Olumurewa Damilola.

 Establishing relationships is one thing as humans we should never neglect because relationships are a bane of human existence. The truth is we all need each other and since we cannot cannot live by ourselves, we just have to make friends. We are designed to have emotions and feelings so it is only natural when you feel attracted or attached to a particular person but how do you know that what you have towards someone is just Philia or it is “complicated”?

Some people do not know how to sort out their feelings towards the opposite sex. Some consider mere infatuation as love which makes their relationship complicated. First of all, it is important to know the definition of friendship. Friendship is a state of enduring affection, esteem, intimacy and trust between two people and the foundation of most  friendships is trust. Having taken note of what friendships means, where the problem lies or where things start getting complicated is when people do not know how to draw the line in a friendship. This is as a result of not knowing how to define their feelings. We have to learn how to sort out feelings, avoiding complications and destroying long lasting friendships we have with people.

Another reason we find ourselves in complicated relationships is that we do not accept the fact that there is more to our feelings towards that particular person. You just live in denial; refusing to acknowledge how you feel towards that person. It should be noted that what is being stated here is relationships between opposite sex.  Most do not just want to voice out their feelings towards the other person waiting for the other person to voice out his or feelings first which kind of puts both of them in a bad spot and a state of confusion so they coin the word “complicated” to define their relationship status. It does not have to be like this where both parties are in confusion when one can just confess how he or she feels towards the other then they can both decide and agree whether they want to be in a romantic relationship.

Moreover, in this Gen-z generation where most people love and are  free to explore so many acts, including the most insane things, it is not so surprising that some people just love being in complicated relationships because they are scared to put a name to the relationship. These sets of people do not want to be friends and they also do not want to ‘date’, so they just want to be in the middle of nowhere making everything complicated for themselves. Those people who are scared to put a name to their relationship are often sacred that once they put a name to what they are relationship it takes away the fun of being confused or being in the middle so they just enjoy the way their relationship is complicated with no label attached to it, it may sound crazy but it is the 21st century and almost everything seems absurd. However, some are just scared of commitment while some suffer from trust issues. 

For some people they are just caught in a web where things just got out of control and it became complicated. Started off as friends and along the way started developing feelings as they got attracted to each other then they moved to friends with benefits” because what they just feel is infatuation but it is hard to remain friends with benefit because one wants a sense of commitment and “something like a relationship” while the other is not ready to commit since they are just friends with benefit then the other tried really hard  to show the other what being committed to someone looks like hoping that the other will reciprocate. Then, all of a sudden they just realize that they are just in a web where they are  neither friends nor lovers and they call it a complication whereas being in a relationship with someone should not be this hard.

If only people could learn to define their feelings and have a  clear cut idea of what friendship really means and when and not when to pursue a romantic relationship with someone then maybe sustaining friendships and relationships would not be a problem and a complication.