Central Singapore District's mass walk are held to make friendships and strengthen bonds. It is an occasion for members from the different Healthy Lifestyle Clubs to interact and meet, strengthen bonds and friendships with others. Miss Wang Ting, who first came to Singapore from China 10 years ago, joined her neighbourhood’s Healthy Lifestyle Club last year as she wanted to make more local friends and assimilate further into the Singaporean community. She made friends with the locals through regular sessions.
Central Singapore CDC’s Healthy Lifestyle Clubs are formed to promote active ageing among seniors through exercise and sports activities and enable these seniors to make friends with one another. Central Singapore CDC has plans to expand the HLC programme to encompass elements of assisting the needy, bonding the people and connecting the community.
These elderly will be encouraged to join Healthy Lifestyle Clubs (HLCs) in the neighbourhood and form friendships with other seniors, strengthening their community support networks.
Friendship can be found everywhere. With today's technology, friendship can blossom over long distances. Penpals are friends who are separated by the different countries that they live in. In order to keep their friendship alive, they use the internet as a form of interaction and communication. Some use social media websides like Facebook, Twitter and even Skype. While others use apps like Whatsapp to communicate and socialize with each other.
Friendship is truly a beautiful bond between people. It is reguardless of race, religion, language and even different countries. Friends look pass their friends differences and just enjoy each other's company. From penpals, we know that friendship can happen everywhere.
Having penpals allows us to get to know each other's traditions and cultures even better. We can sometimes learn more when someone is telling us rather than reading about it from a textbook. Having penpals also allows us to get an inside look into one another's lifestyles and life choices.
A picture of fish and chips bought from the local market. Sent by my penpal from New Zealand.
Friendship around the world is now made more convenient with the help of technology. Friendship is thus able to stand against great distances.
Some disadvantages of friendships include common fights between friends which can lead to having your friends turn against you.
You can be left out by others and be teased, bullied since people are talking about you behind your back without you knowing. You might also be ignored sometimes when there is a problem within the friendship.
In some serious case, there might also be abusive actions. You could be expected to take the blame for every problem. You could be held to higher standards of thinking and behavior by your friend and if you do not meet to these higher standards, you might be accused negatively. When two people in the friendship share different values in certain areas, the other party might act more defensive and hostile, especially when there is strong disagreement.
Friendships are important in everyone's lives. But does it really mean that having friends makes one's life more fun-filled, and not bring in trouble?
As quoted from the website“Good friends are good for your health. Friends can help you celebrate good times and provide support during bad times. Friends prevent loneliness and give you a chance to offer needed companionship, too.”
The website also stated that friends can help to increase our happiness, reduce our stress level as well as help us cope with problems or traumas such as serious illness or death of loved one. This tells me that friends are someone whom we can look for besides our family members. Friends are there for us when we are at our lowest point.
For example, when we are having some problems or difficulties, we can let out our problems to our friends. Sharing our problems to them can at least help to ease the mind. Friends will always help as much as they can by giving advises, going out for a walk at a park or even going to places such like the beach together so that it helps to calm our mind. By doing so, it will help to reduce the stress level.
Another example is when we are feeling down, friends will know exactly on how to cheer us up like do things that will make you happy again.
As for me, when I am feeling sad, my friends will encourage me to stay positive and they will make jokes just to make me laugh again. Other than that, we will do some activities outdoor like playing badminton so that I could put the sadness away.
Friends are also group of people in our life that we can celebrate with when we achieved something in life. For example, when we do very well in our studies, we can celebrate our achievement with our friends by treating them dinner or watch movies with them. In all, friends would stick together with us through thick and thin. They are there with us during our sad and happy moments.
I did a further research about the statement above (first paragraph), “Good friends are good for your health”.
As quoted from the website, “Good friends, however, help protect you from these harmful effects. Your body will deal with the ups and downs of life better with friends in place to support you and give you an emotional lift when you need it.”
The website stated that, “Your friends can influence you to make positive health changes in your life. We often think of friends as a group that we have fun with, but a good time can also mean improving your world in some way. "
From the website I learnt that friends can be a good influence to us by encouraging us to stay healthy, fit and helping us to developed healthy lifestyle. Apart from going out shopping or watching movies, we can also do some exercises and jogging with our friends during our free time. By doing so, it helps to maintain healthy mind and body, and at the same time it could help to release tension in our mind.
In conclusion, I have learnt that there are benefits of having friends. Friends can be our good companion besides our family members. Friends are someone whom I can rely on. They are willing to listen to our problems and help us when we are in need.
Friends would stick together with us through thick and thin. Having a good time like going out together with our friends can help to boost our happiness and reduce our stress. Friends can make us change from an unhealthy lifestyle to healthy lifestyle by encouraging us to stay healthy and exercise regularly.
Thus, it’s good to have friends around us. Furthermore, friends are the closest group of people in our life besides our family members. We are with friends most of the time be it in school or at work. Most importantly friends will not just give emotional support but also physical support for us, am I right?
So, you must wondering why I talked about society in the first place.
A society is made of people coming from a spectrum of different cultures, from various places, attractions, or even dialects that are spoken in the area. It usually revolves around people and their emotional, physical or financial configuration.
Which leads me to a back to where i left of whereby everyone(friends, family) plays a part in this society. So it is really crucial to find good friends in this society because people in our gruesome society is waiting for the opportunity to chance upon your mistakes and judge you.
Speaking of good friends, one of the most valuable qualities we yearn for in a friend is acceptance.
Being able to accept one another despite the flaws one might bear. Being with your friends indirectly gives you a sense ofidentity. Thus this is the importance of having non-judgmental friends.
Trust, is also another important quality to any individual, nobody likes getting betrayed. Being able to find good friends whom you trust with your secrets. Therein lies the essence of the saying, “No man is an island”. Having mutual trust amongst each other opens a door to a person’s willingness to share their personal secrets, it is important for you to open up to our friends instead of tucking away our emotions which might lead up to a major conflict in the future. To a certain extent, it might even affect our state of mind.
These qualities in our friends can affect the way we behave or act because sometimes not being able to blend in can cause you to lose them. It affects us mentally, physically, and emotionally. For example, it might negatively cause a mental disorder called depression which in fact many youths have faced or is currently facing it today. Well of course, if there is a for every negative there is a positive.One general positive impact would most definitely be being able lead a happier and healthier life.
Negative emotions which might feel if a friendship turns sour.
The fact that many professors and professionals have studied the psychology of friend have proven that people with a circle of friends tend to be healthier and live longer. Hence,we should be even more convinced that friendships are indeed important.
Therefore, I not only encourage everyone to embrace your friendships, but employ you to appreciate them for being there with you through the difficult times.
And with that I shall top off my blog entry with this video! True Friends:
