For those of you who apologize when you talk about what’s troubling you:
Skennedy Work: *thinks* Some people consider it a personal drain on themselves when someone else is struggling, and they aren’t “getting it.” They say, “I’ve -told- you what is wrong, now -fix- it” and when they don’t do that, the person gets angry, blaming them for not following through with their solutions, or even the solutions they came up with themselves in conversation. So they cut them loose, saying, “I’ve had enough of dealing with their drama.”
Skennedy Work: I consider whether it affects myself, in that if I’m a party to the problem, and I’m crying over it, -then- something may need to be done to preserve my sanity. If it isn’t about me… what harm is it doing me? Some people pick things up right away, and some people -DON’T-. They struggle when the answer is in front of them, and no one can make them see it, but that is simply a FACT. Nothing to get emotional over, just like it is useless to get angry at someone who can’t write with their left hand.
Skennedy Work: Saying, “I can’t be friends with you because you ask me out for coffee every day to go over the same old thing” is really throwing the baby out with the bath water.
… we all just try our best to deal with our problems, as we can, and everyone has choices they can make, and none of us makes the right ones all the time. If someone is worth being friends with, if they are trying to sort things out for themselves, it’s just egotistical to think that they -must- follow -your- advice. ’cause, they just don’t, and sometimes won’t, and dropping people when they sometimes don’t exceed your expectations when it has nothing to do with -your- life says far more about you than them. Either you accept error-correction as a vital part of being human, and the failure to correct something (read: ADAPT) as natural, or you are placing the bar so high, no one can make it over.
Especially yourself.
you are one of the smartest people i have ever known. wise beyond your years. and a good friend. i haven’t know you for long but i can see why people seek your advice, and friendship.
Thanks, Bob, you aren’t too shabby yourself. ;)
At the same time, some people are just toxic. They work through problems to find new ones that occupy the same 99% of their waking time. They hate everything, their relationships, their jobs, everything sucks, always and nothing ever gets better – mostly because their attitudes don’t change and other than whining, venting and moping, not much is done to change things. Some people live at that level because it actually becomes normal to them and they know no other way. As someone who has struggled through emotional abuse from a parent, depression and my own negativity issues and am just now coming out the other end, I have to decide how much emotional energy I’m going to pour into someone who turns having problems into their career, before I look out for myself and move on. I am responsible for ME, and with a true friend, I’ll be there to support and help any way I can. But when I reach the point where I realize that they are the way they are for the constant attention and drama, and there’s no sign of change in the future, I’m outta there. Period.
I was going to comment with something quite similar.
You can see my comment to her, if you’d like.
I think many people have extremely high expectations of logic that do not apply to most people, especially when they’re inside a problem, instead of looking at it from the outside. If someone obssesses about a problem of theirs or if they use their problem to get attention, that is a separate problem entirely.
What I’m saying is that if someone has an issue in their life that they aren’t correcting, that’s their right. I can give them all the advice I like, but I can’t get offended when they don’t take it. If they come to me because the problem persists, I can say, “of course it does, you didn’t do X” or I can say “this will just keep happening until X happens” or “That was my advice and I’m sticking to it”, but it’s their choice to make, and if they don’t want to follow what I have to say, bully for them.
Other people feel differently, and I think it depends on how people grow up and what sort of stresses are put on them at that time, but it’s no skin off my back to talk to a friend about something that’s bothering them. It’s literally not my problem, it’s theirs. Their load to carry. Empathy isn’t sympathy.
Well, of course you can do what you’d like, and particular circumstances vary. I guess I look at it like this: If a person comes to -me- because they want me to listen to what is going on with them, particularly if they ask for advice… I am obliged to give them the straight dope. They don’t have to believe it, they don’t have to follow it, but I do my best to say how things are.
I won’t lie and say that people don’t sometimes get offended at things that I meant as honest assessment. Telling someone that their real problem is that they won’t address their own problems, that they are driving people away because they make large issues out of objectively small circumstances, these are all important things to tell someone, y’know? And they’re all things that hurt to hear, especially from someone you care about. If someone has problems that are so bad they need treatment from a professional, that needs to be said, too.
I have certainly pushed people out of my life before for my own mental health. If someone is on me every day, it becomes my issue, know what I mean? Perspective plays a big part. I’m not going to turn my life upside down in order to be physically there at every whim of someone who is having problems they can’t seem to wrap their heads around.
That said, I’m still here, and still care about them.
Well said, and I agree with all of it. The last person I cut out of my life got several sittings down with me where I explained that their problems had become the center of our friendship and their life and that they were alienating not only their other friends, but my friends, my entire wedding party and sometimes total strangers with her erratic behavior. After several talks like that I had to give up on her for my own sanity.
There are points in here that I agree with, and those that I don’t.
How do you deal with those that -hunt you down- to tell you the same problems over and over again. Whether or not you give advice, they make no movement forward in their life. They have chosen to lie in their emotional and mental filth until someone comes along and does the work for them.
Do you suggest keeping these people around you? I’m not interested in a “do as you like” response… I would like to know what you would do in this situation.
Are we talking about no movement forward in -their life- or in a particular problem? Ultimately, I am not close friends with those who do not move forward in their life at all. I choose my time as I can, and I’ll take the time to go to lunch with someone, even when they hunt me down to tell me the same problems again, but I’m not going to spend the day holding their hand. I won’t make someone’s decisions for them or take action when they need to do it themselves.
What -should- I do? I know you took it very personally at the time, but there was a day when I told you that I thought -you- enjoyed sitting in your own pain. Maybe you agree or don’t, looking back, but it didn’t both me to listen to you talk about what was going on with you, even so.
Does a person ‘use you up?’ Do they say “yeah but” every time you open your mouth? These are communication issues.
I guess my point is the same as I made for the other two people who had similar reactions, which is that there is a large difference between a normal friend who can not move past a problem, and someone whose psychological instability is causing problems in your relationship with them.
A person has to learn on their own, as I see it, and if they ask for advice, I will give it to them, but it has to be their choice and their actions, and their responsibility.
This is a little less clear than my original commentary, do you see what I mean, or am I just muddying the water? The issues change when the person is truly unstable and not just stuck in a rut.
No, this just muddies the water.
There comes a point, whether acquaintance or good friend, that behavior and refusal to move forward, wallowing in things of their own creating, etc, that they become unhealthy.
It is not wrong to cut these people out of your life.
I’m not trying to make a moral judgment, I’m simply stating my point of view.
We all have unhealthy mental traits, and I still see a very important difference between someone having a personal problem that they can’t seem to succeed at correcting and a behavior problem.
I just can’t say to someone, “We can’t be friends because you can’t figure out what to do about your career” or whatever.
I try to draw a firm line between giving requested advice and getting involved. Taking on someone else’s stress as your own is the advice-giver’s problem, and an unhealthy one. *chuckle* Perhaps the person venting their problems should step away instead, at that point. *muses*
People are illogical creatures that do things contrary to their own survival sense. It seems like few people really accept that, especially intelligent, self-assessing action-oriented people like ourselves.
You’re stating an inherently moral point of view. In stating that point of view, in having that opinion, you have made a moral judgement. I’m asking you to be more specific.
I’m asking you that if a friend goes from having a problem that they can’t seem to succeed at into having a behavior problem, will you cut them out of your life?
Because this is what you seemed to be railing against in the original post. Your last paragraph is beside the point and outside of the conversation entirely.
The stepping away that you mention in the fourth paragraph is the cutting out that you said you were against. I’m asking you to be clear.
I suppose I should be clearer about where the moral judging is. My point of view -is- a statement of what is right and not right, and so it is a moral judgment, however, I’m not trying to tell anyone that their action to cut someone else out of their life is wrong for them. A number of people have commented in such a way as to say, “yeah, but when the person with the problem is a jerk, you don’t think it’s wrong to walk away then, right?” And my response is “Of course. That’s not related to my original post, that’s a separate problem. Your friend is a jerk. Case closed.”
I’ve thought about every person that I -have- intentionally cut out of my life, and in each circumstance, it was because there was something wrong that was affecting me personally. There are others that have what I’d term a behavioral issue that doesn’t affect me, and no, I haven’t removed them from my life. Why would I need to? Do I dislike them? Is this behavior hard on me personally? No, and No, in these circumstances. If the answer was yes, again, I see that as a separate circumstance.
Why do you see my last paragraph as being outside of the conversation? It is a fairly vital part of my consideration of other people, and why I don’t take it personally when someone else fails at something, why I don’t decide I can’t hang out with someone just because something isn’t working for them. That was the original question I was answering, which you have extended by saying “well what if the circumstances are different, what would you do if their behavior is different.” I say different behavior, different situation, different result.
“Taking on someone else’s stress as your own is the advice-giver’s problem, and an unhealthy one. *chuckle* Perhaps the person venting their problems should step away instead, at that point. *muses*”
That is my fourth paragraph, where I try to say that getting too involved in another person’s emotional turmoil is a problem of the caregiver (or whatever you’d term the person), something they need to take care of themselves, which means they have a problem, which means the other person would have just as much reason to walk away from -them-, if that was the correct thing to do to such people. Of course it is what I said I was against, I did not imply that doing so would be the right course of action.
The sound of one hand slapping
Agreed totally. At what point does letting a good friend vent become enabling? Scott makes the point about “being angry at someone who can’t write their left hand”. It’s a good point, and that’s true enough. However, what do you do about those people who keep trying to write with their left hands, can’t manage it with any amount of success no matter how ahrd they try, and constantly cry about not being able to write with their left hands?
Them: I can’t write with my left hand! I’m never going to be able to write with my left hand! It gives me blisters! Waaaaaah!!!
Me: Your right hands works just fine. In fact, you have nice handwriting when you write with your right hand. Why don’t you just write with your right hand?
Them: I can’t write with my left hand! *sob* Waaaaaah!
Me: You’re right-handed. Most people are. Very few people can write with their left hand. Why don’t you just write with your right hand???
Them: *tearfully and with much snotting of nose* I love writing with my left hand! I can’t stop! I shouldn’t have to change if I want to write with my left hand. Owie! It hurts so bad! The blisters! Ow!
Me: Most right-handed people can’t write with their left hand no matter how hard they try. Even after years most people can never achieve the precision they command with their right hand. Use your right hand, for Dog’s sake!
Them: I know what I’ll do! I’ll get counseling for myself and my left hand to find out why it won’t let me write with it. Then I’ll be able to make it work! I wanna write with my left hand! *sniffle*
Me: WTF is wrong with you??? *goes home and unplugs telephone*
Re: The sound of one hand slapping
*laugh* very amusing.
You know, it is perfectly okay to tell your friends to suck it up. ;) That doesn’t, to me, mean “don’t talk about it”, but “you’re going in circles. This is the state of things. Now what are you going to do?”
*shrugs*
“WTF is wrong with you???” … heh. That’s OBVIOUS, though. *shrugs* It doesn’t hurt me to say it again, or to say that they’re going in circles, or whatever. They’re not a stranger, not some random person who IMed me for advice ’cause their dog died and their mom wants to cremate it and put it in their cocoa, they’re a friend of mine who is hurting or unhappy. *shrugs* Of course a person must draw a line when it starts involving -you-. Telling someone that it has to stop, or telling someone to shit or get off the pot isn’t the same as leaving them entirely.
I think someone’s been eavesdropping in my head. :)
I think the hard part of all that (though I think most people will ever come to that conclusion anyway) is that you, for yourself can occasionally struggle with when it’s become your problem, when it’s effecting your sanity and health.
My old best friend, my former MOH (here’s the story) was a sweet girl, and we’ve known each other for years, nigh on 3 or 4 now I think. Last year, living with her, her problems were always my problems, but should I want to talk about anything that was bothering me, she just walked away. However, she felt it was ok to give anyone and everyone an earful on whatever bothered her.
Happily, I don’t miss her, mainly because most of the last year I sat by and watched her attack and abuse other I know and love. The dynamics of our close friends has changed, and while I loved her much, and miss the girl she was… she was no longer, and after many talked, honest confrontations, and attempted discussions, I finally had to let her go, for my own mental health. And it’s been the best choice I ever made.
That aside, I agree with you completely. My closest friends and I all talk like honest adults, and I am willing to say the unhappy thing when need be. I’d rather hear it from a friend who loves me, then someone else who doesn’t.
Right on. There’s no excuse for just being a crappy person ;)
Your cruel indifference won’t stop me from writing with my left hand!
I usually have a high tolerance for hearing people talk about their issues. I don’t want to be the kind of friend that says, “Sure, I like you, but only if you keep up a facade of always being positive and happy.”
But there are a few places where I’ve had to draw the line. It was usually when someone had gotten to the point where they were using my sympathy to manipulate me.
There have also been some times when I have really reached my wits’ end with girls who would repeatedly go back to physically abusive boyfriends. I would regularly hear the details about just how dangerous these guys were and it would get to the point where I would be a constant nervous wreck, worrying about what would happen to them and still feel helpless to do anything about it. With a couple of these, they had also made me promise not to tell anyone what they told me about these guys. So, I was carrying this burden of being the only one who knew what danger they were in. Sometimes, I did want to say that if they wouldn’t leave them, I didn’t want to hear about it anymore. But then, I would also be afraid of abandoning them in that situation. I really don’t know how I would deal with this sort of thing in the future.