Published on 12, July, 2020
How do you feel about doing this and if others do it to you?
E.g. you've not heard from a close friend in a while. You begin to feel a bit insecure and you just want to check in on them to see how they are, and whether or not they're angry with you. Or if they're happy with being your friend.
I used to do it once in a blue moon, not regularly or anything, but I'd still hate myself every single time. I feel like I'm being difficult and irritating. I would worry that at some point, someone will flip out at me - "I'm just busy, I haven't got the time to chat" in a way that might leave me feeling they hate me for asking.
Even though I know that if someone approached me in the same way, I'd be honest with them and I wouldn't think bad of them. If anything, I'd welcome the fact they care that much.
That said, I can be quite cynical.
I do have quite a few friends.
But none of them I would call a true best friend (other than my dad) I mean no wonder I don’t have a bestie if I’m comparing them to my dad….. he’s awesome.
The type of friends I have are as follows.
1, the friends that your friends with because your child and their child are friends (basically if the children fall out you never see them again)
2, the couple friends that mostly my wife has encouraged to which I make an effort for her sake but I can take or leave.
3, the friends that you have known for a long time that let you down in their behaviour and I can’t forget. Eg attempting to be unfaithful to their partner if they are out. I just can’t forgive them.
4, I had a bestie for 35 years, since we were 5 years old. He lost his temper so much with me one day that he very nearly attacked me. He still to this day asks if we can get together but those days are over. Im not good at staying in contact with people unless it’s for my children. The thing with that is when you keep getting asked to do something socially if you turn them down enough times they stop asking. That makes it even harder to join in with stuff.
All in all I’ve got people I know and mostly pretend to socialise with but not really anyone special that I could feel totally at ease with.
So what do I actually have?? Really not sure but I guess when I get an assessment and actually tell people there may be some that surprise me… who knows.
Sorry if I sound ungrateful but people really do let me down in how they treat others and their lack of values.
Anyway finding this place and being able to chat to others on here is brilliant, part of my daily routine is checking my notifications and trying to see if there’s anyone I can offer a sympathetic ear to.
Long live NAS
Just humans and their eerie ways of socialising.One minute they’re all chummy with you and next minute they could stab you anytime.Difficult for people like us out there ….Regarding the discussions do you have any career related advice? I’ve posted a discussion but I’m not able to reach people ..hopefully you can help?
Not chasing what's not meant for you is something I've struggled with, and learned the hard way. Hopefully you'll find the right people.
With regards to your second point, it seems to be very hit and miss as to which discussions get traction.
One thing I’ve learned is that unless you don’t approach them ,they won’t come to you.Its like working hard to earn them ...unless they are jerks then don’t bother caring about them.I was in similar situations like these a lot of times and they didn’t talk to me unless I spoke to them and you start to pick up a hint that they are a waste of your time.I would say focus on yourself more ,trust me being independent will help you grow rather than mingling with irrational humans….
Also if you don’t mind me asking… I’m kinda new here and I wanted to discuss some things but i don’t think I’m able to reach people.Are you people using tags of some sort for reach ? If so ..where can I find them?
I went too far the other way and reached out far too much, pushing them away as a result.
Ideally I'd have had a balance of the two. The problem is while I used to communicate with people a lot, we didn't get to the root of a lot of things and I dodged the more vulnerable conversations. I'll regret that forever.
One of the reasons I’m so poor at keeping friends is that I hesitate to reach out to them because I feel like I’ll just be bothering them and they don’t really want to hear from me anyway - if they did they would call or text me.
I realise this is self defeating.