This Saturday, 30 July 2022, is the day to cherish the friends you choose as family on International Friendship Day. One should actually be doing this every day… Still, on this specific day, we show our appreciation and love by sharing cards and gifts, catching up and visiting your favourite hand-out, which we’re assuming is your favourite PNA store.

So, get your head around the plans for this weekend with your bestie to remind them (and yourself) why they’re your best buds! But first, allow us to explain why you need friendships.

Why do we need friendships?

Friendships can enrich your lives in many ways, teaching you about yourself and challenging you to be better. Here are 6 quick reasons why friends are necessary to your health –

1. Friends contribute positively to our physical health, which can help decrease our risk of health problems such as diabetes, heart attacks and strokes. They also decrease feelings of loneliness, increasing our longevity.
2. Friends encourage healthy behaviours through lifestyle changes. For example, they can steer us away from eating doughnuts the whole day to exercising daily. People are much more likely to attain goals when buddied-up.
3. Friends provide emotional support through tough times and through happy times as happiness is contagious among friends. A study has shown that depressed high school students were twice as likely to recover if they had happy friends.
4. Friends help build confidence because they know our self-doubts and insecurities, and they’ll offer praise and reassurance always – shining the light on us.
5. Friends reduce stress through stressful events. Friends in tense situations help us produces less cortisol – a hormone released by stress, which can harm the heart’s arteries, gut function, and the immune system.
6. Friends provide a positive influence pushing you to be your best. Friends teach friends their values of being generous with their time, helping others, and being ambitious or family-orientated. Friends have the power to mould us into our ideal selves.

All of the above is great, but how do we know when acquaintances become friendships?

An acquaintance of a friend?

If you fall, an acquaintance will help you up, ask if you’re okay, and never mention the fall again. But if you fall, a friend will laugh at you now to turn an awkward situation into a funny memory later. This example carries some truth, but a friend will treat you with respect and make you feel happy and like you belong.

Unfortunately, there is no formula for turning an acquaintance into a friend. However, having acquaintances is also crucial because they can become future friends. It just takes time, and you will know when you’re on the next level – you feel comfortable knowing weird and awkward things about them. You can share anything, and they won’t abandon or judge you.

How to celebrate our friendships?

Whether far or near, this day, more than any other day, is the chance to reach out to your friends so they know we care and appreciate them. Buy something from PNA that celebrates what your friendship means to you, or make something by using the tutorials available from our blog or videos.

Alternatively, scroll our Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. We guarantee you that you’ll find something!

Happy International Friendship Day… “We all need somebody to lean on.”