And just like that, we also have a favourite person. A person who’s not a part of our family so we aren’t exactly biologically programmed to love them.

But because we choose favourites, we choose our favourite person and label them as our ‘best friend’.

And while it may feel like this feeling will last us a lifetime, human beings are subject to change.

So does that mean our favourite person could be replaced too? Is the idea of having more than one best friend not valid?

While that is what pop culture has fed us all our lives, that we have one BFF and that’s how it is supposed to be like, there’s a possibility that won’t happen in real life.

I’m definitely not the same person I was at 16. And even though my best friend grew up with me, we certainly did not grow up the same way.

I love her the same way I did when I was younger. But to be honest, I have come to realize that we don’t have a lot in common anymore.

There comes a time in everyone’s life when things change over a period of time and relationships are on top of that list.

Friendships are very capable of running their natural course and more often than not, it happens gradually enough for you not realize it right then.

Don’t get me wrong. It’s not that I don’t consider her my best friend anymore. Because I do. But since we are very different people now, there are several things I don’t really share with her anymore.

We pick our favourite person based on a lot of things. The way we dress, the things we like to talk about, our favourite foods and a lot more. But that doesn’t mean we have to make it work even when our choices change. 

This acceptance helped me when I met, as I would like to call her, my adult best friend.

I met her on the first day of college and we didn’t seem to have much in common based on first impressions.

But as we gave each other more time, we realized how easy it was for us to talk without any self-censorship. And the moment you find out that you don’t need to filter your conversations, you know you’ve found a person to cherish.

I started addressing her as my BFF. And even though I treated my best friend from school the same as I always did, there was something very different about the one I met in college.

I think it had a lot to do with the fact that, even though a little later in life, we literally grew up together from clueless 18-year-olds to young adults who were ready to face the world. 

Distance plays a huge role when it comes to maintaining relationships. And the fact that we would spend almost every second of the day together made us fond of each other even more.

However, as we grow up, we refine the way we choose our friends. It has a lot to do with maturity and to be honest, we definitely make smarter choices.

But the journey doesn’t end there. Unlike college. Which did end. And both of us went our separate ways. Geographically.

It’s not exactly the easiest thing to do, keeping in touch with someone 24×7.

But life goes on and everyone tries their best to maintain relationships, and if you’re lucky, you manage to do it really well.

Now as a 24-year-old with a million things on my mind and my latest favourite person far away from me, I felt lonely.

But loneliness isn’t a permanent state of mind and life doesn’t let you feel a certain way for too long. Thankfully.

I started working and met a lot of new people. And in this pack of new people, my favourite person just stood out.

He was nothing like the kind of person I had been friends with earlier. But since the high school me and the college me were so different, I concluded that the working me is also a brand new person.

A brand new person with brand new preferences, life choices, and goals.

My latest best friend is my saviour at work. It mostly has a lot to do with the fact that he can relate to whatever I have to say because we work in the same place and share a lot in common.

I still talk to my college best friend about everything that makes me happy or bothers me. But it isn’t exactly the easiest thing to do since she isn’t aware of my day-to-day activities.

It comes back to this frequently asked question, “don’t you feel like you’re betraying your other ‘best friends’?

And to that, I have to say no, I don’t feel that way.

I feel that I am glad I have this realization that it’s okay to have multiple best friends for multiple purposes.

Not everyone understands everything and it feels great to have a few people to go for different things.

I am fully aware of who gives out the best advice for what kind of problems and who celebrates my victories because they understand my full potential in that particular field.

While it might sound like there could be a clash here but the reality is that it’s absolutely alright to have more than one best friend.

The best way to maintain separate friendships is to never compare one with another.

Each of my best friends have their own special place in my life. And they don’t necessarily have anything in common.

And that is the beauty of multiple best friends.