtube video who "just wanted to be friends?". Guess what? They're also your friends. 10) You can be friends with other objects as well. Many people name their cars or boats or kitchen appliances. Even without a name, didn't you ever yell at your computer, "Come on you idiot, work already!?!" You weren't talking to yourself. You were talking to your friend, who is right there, not listening to you. 11) You can be friends with words. Do you have favorite words? Words that have almost a magical quality to them and make you smile? They're also your friends and humans are generally very good at playing with words and meanings. Yes. Playing with your friends. 12) You can be friends with numbers. Am I starting to sound far-fetched here? It's not. People who work in mathematics often talk about mathematics as their friend. That's because it is their friend. 13) You can be friends with beings that may or may not have ever existed. This one is common to almost all people. In fact, this is the realm in which you can find the largest number of friends, in what's called fiction. But... in fact, they feel like your friends because they are your friends... or enemies... or frenemies. You care about them because they are real to you. 14) You can be friends with reason or logic, a programming language, science, a religion, the Internet, a set of ideals. You can love them, hate them, think about them, care about them in some way. You have different friends for different reasons, some you play with, some you have deep discussions with, some cheer you on, some just wish you well. And some... you just enjoy their company. Does sound crazy? Some call it anthropomorphizing or personification: giving human-like qualities to things that aren't human. But we all do it! Want proof? Just listen to yourself throughout the day. Notice how many times you talk to your computer or yell at someone on TV or in a video game or talk to your pets. It's perfectly normal. You are most likely quite normal when you do this. Sometimes someone will call you weird if they see you consider someone or something your friend that they don't agree with - but they do it too. Think of your stereotypical fashion conscious Mean Girl: "I hate these shoes! I love this color!". Their shoes are their enemy, the color - their friend. It's normal behavior all humans do. It starts when our mother's face first imprints on us. You become friends with your toes and your fingers. You become friends with your vocal cords when you babble and play around with sounds. You become friends with music as you learn to sing and bang on pots and pans. You become friends with pots and pans. You become friends with a doll or stuffed animal or characters in bedtime stories. Maybe you become friends with hundreds of Pokemon or your favorite sports team or favorite Operating System, colored pencils or musical instrument. You become friends with your pillow and your bed when you go to sleep at night, and curse at the shower when its too cold or hot. But what do these all have in common? Quibble as you may that some are real and some are imaginary, I have a proposition to make: They are all real. And they are all constructed. We make them our friends by the way we think about them and how they make us feel. Do you really know what's going on in someone else's head? You think you do and when you're in sync with someone else, thinking similarly to them, you can often know *exactly* what they are going to say. Perhaps this is why our friends on TV, movies, video games and toys, reason, logic, mathematics, a favorite science, a set of ideals, a religion, are so important to us: They don't let us down. And when they do, it's predicable - even if predictable means: "unpredictable - just like always". In other words, predictably unpredictable. Our most dependable friends are entirely constructed. With TV, movies and books, Scriptwriters, authors - some *other person or people* created the character that is now your friend. Constructed by them and THEN, when you felt friendly/enemy/frenemy feelings about them, they became your constructed friend. And.. haven't you ever been shocked when a friend did something you didn't expect? Why didn't you expect it? BECAUSE YOU CONSTRUCTED IN YOUR MIND what you think they're like... and they didn't behave that way. Who they are is *more* and often *different* than the friend-you-thought-they-were. The one you constructed in your mind. They're still you friend. It's still real. Maybe they'll transform into enemy or frenemy, in a way - becoming a friend you are deeply disappointed in or a friend that you now hate. But in the end, they are your very real friends, wherever they come from. And they are constructed friends. Not fake. Not imaginary friends. But a friend: very real and constructed in your mind, predictable and unpredictable, that you feel emotions about. Unless you believe in mind-reading, which you may, all we really know of someone is what we see, what we hear, and most importantly, how they make us feel. There's power in this. You can change how you feel about someone else. Another power in this? You're never alone. [1]reconstructed prototypes through life (summary) - further exploration of the construction of flesh and blood friends - what are the building blocks, why they disappoint us and we disappoint them. Thoughts? Find me. I'm Kenneth Udut and I'm easy to find on G+, Facebook, Vine and I'll be happy to be your constructed friend/enemy/frenemy - that parts not up to me. Frenemy is kind of fun, especially the arguing and awkardness. Getting from Frenemy to Friend Status can be tricky but entirely doable. Look me up if you you agree, or especially if you disagree. [first (and maybe/maybe not last) draft - 11/11/14 by Kenneth Udut - the.email.that.nobody.needs@gmail.com ] References Visible links 1. Reconstructed Prototypes http://icopiedyou.com/reconstructed-prototypes/