What Do You Mean by “Friend”?

In 1994, I finally made it back to my Hapkido dojang after being gone for about eighteen months after the "spleen incident."

I had missed that place.

The construction economy and job market had been rough in 1992 and 1993, and I had been trying to recover financially as well as physically from the splenectomy.

For a long time, getting back to training simply had not been possible.

So when I finally returned, it felt like getting a piece of my life back.

Then one Saturday, something happened that I have never quite been able to shake.

Peter Batte came running downstairs from the upstairs locker room asking if anybody knew CPR.

I did.

Or at least I had.

During my electrical apprenticeship we had gone through CPR certification regularly, about every six months.

It had been a couple of years since the training, but I still knew what needed to happen.

Brian Buck and I ran upstairs.

Robert von Pape was collapsed on the locker-room floor after coming out of the shower.

Brian and I started CPR.

We kept going until the paramedics arrived.

Robert did not make it.

I did not know Robert well.

He had not been around during my earlier years of training in the 1980s, and even when I had been at the school before the injury in 1992, I had not really gotten to know him.

So I am not going to pretend I know why he died.

I just know what Brian and I experienced that day.

One minute it was another Saturday at the dojang.

The next minute two guys who normally trained together were on a locker-room floor trying to keep another man alive.

Crisis Can Make People Feel Close Fast

Before that Saturday, Brian and I were guys who trained together.

We liked each other.

We got along.

Afterward, something changed.

We had been through something together that neither of us expected.

So we started spending time together away from the dojang.

We would get something to eat.

Maybe have a few drinks.

Talk.

Get to know each other as people instead of just two guys wearing uniforms in the same class.

Shared experiences can create closeness quickly.

Going through something like that together certainly accelerated things for Brian and me.

But eventually Brian said something that made me stop.

He called us friends.

And I basically said:

I beg to differ.

Which probably sounded ridiculous considering what we had already been through together.

We had literally tried to save a man’s life.

We trained together.

We spent time together.

I liked him.

He liked me.

What the hell else did I need?

Apparently, I needed a definition.

What Do You Mean by “Friend”?

Brian and I started talking about what the word friend actually meant.

That is when we discovered we were not really arguing about the relationship.

We were arguing about the label.

Brian’s definition of friend was much broader than mine.

What he called a friend, I probably would have called a buddy.

What I called a friend, he probably would have called a best friend.

And we only had a couple of those.

So the disagreement started shrinking as soon as we defined the word.

That stuck with me.

Because we do this all the time.

Two people use exactly the same word and assume they mean exactly the same thing.

Sometimes they do.

Sometimes they do not.

And if nobody stops to define the word, you can have a hell of an argument over a disagreement that barely exists.

For younger me, friend had a pretty demanding definition.

A friend was somebody I had known long enough to know that I liked them.

Somebody I wanted to continue having in my life.

But there was one more requirement.

We had to have fought.

Not punched each other.

Not thrown each other across the dojang.

I mean we had to have had a real disagreement.

Something uncomfortable.

Something that put pressure on the relationship.

And then we had to have kissed and made up afterward.

That was the test.

Why Did I Need the Fight?

Looking back now, I am not sure the fight itself was ever the important part.

I think younger me wanted evidence.

• It is easy to like someone when everything is comfortable
• It is easy to get along when neither of you is disappointed
• It is easy to feel close when both people are getting what they want

But eventually something happens.

Someone says no.

Someone screws up.

Someone hurts somebody.

Someone feels ignored.

Someone gets angry.

Someone thinks the other person is wrong.

And suddenly the relationship is under pressure.

That was what I wanted to see.

Who are we together when it is no longer comfortable?

How do you fight?

How do I fight?

Do we try to solve the problem, or destroy each other?

Can I tell you something you do not want to hear?

Can you tell me something I do not want to hear?

Can either of us admit when we screwed up?

Can we come back afterward?

Because for me, that last part mattered most.

Maybe the fight was never really the point.

Maybe the repair was.

Character Shows Up Between People Too and the Difference Between Friendship and Trust

I have been thinking a lot lately about character.

What do you do when the boss is not watching?

What happens to you under pressure on the mat?

Relationships give us another version of the same test.

What happens when the pressure is between two people who supposedly care about each other?

It is easy to call yourself loyal when nobody has disappointed you.

It is easy to call yourself honest when the truth costs nothing.

It is easy to call yourself forgiving before somebody gives you something real to forgive.

It is easy to talk about communication before the conversation is one you desperately want to avoid.

Then the relationship gets uncomfortable.

And now we start learning things.

Not necessarily whether somebody is a good or bad person.

People are more complicated than that.

But we start getting evidence.

• Can this relationship carry disagreement?
• Can it carry disappointment?
• Can it carry an apology?
• Can it carry somebody being wrong?
• Can it carry two people who remember the same event differently?
• Can we repair?

That matters to me.

Brian and I Eventually Passed the Test

Eventually Brian and I did have our fight(s).

I am not going to turn it into some dramatic story because the details are not the important part.

We disagreed.

It became uncomfortable.

And afterward, we repaired it.

We kissed and made up.

Figuratively.

And in younger Chuck’s classification system, Brian had crossed the line.

Buddy became friend.

Brian probably would have said friend became best friend.

Different words.

Pretty similar relationship.

More than thirty years later, we still keep in touch.

That is evidence too.

Maybe much better evidence than any label either of us used in 1994.

We Use Relationship Labels Fast

I think we sometimes call people friends very quickly.

We meet somebody.

We like them.

We have things in common.

Maybe we train together.

Work together.

Travel together.

Spend a lot of time together.

We feel close.

So we call each other friends.

Maybe we are.

I am not interested in becoming the friendship police.

Brian’s definition was not wrong.

Mine was not necessarily right.

But I do think there is value in recognizing that different relationships have accumulated different amounts of evidence.

Chemistry is evidence.

Time is evidence.

Shared experiences are evidence.

Showing up is evidence.

Keeping confidences is evidence.

Conflict is evidence.

Repair is evidence.

Years are evidence.

You do not need to distrust somebody until they pass some artificial test.

But maybe you also do not need to pretend you know everything about the strength of a relationship before life has put any weight on it.

The Book Brian Gave Amy and Me

Years later, when Amy and I got engaged, Brian gave us a book.

​Smart Couples Finish Rich by David Bach.

He was continuing a tradition.

When Brian had gotten engaged, somebody had given the book to him.

So when Amy and I got engaged, he passed the lesson along.

I continue the tradition with my BJJ "buddies."

One of the useful ideas in the book was that couples need to talk clearly about money, goals, needs, and what those things actually mean to each person.

That probably sounds obvious.

It is not.

Money is not just money.

• “Enough” does not mean the same thing to everybody.
• “Security” does not mean the same thing.
• “Support” does not mean the same thing.

“Quality time.”

“Successful.”

“On time.”

“Clean.”

“Responsible.”

We walk around using these words as though everyone received the same dictionary when they were born.

Then we get pissed off when another person violates a definition we never bothered to tell them we had.

Brian and I had already learned a version of that lesson years earlier.

With one little word:

friend.

Words Matter. Shared Definitions Matter More.

The funny thing is that Brian and I were not that far apart.

He was not saying we met yesterday, therefore we are lifelong brothers.

And I was not saying I refuse to trust another human being until we have a screaming match.

We simply had different thresholds attached to the same label.

Once we talked about the definitions, the misunderstanding disappeared.

That makes me wonder how many disagreements in our lives are partly semantic.

Not fake disagreements.

Not meaningless disagreements.

But disagreements made worse because two people are arguing with different dictionaries.

One person says:

The other person says:

Maybe they are not lying.

Maybe support means encouragement to one person and practical help to the other.

One person says:

“We spend plenty of time together.”

The other says:

“We never spend quality time together.”

What does quality mean?

The problem is not always that someone does not care.

Sometimes we have not defined what caring looks like.

Friendship Is Not Proven by Never Fighting

Thirty years later, I would probably change part of my old definition.

I do not think I need to deliberately have a fight with someone before I am allowed to call them a friend.

That would be stupid.

But I still care about what younger me was trying to learn.

Can the relationship survive reality?

Can we disagree without turning each other into enemies?

Can we disappoint each other without destroying the connection?

Can we tell each other the truth?

Can we apologize?

Can we forgive?

Can we repair?

Because no relationship stays comfortable forever.

Not friendship.

Not marriage.

Not family.

Not business.

Not training partners.

Eventually pressure shows up.

And when it does, character becomes relational.

It is no longer only:

Who am I?

Now it is:

Who are we when something comes between us?

Brian and I started getting to know each other after one of the most surreal Saturdays of my life.

A shared crisis made us closer.

A disagreement over one word made us define what we meant.

Eventually conflict gave us the evidence younger me thought I needed.

Repair gave us more.

And thirty-plus years of staying in touch gave us more still.

Then years later, Brian handed Amy and me a book that carried forward essentially the same lesson:

Talk about the words.

Talk about what you mean.

Do not assume the other person is using your dictionary.

Maybe that is part of friendship too.

Not agreeing about everything.

Not avoiding every uncomfortable conversation.

But caring enough about the relationship to define, disagree, repair, and keep learning who the other person actually is.

So here is a question worth asking.

Not just about friendship.

About every relationship where the word matters and the definition probably does too.

What important word are you assuming the people closest to you define exactly the same way you do?

Because sometimes the relationship is not the problem.

Sometimes you just need to compare dictionaries.

⚔ The Dojo Drill

Today’s training:

The 5-Year Vision Drill

Write a paragraph describing:

Your life in 5 years if everything goes right.

📚 Leader’s Library

​On Character by General Stanley McChrystal​

Why?

McChrystal examines character as something built through the choices we repeatedly make and the discipline to live according to the standards we claim to believe in.

That raises a harder question than simply asking whether we have good values:

Do our actions actually match them?

It is easy to meet the standard when the boss is watching, the instructor is standing there, or somebody is keeping score.

Character gets more interesting after they leave.

Eventually the external standard has to become your standard.

That is when you find out who you are becoming.

P.S. Know a martial arts gym owner who’s stressed about money or student numbers?

Do them a favor: send them to The Leader's Dōjō, my website where I help owners get more students and keep them longer with simple systems.

One forward from you could change their gym: The Leader's Dōjō​

Chuck