Each week, Samantha Lewis shares her insights on various topics, from exploring new health trends to reimagining personal growth.
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We talk a lot about communication in romantic relationships, but the older I get, the more I value it as the backbone of every relationship we have; friendships, family, colleagues, the people we love, the people we are learning to love, and even the people we are slowly outgrowing.
Communication is the bridge that keeps all these connections intact, especially when life shifts and dynamics change.
There’s a particular tenderness required when friendships move into new seasons.
When someone you adore enters a new relationship, it can stir up all kinds of feelings, excitement, hope, worry, and sometimes a quiet fear that the friendship might change in ways neither of you planned for.
And beneath that fear is usually care.
Genuine, human, heartfelt care.
Sometimes a friend’s reaction to your new chapter is not about judgment at all.
It is about what they’ve held for you.
The nights they stayed on the phone while you cried.
The moments they picked you up off the bathroom floor of heartbreak.
The times they nursed you through endings and watched you piece yourself back together.
There is a protective instinct that grows in those moments, a guard dog of loyalty that sits beside them.
When a new person comes into your life, that instinct can bark a little.
Not out of jealousy or judgement, but out of devotion.
For many of us, there is also the “broken-wing fixer” pattern.
When someone we love has been hurting, we swoop in.
We tend, we care, we help rebuild.
It’s beautiful, but it can blur something important: the moment that person is well again.
Ready to fly again. Ready to explore love again.
And if we’re honest, it can be a strange feeling to loosen our grip and trust that they will navigate this next chapter safely without us hovering.
That’s why communication matters so much.
Without it, we begin assuming motives.
We project fears.
We create stories that were never true.
But when we actually speak, and I mean truly speak, we give the relationship space to breathe.
Communication means saying, “Hey, this new chapter is big for me, and I’m excited … but I’m also a little scared.”
It means allowing a friend to say, “I love you, and I’m just worried because I care.”
It means asking, “Are you wanting advice right now, or just someone to listen?”
It means recognising when we’re offering guidance from love and when we’re offering it from fear.
Boundaries help too.
Beautiful, gentle boundaries.
Knowing when to step in, when to step back, and when to simply sit beside someone and trust their process.
Boundaries honour both people.
They give friendships room to adapt instead of rupture.
And maybe that’s the heart of it: adaptation.
Relationships don’t stay the same, and they aren’t meant to.
They stretch, soften, tighten, evolve.
The people who walk beside us change shape as we all grow.
What keeps those relationships intact is not permanence, but presence.
Not stability, but willingness.