Voicelessness and Emotional Survival > Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board
Making New Friends
BonesMS:
--- Quote from: Twoapenny on November 03, 2013, 01:06:14 PM ---
--- Quote from: BonesMS on November 01, 2013, 06:27:13 AM ---"Bones, I hope you get more good days and bad. And someone to play with Smile Yes, I know people like that. I have a friend - who I try and see less of now - who just last week wrote a date down on my calendar without asking me whether I was free or whether I wanted to meet with her and the other person she'll be with. And I don't want to, the other friend is someone else I rarely hear from and I just don't want to spend time with her anymore. I honestly feel scared about saying that. But I feel I'm being deceitful if I don't tell the truth."
Thanks, Tupp.
From my perspective, you're not being deceitful when the other person REFUSES to HEAR YOU!
--- End quote ---
Thanks, Bones. I think I'm starting to get my head around it all a bit more now. I think what I want in a friendship is equality? There will always be times when one person is more capable than the other for all sorts of reasons. But I think I'd got to the point where I felt like I was making a lot more effort than other people were. I think I also still feel a bit as if I don't have a right to choose who my friends are. I think I've mentioned in this that I've always been very passive in friendships and I've sort of gone along with other people regardless of whether or not I want to be around them and/or enjoy spending time with them. I've also got to a point, I think, where I can see that there are some people who I did/do like but our lives have got to a point now where the relationship just isn't sustainable. I suppose friendships are like romantic relationships in the sense that sometimes it just runs its course, there isn't always a big reason or a situation.
But I think what I do want in my life are friends that make a similar amount of effort to see or spend time with me and who enjoy my company and aren't just filling time until something or someone else comes along. I think that's happened a lot to me, largely because I just let myself go along with things. So I'm making an effort to connect more with other people. I think there is also that comfort zone of doing something even though you don't really want to anymore? So I'm trying to get out of that now as well.
--- End quote ---
You're welcome, Tupp.
I'm saying too much right now as I'm feeling really cranky about a 3-D situation here.
Hopalong:
Tupp--
Two "secrets" (from learning everything the hard way):
1) "Keep the line moving." (IOW, meet a LOT of people...hence, community, exposing yourself to groups, more and more.)
2) Reciprocity. (If you do #1, eventually you'll find some folks who seem to respond, and respond adequately.)
Bonus secret: Keep enough "score" to be aware when relationships (and who reaches out) are way out of balance, but not so precisely that you can't tolerate variations in "appetite for connection."
xxoo
Hops
Twoapenny:
--- Quote from: Hopalong on November 05, 2013, 09:00:36 PM ---Tupp--
Two "secrets" (from learning everything the hard way):
1) "Keep the line moving." (IOW, meet a LOT of people...hence, community, exposing yourself to groups, more and more.)
2) Reciprocity. (If you do #1, eventually you'll find some folks who seem to respond, and respond adequately.)
Bonus secret: Keep enough "score" to be aware when relationships (and who reaches out) are way out of balance, but not so precisely that you can't tolerate variations in "appetite for connection."
xxoo
Hops
--- End quote ---
Hi Hops,
Yes, I see what you're saying here. I've been thinking about this over the last few days and I realised that when we were little my mum's preferred form of punishment was silence. She'd go days without speaking to us over some misdemeanour or other. So I think now when I call someone and they don't call back it triggers that feeling of "what did I do? Why am I being ignored? When will it stop". When we were kids I used to trip over myself to get her talking to me again, and I think the shift in that behaviour is that I stopped returning people's calls straight away if it had been weeks since they'd called me. I know it sounds childish (like a sort of tit for tat) but as I look at it now I think it was breaking the pattern in the behaviour. I'd call them, get silence for two months and then be so grateful that they'd called me that I'd ring back straight away and be very effusive and chatty. And that was really pissing me off; I felt I was being treated badly but jumping through hoops instead of complaining about it.
So I think what I'm trying to do at the minute is trying to get that balance of not being around people who trigger too much but not cutting out so many that I'm left with no-one. But definitely meeting new people is something I'm getting better at and feeling more confident about :)
Hopalong:
I understand that so well, Tupp.
To me, the silent treatment feels like shunning.
I also have a very hard time with managing the "space" between connection, sometimes.
love
Hops
Meh:
--- Quote from: Twoapenny on November 06, 2013, 03:43:53 AM ---
So I think what I'm trying to do at the minute is trying to get that balance of not being around people who trigger too much but not cutting out so many that I'm left with no-one. But definitely meeting new people is something I'm getting better at and feeling more confident about :)
--- End quote ---
Yah,
Finding the "right" people if they even exist is quite the process I suppose.
I find that a lot of people are very selective with whom they become friends with and I never really figured it all out to be honest.
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