Celebrating and Valuing Friendship

In Spanish  is called “el Día del Amor y la Amistad.” The Day of Love and Friendship. It is about more than celebrating love with a significant other. It is about love AND friendship, celebrating those special people in our lives, our amigas.

So I want to talk about friendship. Friendship is a very important part of life. It allows us to connect with others in extraordinary ways.

Everything I learned about being a good friend and cultivating lifelong friendships I’ve learned from my mother. By this I don’t mean she say me down and gave me a speech on how to be a good friend. She gave me something much more valuable than that. She taught me through her actions. Throughout my life I have seen how she cultivates and values her friendships.

My mother has friendships that have survived and transcended time and place. She has managed to keep those friendships alive when it was harder to do so, before the Internet and Facebook existed and when long-distance phone calls costs a lot more than today! She is the person that goes back to her home country and rallies the troops and gets everyone together for a celebration.

My mom and her amigas have been through it all: marriages, divorces, children, grandchildren, deaths of loved ones, you name it. Even though they have busy lives, they still make the time to come together and celebrate life. There is so much love and friendship and positive energy and laughter when they come together, it always leaves me energized and happy.

Because I grew up seeing her build and keep friendships all her life, I strive to have real, lifelong friendships. She has given me such a great gift, that of appreciating and valuing my friends.

So today, on El Día del Amor y la Amistad, I want to say thank you to her for giving me such an enormous gift and I wanted to tell all my friends thank you for being in my life.

Sometimes, our lives get so busy we don’t reach out and tell the people in our lives how much we appreciate them, today is a great day to do so!

Have a friend you love? Send them a message and tell them how much they mean to you!

XOXOs, Feliz Dia del Amor y la Amistad,