This is the second post in our Tough Cookies series where we address friends who make friendship hard. Last time Sally wrote about The Demanding Friend. This time . . .
It’s 10:15. You’ve been waiting at the park for 15 minutes past. You text your friend who was supposed to meet you. She texts back, “I thought 11. Getting ready now.”
It’s happened before. You thought you were clear. You’re left waiting thinking of all you could be getting done at home.
Photo credit: meditationbeats.com
You wonder if your friend is just unaware of time.
You also wonder if you’re unaware of how unclear you are.
******
You’re on the beach and your friend starts doing yoga in full swing. After reps of Downward Dog and Warrior, you start wondering how to point out the strange glances she’s drawing. You’re wondering if she cares as much as you do.
Is she just blissfully unaware?
******
You’re traveling abroad and find yourself at a ruin in Italy where all bathroom stalls are out of toilet paper. Your Type A friend always carries a roll. When you try to break her away from the group to privately ask for her stash of tp, she cheerfully pulls it out and hands you five squares. When you ask for the whole roll, she pushes you over the top by loudly demanding, “Just tell me how much you need?”
What do we do with unaware friends?
When do we share that their unawareness is bothering us?
Many of the unaware things we do (crunching ice, interrupting, popping our gum, monologuing, etc.), while annoying don’t necessarily mean the friendship is over. We just need to evaluate how important the annoying things are… to us and to our friendship.
Every friend will do something that shows they’re not as aware of the things we care about. We do it, too.
This doesn’t mean we have a doomed friendship. But if we’re honest, we will admit to ourselves and God that their unawareness bothers us. Pretending we’re not bugged only means our denial will spill out in “unintentional” hinting, which then becomes our unawareness bugging others.
We always need to admit it to ourselves.
Sometimes we need to share it with our friends.
So when do we bring it up?
Try using these questions to process:
- How much and how badly does their unawareness bother me? Is it keeping me from loving them well?
- Could your friend say of you, “She really lets me be me, even though I know we disagree or she doesn’t like it when I ….”? In other words, are you a safe person?
- Is your friend safe? When you want to bring up something that bothers you, how do they respond? Are they glad you noticed and shared? Are they insulted? Do they receive your observation with interest or curiosity or are they threatened and hurt? This will indicate how honest they really want you to be with them.
- It helps to think of the four seasons friends as the best to begin those honest conversations that start with, “When you do x, I end up feeling embarrassed or annoyed…”
Let’s say you’ve figure out your friend is
- truly annoying you by being unaware and this is keeping you from loving well.
- a four seasons friend, open to hearing your input.
So how to your bring it up?
First, draw back into your memory of when YOU were that unaware friend, the one who didn’t know you didn’t know. Remember how blissful it felt to be unaware, for a moment. Remember how ashamed you could feel when someone alerted you to your ignorance without bathing it in understanding?
This is our first lesson: If you’re going to let an unaware friend know, enlighten them kindly.
Think of how you like to learn you have spinach in your teeth. I don’t want to learn this from my bathroom mirror after hours on the town with my girlfriend. I want to be told, discreetly, ASAP.
For instance:
Direct approach: “Hey, you’ve got spinach in your front teeth. This one (tap your own tooth in a mirror so your friend isn’t digging around in her mouth for five minutes).”
Indirect approach: “I think you have something in your teeth, you want my mirror?”
Friendship works because our friends see the exceptional qualities in our souls that no one else can offer them. These are often the flipsides of the things that bother us. So anytime you’re about to wallow in your friend’s unawareness think of the reason she’s like that. My always-late friend, for instance, is never annoyed when I’m late. My yoga loving friend is someone I could never embarrass I’m public. Your tp rationing friend is…. someone who….
Photo credit: redbookmag.com
well, that might be worth bringing up.
I have an unaware friend who either doesn’t know she causes her own stress or hasn’t admitted it to me. A week before she was supposed to move out of her apartment NOTHING was packed. I told her I would help her pack/move as much as I could. I spent hours packing most of her kitchen one night. Then I spent hours loading up cars and a trailer and then unloading her stuff at her new place. She kept complaining about how she didn’t have enough help and this move wasn’t going the way she wanted it to go. If only she had a husband who would take care of all this. You get the point. She thanked me for helping, but I never felt like it was enough. I saw how the situtation was less than ideal, but there were a lot of things she could have done to help it be less distasterous. This type of thing makes me want to help less in the future, which is a terrible attitude. I’m struggling to know if I should say something or just let it go. This is a friend I see weekly for a Bible study group, so we’re close in some ways, but not in others.
This is a great example of an unaware friend. She may not be connected with how she creates part of her own problem…in a sense pushing people away because they no longer want to help. I actually do not think that this is a terrible attitude to have, I think it is you responding to the situation – appropriately. This friend seems to wait for people to help – this is not uncommon…many people feel loved when others help them. But this can be abused, as it sounds in your situation…all the while she is complaining and saying more people should be involved, more people helping her, etc.
What is your gut about saying something? It might be uncomfortable. How has the friendship handled confrontation in the past? You might be sticking your neck out given that you are not best friends, but you also offer her something in being honest with her. Especially if she is wanting closeness with others, including a husband, she might benefit from hearing from you. You could talk to her in a “Can I tell you what that was like for me…” form instead of “I see something you could work on…”.
There are a few posts we have written about confrontation and being honest. Those might give some good ideas, but I also recommend your going with your gut, being realistic about what you might lose (e.g. a friend), and what it might cause (e.g. an uncomfortable situation where she responds angrily). When we share or confront, there is no guarantee that the other person will appreciate our bravery and honesty.
This is a difficult part about choosing to be honest with a more unaware individual…or any friend really…the friendship can grow in honesty or stay status quo. Often times when we are faced with someone being honest with us about us…it is just hard…and many times it is stuff we already know and can connect with on some level. She may agree with you, she might have heard this before, she might know there is an achey part in her that longs to be cared for that manifests in her being unaware and dependent.
Thanks for writing in – you offer a story that highlights what Jonalyn says in this post.
http://letmebeme1.wordpress.com/2011/02/22/ready-shoot-aim-confronting-friends-without-losing-them/
http://letmebeme1.wordpress.com/2011/04/06/dead-end/
http://letmebeme1.wordpress.com/2012/03/20/the-reason-most-friendships-dont-last-a-lifetime/
I have a friend who I think may be unaware of friendship boundaries. About a year ago, we went our separate ways. She had become so filled with emotional pain under various circumstances that she chose to wallow in bitterness and resentment. She had been one of my best friends for many years. To our mutual friends, she preferred to come across as a victim. I had invested a great deal into the friendship but realized about a year ago that I needed to leave it be. I thought our conversations to work on the relationship were meaningful for both of us, but nothing changed. I felt very drained by her. By then, my desire to be in her life had also gone.
Now, I am having trouble and am confused by the way she has been reaching out to my friends online, friends who she knows only because I am close with them. Most of my friends don’t know what happened and I plan on keeping it that way, but I am rather surprised by the way she befriended them online, compliments them, tries to make plans with and offer advice to them. I don’t know if that makes her unaware, or if she knows it is hurtful to me. While I don’t mind not hearing from her anymore, I have difficulty moving completely forward when I see all of these attempts to reach out to these aquaintences and friends of my own. I am embarrased by her behavior, but deep down it hurts and it feels awkward that I am somewhat connected with her.
That felt great to share that. Thank you for your blog. I have found it to be so healing and redemptive. Blessings to you both!
Hi Amanda,
Thank you for your kind words about LetMeBeMe… It means a lot that you’ve found our thoughts helpful and hopeful. Redemptive and healing are good words for us to hear.
This is a very good example of a potentially unaware friend. It sounds like the best case scenario is unawareness. Even so, due to your desire to be more healthy and not do double emotional work with her I think it is wise to process your emotions separate from your friendship with her.
While this will be jumping to conclusions based on limited knowledge her reaching out to your fellow friends/acquaintances when this was something she seemed to distinctly lack in your friendship feels underhanded to me. Almost as if she’s trying to remind you of what you’ve left.
It is not mature.
It is not kind.
And while it may be unaware, it flows from a heart need.
That you feel embarrassed and awkward is appropriate. Her behavior is embarrassing and bizarre. It’s almost like an ex-boyfriend trying to get close to your girlfriends.
That said, her decision to compliment and interact with them online is nowhere the kind of friendship she longs for.
I believe feelings the embarrassment is step one.
The next step is stepping into acknowledgment that her behavior and strangeness is not a reflection on you. As this blog is titled, “let her be her.” She does not reflect you, she reflects her own heart. And her heart is hurting, she is making mistakes because she seeks love.
Out of the heart the mouth speaks. I would suggest you work on, as a third step, a plan to pray for her to recover, to notice her pattern of unawareness or worse, to come clean with her behavior to herself and to God.
This quote about Snow White comes to mind. I hope it helps.
“What does Snow White want?” I ask him.
“She wants love.”
“And what does the evil Queen want?”
“She wants power.”
“But what does the Queen really want?”
“Love.”
“What does that mean?”
“She’s making a mistake.”
from: http://carlosantoniodelgado.com/2012/06/22/things-i-believe-are-the-same-as-or-different-than-things-you-believe-even-so-even-so-some-notes-on-so-called-christian-art/
Thank you for your encouragement and kind direction, Jonalyn. I really appreciate your time!
Looking back, I don’t believe I’ve ever sat down and expressed my feelings of how her comments were hurting me. I wanted to avoid being blamed for being too sensitive or judgmental. I assumed she would understand my pulling away from her after a competitive, difficult relationship for so many years. I think she feels like I disappeared, no matter how hard I encouraged her and was there for her. I am (almost) done with the feelings of inadequacy I was experiencing, because of not investing as much as I used to.
This whole process has most certainly stretched my relationship skills. I’ve learned a lot from this friendship, and I might have approached things a little differently was I fully understanding of my limitations and needs. Things remains as I wrote above, but I have started to pray for her…and truly mean it.