Who hasn’t had problems with their friends once in a while, right? Well, when it comes to me, I can’t stand it when “drama” comes up between me and a friend or anyone else I’m close with. It wasn’t such a problem when I was in high school because I had one best friend who was a girl and we molded so well with each other that it was never really awkward. Maybe we were distant for a while here and there, but never any big fights. We just understood each other.

But coming to college, I wanted to meet more college women who I could relate to. It started off great – we had late night dorm chats about everything from school to boys and we would do each other’s hair and makeup before every party. But when I had my first confrontation with a girl I’ve been friends with all year during my freshman year in college, it was pretty bad. It was pretty much from the fact that I didn’t know how to be sensitive towards different kinds of people – I just thought everyone was like my best friend from high school and I just assumed that I didn’t have to worry about anything!

Everything got resolved but I gained an important insight to how to keep relationships going and intact: Communication. I’m not talking about just being there to talk to each other whenever problems arise, but I’m talking about saying the right things at the right time. Seems pretty simple but it’s hard to actually put it into action.

So what did I really learn? Apologize for anything you could’ve done to make the other person feel bad. Even if you think it’s okay, it’s all an assumption. People take things in different contexts. And try not to attack the other person while talking to them. That creates the other to get into a defensive mode and trust me, you won’t get anywhere with that. Oh yeah, and end on a light note. Joke around about something that both of you will laugh about or you could even be honest and say,”Oh my gosh, I’m so glad we got this out of the way. I really didn’t want to make you mad!” and give them a hug (of course).

What do you guys think? Let me know if you’ve tried this! I hope it’ll work for you as it has worked for me.