Losing Friends

[Wiseman2]

A lot of people use social media to keep up with classmates, former coworkers, old friends, people from their home towns etc.

 

Why not update your social media with new pics especially your new area, job, activities, etc. Also follow and friend your hometown people and comment on/like their posts to continue the rapport and stay on the radar.

 

Join LinkedIn with a good profile and upload your contacts, join some alumni and professional groups on there. It's a good way to network and perhaps make new contacts with people you have something in common with.

[Batya33]

Balance comes from having more than one friend. :)

 

Some friends tend to value me more than I can focus on valuing them at a given time, so I extend the same flexibility to others when they have other priorities in their lives.

 

Keeping old friends is a dance that allows for divergence. I have some friends from early childhood, and while we can maintain regularity in some stages of our growth, we recognize that we are not always growing in the same ways or at the same pace--but the love is there.

 

Sometimes history trumps my ego, or the love does. Other times I recognize when someone isn't equipped to treat me well, and I'll fly off of their radar without burning a bridge. Often that person grows into someone who can appreciate me through new vision, and we'll synch back up to make a go of things on higher ground.

 

There's no one-size-fits-all in friendships. Sometimes we need to downgrade into acquaintanceship or back burner certain friends when contact isn't in our own best interests. None of this criminalizes anyone, so no dramatic endings are called for. Just a change in focus.

 

Yes, totally true. What I was referring to was not the flexibility but there is a point, at least for me, where it's too one sided so that I'm not only valuing that person more, I have a strong sense that the other person is never going to value me in any meaningful way whether or not there are other priorities. When the love as you aptly put it is no longer there. I am totally fine with someone stepping aside with a frank explanation "too much going on right now to keep in touch -I'm fine and hope you are well - hope to catch up another time" but part of the foundation/love is that commitment -future commitment -to want to resume when things quiet down. And sure if the love returns, no burnt bridges. But I also stop reaching out at some point because self-care also means valuing yourself and respecting yourself so that you're not feeling uncomfortably needy/desperate.

[catfeeder]

Yes, totally true. What I was referring to was not the flexibility but there is a point, at least for me, where it's too one sided so that I'm not only valuing that person more, I have a strong sense that the other person is never going to value me in any meaningful way whether or not there are other priorities. When the love as you aptly put it is no longer there. I am totally fine with someone stepping aside with a frank explanation "too much going on right now to keep in touch -I'm fine and hope you are well - hope to catch up another time" but part of the foundation/love is that commitment -future commitment -to want to resume when things quiet down. And sure if the love returns, no burnt bridges. But I also stop reaching out at some point because self-care also means valuing yourself and respecting yourself so that you're not feeling uncomfortably needy/desperate.

 

Well put. This is exactly what I mean by flying off of someone's radar when you sense that they aren't in the right frame of mind to appreciate you. It doesn't need to be confrontational. It can either be a fade or you can explain that you're offering some time and space to regroup at a later date.

 

The point is just to be aware of your intentions and avoid the rubber-band SNAP of hurt feelings that people often unconsciously use to cause drama and end relationships with crash 'n burns. I've seen this a lot, especially among friends approaching graduation or coworkers who've worked together in harmony for years but are facing a layoff. Suddenly it's all about conflict to cause anger rather than suffer the pain of a bittersweet parting.

 

Hurt feelings can feel like a 'forever' state, but they're usually temporary provided that we don't stoke them and cultivate them into a bigger barrier than is really necessary. Sometimes people rub us the wrong way or visa versa, but dramatizing our self talk with words like 'betrayal' or 'unforgivable' (or other extreme language) attempts to rationalize a permanent rift out of stupid stuff. This makes no room for the idea that time and distance will grow us and someday teach us how to spin such stuff another way that's actually more beneficial to our own psyche.

 

Time and distance combined with growth usually equals a new perspective. So if we make room for the idea that we don't know 'everything' yet, we can often look back and see things in a new way that never would have occurred to us at the pivotal moment we opted to fry history.

 

Time changes everything because it changes us--IF we allow for that and keep our options open.

[catfeeder]

Yeah I'm realizing those who can appreciate my new vision and life changes that I go through. And I feel bad to downgrade a once really close relationship but when I'm not seeing any reciprocation, I'm more inclined to do so. "There's no one-size fits all in friendship" -that's the truth right there

 

Sometimes there's just a natural course of divergence because something foundational has changed. In your case, that's distance. Most people have sincere intentions of maintaining a friendship when they say goodbye--and then life happens. This doesn't make anyone a villain, it just shows up as neglect. But the foundational change can be one friend going knee deep in diapers while her single friend glazes over every time she can't complete a sentence without screeching-baby-interruptus. We all reach different stages of life at different times, and sometimes those reshape us into a lousy fit with certain people during that time.

 

This doesn't speak of 'forever,' and that's the thing young people don't get. They can't envision the joys of their next reunion in a few years because they've trashed 'what was' with permanent hard feelings. So what if you don't do that? What if you just roll with your new life and decide that this is a private challenge for you to cultivate new relationships while putting your old ones on a back burner?

 

It's not an 'all-or-nothing' deal, it only feels that way because you've not yet learned to pull back your microscope. So focus on expanding your scope. This will add a whole new dimension to your perceptions, and you'll be less inclined to freeze frame the limitations of your old friends at this time.

 

You don't know what you don't know yet. Go THERE.

 

Head high. This is much bigger than 'them,' and you can embrace it or miss it. (I vote for embrace!)