Navigating Friendships
Friendships can be deeply rewarding and also deeply painful when they go wrong. In this episode we discuss relationship problems that ended up touching on the biggest questions in life.
Transcript
Welcome to honest talk about heartbreak, dating and relationships, relationships, the podcast helping you navigate your path to happy ever after with your host, Rob McPhillips. I've not really done a lot of work in terms of friendships, so I'm not really clear on what people want to talk about and what the biggest issues are going to be. So if we talk about. In the group's. Really, what you'd like to get out of how you like your relationship friendships to be improved.
Any problems that you have in your friendships? And then we'll come back and go from there, because we've got to have some new people just to remind everyone that we record the audio of what was discussed in the main room. And but what was said in a bright carriage is private, so. Yes, sir, we only the audio and first time. Right, so. He wants to sort of sum up some issues that came up in breakout rooms.
I don't know whether I don't mind. So basically what we can do with shamers in order to. To attract a friend, especially when you've got to be a friends yourself and show, in other words, it's about being comfortable within within yourself, and then once you're once you've got that level of comfort, when you meet another human being, regardless of gender or age, that person will automatically be attracted to you because of the quality that your students from yourself.
So I gave an example yesterday where I went on when I went on a walk with another Meetup group, which had never done before, and my expectation wasn't negative. I wasn't thinking I'm going to go on a two hour walk with a lot of the people who we don't know and they don't know me and I'm going to be bored and will I enjoy it. I just went with complete serenity in my own head, and when I arrived, I instantly got so wimbish, like all grown.
And then we spent the next two hours walking around up in a really good laugh and I really enjoyed myself. But at the end, once I had listened to the other people, other people's conversations whilst I was there, I was aware that although I would be able to hold a conversation with them, they were compatible, compatible with myself and I wasn't compatible with them. So it was like like it had automatically attracted, like by me not doing anything.
Yeah, yeah, I think that's that's that's one of the key things, I think, of the issues underlying friendships. And I was discussing. That's some friendships can be hard to start, like one party will recognize traits in another person that they've just met that they like, but they're barriers that the other person presents. And sometimes it's a bit of a challenge. You almost have to work at it to get through that, to get to that friendship.
And I was setting an example with myself.
A friend of mine that I met at university, we were in the final year together and the initial meeting was one of she just didn't like me at all. She just was like this, you know, but I liked her.
And I know we're best friends. And she lives in London. And, you know, we have been friends ever since.
But it took effort, it took a lot of time and I had to, I think, suppress some of some of my natural instincts, behavior to not antagonize her and to allow her to see that I meant well and and study partners who were in the same group and study group. And so we got to know each other and. You know, I was a bridesmaid and her daughter's godmother, I mean, we're that close. But it took it took months.
And that was really developing the trust and then once you trust it, yes, I think there was a lot of anger in her and I think she saw me as.
I hate to say this, but she she was at the time we were like polar opposites and she didn't recognize that she had things going for her that I didn't have.
She she's an accomplished musician, she has a beautiful singing voice. She has been on television singing and well, this is in Jamaica, OK? And so very talented and and a pretty girl.
But she was twice my size. So for her, it's like, OK, you're looking skinny thing, you know, sort of thing.
And I'm large, but I can't sing to save my life, OK?
I'm not a single I'm so she had things that I admired and looked up to and I, you know, and I had given up on my music lessons and all the rest of it. And here she is. Great. You know, going off to competitions abroad and all the rest of it. And I'm in all of her.
But she just looked at me and said, oh, that's the pretty girl that everybody's after. I don't like her kind of thing, you know, and I don't that's not that's not me that's on the outside, you know.
It took a while for us to get. To the point where we could actually emerge as friends. Yeah, I can see I can see how that relates to what Alan was talking about in terms of, you know, relationships are barriers are really it's a self that puts the barriers there. And so, yes, I can see some commonality of that. Did anyone? I like to start from problems because I think when you've got a problem, you're able to to analyze that is, did anyone have any problems that they wanted to talk about?
Yeah, actually, I had one that I was sharing with the group, so I have a very good friend. We've been best friends for five years and the last few months, a few weeks, I feel like we are growing apart and I'm not sure.
I feel like I'm changing, but she's not changing the same direction and she's going through some things as well, and it makes me feel like she's less open actually towards me and what is happening with me and she's less empathetic.
That used to be and I confronted her about it today, that I felt like she was insensitive towards me a few days ago and it just really bounced off her and she just really didn't get it. And I'm not sure if I should. Try to have another go, like in a really structured way, explaining her where I'm coming from, what I feel, or maybe it's time that I just kind of like. Let it go a little bit and let it be a little bit closer, friendship and.
Focus on the relationships in my life. This sort of relates to we were discussing we sort of had a breakout room here in the main room where.
Sometimes friendships, people change and then the friendships change. And so I think you have people in your life for some maybe for the lifetime, some for less parts. It's like as we change in different stages of life. Relationships change. Do you feel like where you met? And the friendship was at its strongest, all the situations like the situations you used in her life, have they changed? Yeah, I feel like we are in different life situations and I feel like I used to have most of my life, I wasn't conscious of that.
My whole life revolved around my relationship. So like, I was always in long term relationships, but it just I just had too much emphasis in my life in relationships and.
Those kind of things, and I'm going through therapy at the moment, and I really feel like something is shifting in me and I don't want to live like that anymore. I want to have fulfillment in my life. And then if I have a relationship, that's great. But I feel like she's still just a little like her mind is like all about dating and that will fix everything. And I can't relate to it. And I don't want to be one of the things.
But but otherwise, she has so many good qualities as a person and. When I got to know her, but now I also feel like she's kind of going through some sort of mid-life crisis and she's changing like I think she used to be more compassionate, but she's not like that anymore. And I'm kind of puzzled. Have you asked her anything about her situation? Yeah, like we talk about her situation all the time, but. But, you know, like.
When she feels down, you know, and she's explaining telling me her thing, you know, I need to understand what when I say what is bugging me, she's just brushing it off, you know, and it doesn't feel nice, like.
I think Alan Alan made a good point earlier about forcing the issue, I suppose it sounds like you you've you reached out to try and mend the relationship, to find out what is wrong, to see if it could be salvaged, if you could be close together again. It sounds OK. And if she is if she understood what you meant. So if it was a meaningful conversation where she really understood what you meant, but she is still rebuffed and said, no, I'm going my own way, then I suppose you can't you can't force the issue.
At the end of the day, you cannot only self. And if you are healing yourself, then you know you have to you have to go on your own journey, I suppose.
Yeah. Oh. No. Yeah, I think so. But you've got to be. You got to be true to yourself, I think, and without. Without without being desperate for other people's company, hmm, this is, again, the point that Alan was making, quite rightly. Yeah, you've got to be comfortable with the company will come back and change. Change is good. Change happens all the time. We can't have because we are not the same people that we were when we were first born grow and change as a person ourselves.
And things don't stay static. Change is always supposed to happen in life. That's how better things come along. Hmm. That's my belief. No, thank you. I was just going to say in the back on the back of that is that. They've left then they weren't meant to stay. Left, they were never meant to stay, so. I think would be an injury, we will look at things through the level of our own understanding and the level of our understanding about anything, least of all somebody else we know almost any of us here truly know about ourselves.
Probably not a lot. And we're here to ultimately discover ourselves and and find out how we can interact with other people more successfully with more children. I'm afraid that's got 10 friends. I have got probably about 10 close friends. So I'm not here because I'm laughing friends, but I'm here because I'm looking to get better relationships with the friends and better relationship with Michelle. But, you know. Nobody ever walked away if they were meant to stay and.
What we've seen before in regards to why people go well, we don't know the answer to that because our level of understanding is is absolutely mind youth and we we'll try and ask them. They might not give us the answer. And even if they do, they might not give us an honest answer. That's where the acceptance comes in if someone's walked out. You just got to let them go and move forward in your life because your life is more important to them even.
Mhm. Yeah.
I think sometimes you need to be cynical and just think to yourself, does this person take away more than that.
I know that can feel quite harsh, but at the end of the day we have a very short time on this earth and also maybe even shorter than we think it might be. So why should we spend it with people that. Take away more than they give. I know that sounds cynical, but I, I know. Also, I think that. Friends come in different packages and feel different needs in in a person. They have different purposes. So I find as I have gone along my friendships, it's almost like they alternate depending on what's happening in my life or their lives or if they need me, if I need them, depending on what's what's happening.
Then one friend will probably be closer at a particular point and another friend. So it moves around. But there's still all we're still all friends.
And also in my situation, I find that if my friends, I keep my friends separate in a sense, I don't try to make them become friends, too. I don't force that. So when I'm with one friend that I give that person my full attention, that's my friend, I'm dealing with you, but I don't try to put two or three of my friends together and force them to be friends because I'm your friend, but also. My friends, I go to different friends, so different things, I get different things from from different from from from from from each one of my friends.
And Alan, you have a small group of people that you turn to, you know, most of the time.
And also, I suppose there are layers of people who you reveal your inner self to, some more so than others. So, you know, there are some who.
