I like my friends like I like my coffee — strong enough to wake me up in the morning, yet smooth enough to ease me into the day.  ~ Tony Roberts.

 

I think that real friendship always makes us feel such sweet gratitude, because the world almost always seems like a very hard desert, and the flowers that grow there seem to grow against such high odds.― Stephen King,

 

A good friend is not overly sensitive and makes a better effort at communication and contact.  ~ Rachel Yahne-Oakes

 

A letter always seemed to me like immortality because it is the mind alone without corporeal friend. ― Emily Dickinson

 

9 Two are better than one,

because they have a good return for their labor:

10If either of them falls down,

one can help the other up.

But pity anyone who falls

and has no one to help them up.

11 Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm.

But how can one keep warm alone?

12 Though one may be overpowered

two can defend themselves.

A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.

~ Ecclesiastes 4:9-12, as selected by Deb Shepherd Baker

 

The friend in my adversity I shall always cherish most. I can better trust those who have helped to relieve the gloom of my dark hours than those who are so ready to enjoy with me the sunshine of my prosperity. ― Ulysses S. Grant

 

A person with whom you value contact (of whatever kind), and the kind of person who makes an improvement in your day when you think of them.   ~ Ken Leonard.

 

“My friends have made the story of my life. In a thousand ways they have turned my limitations into beautiful privileges.”
― Helen Keller

 

Friendship … is born at the moment when one man says to another “What! You too? I thought that no one but myself . . .”
― C.S. Lewis,  as selected by Lorraine Potter Zechmann.

 

A friend is more to be longed for than the light; I speak of a genuine one. And wonder not: for it were better for us that the sun should be extinguished, than that we should be deprived of friends; better to live in darkness, than to be without friends ― John Chrysostom.

 

Someone who is there for you when you need them. Someone who laughs with you, cries with you and shares life with you. Someone who accepts you for who you are. ~ April Cohen.

 

“Friendship needs no words – it is solitude delivered from the anguish of loneliness.” ― Dag Hammarskjöld.

 

… a friend can sit in silence with you and it not be awkward … a friend can converse with you even when the words are few and far between … a friend can tell you the truth about yourself without flattery or falsehood … a friend really does pray for you when they say they will … a friend will pick up right where you left off… a friend laughs at your stories—even the one they’ve heard before.   ~ Les Rust.

 

Human beings are born into this little span of life of which the best thing is its friendships and intimacies … and yet they leave their friendships and intimacies with no cultivation, to grow as they will by the roadside, expecting them to “keep” by force of mere inertia. ― William James

 

A friend is someone who is not only willing to acknowledge the scars on another, but able to know when to pick at them and when to let them go…  ~ Mark Geisler.

 

Nothing firms up a friendship like a good-natured argument. ― Lemony Snicket,

 

Someone you can always count on…. someone you always feel comfortable with even if you have curlers in your hair… someone you know will not judge your circumstances but will protect and nourish your soul and make you believe in yourself again.  ~ Jennifer Docke.

 

I want someone to sit beside after the day’s pursuit and all its anguish, after its listening, and its waitings, and its suspicions. After quarrelling and reconciliation I need privacy – to be alone with you, to set this hubbub in order. For I am as neat as a cat in my habits. ― Virginia Woolf.

 

Someone you can call and count on them to send a prayer up right then and head over to be with you if needed. any time day or night. Someone that puts your needs above them and give you help. whether prayers, emotional or manutal labor, whatever they can do to help.  ~ Jan Cook.

 

I dreamt we walked together along the shore. We made satisfying small talk and laughed. This morning I found sand in my shoe and a seashell in my pocket. Was I only dreaming? ― Maya Angelou

 

My friends are true blessings who never judge me. They have been in my life for many years. I can confide absolutely anything in them and they make me feel safe and secure. I do the same for them.  ~ Kristie Palmore Willsey.

 

If you wish to befriend someone, look for a person who loves first God then themselves. If they love God, they will be able to love their neighbor, too. ― Petar Dunov.

 

Someone who consistently puts the interests of another above his/her own.  ~ Andy McCracken.

 

Kindred spirits alone do not change with the changing years.― L.M. Montgomery

 

A friend is one who is trustworthy, loyal and dependable. One who will be honest, even if it hurts. Someone with some common interests, though not always. One who keeps confidences, (unless it is some horrific crime or abuse against another person). One who encourages you, laughs with you, and cries with you. ~ Janice Tharp Garrison.

 

A friend doesn’t go on a diet because you are fat.― Erma Bombeck.

 

My friends are the ones I like to be with more than I like to be alone.  ~ Ryil Adamson.

 

“I have unclasp’d to thee the book even of my secret soul.” ― William Shakespeare,

 

A friend is somebody you have spent a lot of time with, time you have chosen over other things. Times of laughter and sadness. A true bonding of appreciation and caring for each other’s lives. A friend is somebody that you can be mad at and even distant at times but then when you call them up, it is like the issue didn’t even matter.  ~ Brett Wells.

 

Friendship…is not something you learn in school,but if you haven’t learned the meaning of friendship you really haven’t learned anything. ― Oscar Wilde

 

I would define a friend as safety. I don’t have many friends, but when I’m around them I can relax. ~ Amanda Irene Schulz.

 

If friendship is your weakest point then you are the strongest person in the world. — Abraham Lincoln

 

I think it’s wonderful and important to have people in your life who challenge you and your beliefs, and who offer opposing viewpoints, but in my case, the people I would consider friends (as opposed to acquaintances) are interesting folks who can have meaningful conversations about anything and everything, But ultimately share my world view.  ~ DeMaris Gaunt.

 

…it’s only on a black day that you begin to have friends.― Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn,

 

Friends are God’s way of letting you know that your mother is not the only one who likes you, who can put up with you for an extended period of time.  ~ Joshua Erney.

 

I find friendship to be like wine, raw when new, ripened with age, the true old man’s milk and restorative cordial. ― Thomas Jefferson

 

A friend is a soulmate…. a person who accepts me as I am, encourages me, fully supports me. A friend senses when I am down and truly listens to my issues. A friend is someone who makes me laugh, who likes to be goofy with me, who celebrates my successes and hugs me when I fail.  ~ Jeanne Jordan.

“The world is round so that friendship may encircle it.” ― Pierre Teilhard de Chardin.

 

l picture of series of Venn diagrams where two people have enough shared overlap in different areas that they can have conversations that go deep in the areas where they overlap but also are free to expand each other in different directions.  ~ Robert Retherford.

 

It is one of the blessings of old friends that you can afford to be stupid with them. — Ralph Waldo Emerson.

 

Well a friend is someone you like and enjoy being around. Someone you can trust and you know will support you when you need it. Someone who stays in touch.  Being a good listener is important.  ~ Linda Roberts.

 

My best friend is the one who brings out the best in me. — Henry Ford.

 

A friend is someone you want to spend time with even when years have passed. It’s someone who knows you and still thinks you’re awesome. A friend is willing to help you even when you don’t know you need help.  ~ Jennifer Atkinson.

 

“How lucky am I to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard.” ― A.A. MilneThe Complete Tales of Winnie-the-Pooh

 

A friend is someone who cares about you, listens to you, likes to be around you. It’s really great to have a friend and it takes effort to be a friend.  ~ John Dobbs.

 

Because he needed a friend so desperately, he never found one. ― Joseph HellerCatch-22

 

A friend is someone who knows the good and bad side of you, but at the end of the day and no matter what they are always there for you through thick and thin. Someone who you can call upon in your time of need.  ~ Carol Stephens Quirl.

 

Oh, if I had had a friend at this moment, a friend in an attic room, dreaming by candlelight and with a violin lying ready at his hand! How I should have slipped up to him in his quiet hour, noiselessly climbing the winding stair to take him by surprise, and then with talk and music we should have held heavenly festival throughout the night!― Hermann Hesse

 

A friend is someone you can call in the middle of the night if your car breaks down and you need a ride.  ~ Steve Franz.

 

“No man, ever indulged more freely or happily in that playful facetiousness which gratifies all without wounding any.”
― William Wilberforce

 

A friend is a trusted counselor, ready to listen and advise on the good and the bad.  ~ Matt Blashill.

 

[Spiritual friendship] is eagerly helping one another know, serve, love, and resemble God in deeper and deeper ways.
― Timothy J. Keller

 

A friend is someone you trust.  ~ Chris Sitler.

 

Where friendship blooms, life is reborn.― Vincent van Gogh