Insecurity 101: I look so bad in this picture.

The trend of #liesgirlstell came up on twitter last weekend. I found a lot of retweets of this lie:

“Upload pics to Facebook, comment ‘I look so bad in this picture.’”

Made me think of why Samantha Brick was condemned. She took “bad” pictures and still liked herself.

How dare she!

When I see pictures of myself with other friends on Facebook, I usually look at myself first.  How do I look? Did those clothes work?  Whey didn’t someone tell me my hair looked like that?

Do I look okay?

A good photo can give me a feeling of security, while a bad photo can make me wonder about how well I really come across?

I know I’m not the only one. How many of us have photos in our Facebook albums that we know look better than we really look?

I do.

Right now I have this wallpaper pic on my cellphone background. It’s of me and my son. I’m smiling a typical, non-photo op smile which means the dent in my cheek is obvious and my eyes are crinkled.

It’s a smile of pleasure, not a smile of perfection. But it’s me, that is how I look when I’m happy.

I put it up because it helps me work on the reality of what I look like when I’m not posing.

Each time I pick at my cell phone I get a little reminder that I’m neither glorious or hideous. THAT this is what I look like.

Quick, I tell myself, now look inside, what is bubbling up.

When I’m feeling insecure, the picture bothers me. I don’t want to look like THAT. When I’m feeling relatively stable I think, “Hmm, that girl looks really open and happy. I like her.”

Sometimes I want to change my wallpaper to a picture of my son. It would be easier.

When we post up a picture when we have strawberries on our teeth or one eye closed then it’s fine to say, “I look funny in this picture.” Last night during our family photos I wound up with half-closed eyes for a photo. It looked really funny.

But when we scroll through pictures of ourselves and we’re looking

like we look and our friends think it looks

great

and we don’t like it.

Well, if it’s an honest picture,

wonder for a bit about why you don’t like that picture of yourself.

Do we judge ourselves for looking just plain?

Do we think we deserve less love for looking less than glossy?

“Bad” pictures are interesting for what they reveal about our own tendency to hate the working body and soul God gave us.  

Take a second and try to observe without criticizing your face.

Or try to giggle at your own photo for second, then notice the soul within.

You might find your insecurity melting into affection.

Oh yes, you shaped me first inside, then out;
you formed me in my mother’s womb …
Body and soul, I am marvelously made!

The Message, Psalm 139:13-14

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A Penny For Your Thoughts…on Samantha Brick

We are hoping the readers of Let Me Be Me will weigh in on the

Samatha Brick topic!

Don’t know what that is?  Samantha Brick posted an article discussing her own beauty (worth reading). She believes she’s attractive, but, as Jonalyn tweeted it, believes it “unapologetically”.  The response has gone viral and people are responding strongly to her assertions.  Some are claiming:

• she is not that pretty
• she is crazy for verbalizing her experiences as an attractive woman
• it is awesome that she has brought the topic to light

In an interview on the Today Show (worth watching and reading), she shared a few more details about the article…and we learn a bit more about this woman as a…real person.

She lives in the French countryside, has four dogs, a great group of girlfriends…and is quite surprised and hurt at some of the responses she has gotten.  Is is possible she has been misunderstood?  Is it possible that we have heard her spot-on (get it…a British saying…:) ) and that she should have posted an article on something a lot less inflaming?

In this blog on female friendship, Brick has given us some good material to work with!

So, Let Me Be Me readers…what are your thoughts?

• Is there a little bit of Samantha Brick in you – you know your own beauty and have gotten a public response from both men and women because of it (e.g. free drinks, salty glances from other women)?
• Do you begrudgingly tolerate women like Samantha Brick?
• Do you have a Samantha Brick in your life?

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Poor Foundations for a Friendship

When I first moved to Virginia I knew I needed friends. It was easy to find girls like me.

Photo credit: pamsclipart.com

That’s a rock solid foundation for a friendship: similar interests.

I found a friend, call her Debbie, who loved French class and good tea, talking theology and breaking out of the box in loving Jesus. She cared about organization (have I mentioned that I’m really organized?) and was a true servant.

Seriously, she was always available for me. I cried in her dorm room when I found out some horrible news and I felt comfortable enough to ask for help with my laundry when I was in a pinch.

She was faithful, too. She’d stand up for me and stuck by me when a few other friends badmouthed me.

Sounds like a perfect friend, doesn’t it?

Just when everything seemed to be going peachy, when I would talk to others about how great and stable, faithful and true Debbie was to me, her younger sister came to UVA.

I met and befriended her because I felt a loyally to her, through my friendship to Debbie.

Surprisingly, this angered Debbie. You can hypothesize all you want, you can call it jealousy or possessiveness. You can say I was short-sighted to expect to be friends with both sisters.

Regardless, Debbie confronted and turned on me in a verbal attack I’m glad I’ve mostly forgotten. The words were searing, they took advantage of weaknesses I had revealed and cut me off.

When I prayed and thought and in the end asked for another audience with her, it was as if I was talking to another person. She even mocked me for asking for another chance.

Debbie used our closeness to be cruel. She finished our conversation with warning me away from her sister and set me up for months and months of coldness. Anytime I tried to be warm she cut me off with sarcasm or belittling remarks.

About this time I began analyzing what I thought we had as a friendship.

Was it all my fault?

Could I do something to make things better?

Photo credit: static.freepik.com

But years later I see what was wrong. As Virginia Woolf says, “Truth had run through my fingers.  Every drop had escaped.”

I didn’t realize the truth of two major things.

First, Debbie was quick to meet any need I had, but she couldn’t share a need of her own. She never let me help her. I can’t even imagine her crying on my shoulder or letting me do her laundry. She was needless. This was the first lie in our friendship. Now, I believe Debbie thought other people would judge her if she showed her needs. She, like all of us, believed everyone was judging her as much as she was judging them.  In looking back I can see that any time I let her help me, she ended up feeling superior, stronger, more “together”. There is nothing quite so poisonous to a friendship as taking the moral high road.

Every time.

Debbie could not admit to failing, to being wrong, to needing from me.  But, ironically she did need something, she needed me to need her.

Second, Debbie disagreed with the cardinal rule for all my relationships: there is never a good reason to be unkind.  Dale taught me that years later, but looking back I can see that it is a principle grounded in the heart of everything good about love.  Debbie believed my friendship with her younger sister warranted cruelty. To date she remains one of the most unkind women I’ve been so close to.

Her about-face in how she treated me scared me because I felt as if I was involved with someone who had two personalities.  It shocked and sent me on a looping road of what I had done to cause this.

But if there really is never a good reason to be unkind, then I can still ask and expect kindness even if I’ve made a mistake.

Looking back it would be easy to think of the years of being Debbie’s friend as a waste, as time lost with someone I am no longer close to.

But, I feel both sadness and gratitude. Sadness over Debbie and her current friendships (I know she continues to have trouble being close to anyone).  Gratitude to God, for working a deeper awareness of love and how to build friendships. Love rejoices in the truth, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13. And I didn’t let the truth about Debbie come into my belief in how great she was.

I know I need to find women who really rejoice in the truth . . . about themselves.  I need . . .

1- Friends who will let me help them as well as who will help me.

2- Friends who follow their unkindness with humility and apology.

3- Friends who don’t secretly believe they are better than me. Friends who I feel lucky to be close to and who count themselves lucky to hang out with me.

Good friendships will be natural in one way and hard work in another. But the naturalness will grow and the hard work will feel like a highway going somewhere, not a looping track.

Virginia Woolf described that naturalness well at a dinner party where she beautifully writes about the rich yellow flame of good conversation.  ”No need to hurry. No need to sparkle. No need to be anybody but oneself.”

What poor foundations have you found in your friendships? Will you share with us so we can build stronger friends for the future?

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She’s Not My Type

She’s Not My Type

As part of our January “Authors” month, we wanted you to see a bit more of who we are and how we make our friendship work.  We both completed a personality test – The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), which organizes personalities into different types.

This test is well-known and widely used…you might even know your own type!  What you learn from a test like this can be helpful in understanding yourself and others – the results are useful in all types of settings – career planning, social tendencies, ways of thinking and planning, relationships…and friendships!

Jonalyn (purple) & Sally (blue): A Quick View of How our Personalities Line Up

In comparing our results, I learned what I already knew.  Jonalyn is not my type – literally.  As you can see in the chart – there are places we overlap and have similarities…and there are places that leave plenty of room for miscommunication and misunderstandings.

What is Personality?
Personality is the structure of who you are, how you interpret and interact with the world around you, how you go about a daily tasks, how you work with the people in your life, how you think about things, how you spend your time.

Party!

Party!

What are you like?  What are your preferences?

One great way to evaluate some of your tendencies is to think of a party.  What does that conjure up in you?

• Feelings of excitement and anticipation, or, feelings of exhaustion and hesitation?
• Does the idea of planning a party appeal to you?
• What would you plan to do after a party?  Go out with friends or speed home and jump into your pajamas?

Other aspects of personality include response to how your time is spent, how you take in information from the world around you.

• Do you like plan and structure?
• Do you like hands-on experiences or learning from afar (e.g. let me try! vs. show me!)?
• Are you detail-oriented or do you work better with the “bigger picture”?
• Do you make decisions quickly or slowly?

Jonalyn & Sally

Jonalyn’s MBTI description:

• warmhearted, conscientious, cooperative, loyal
• likes to work with others to complete tasks accurately and on time
• notices others needs
• likes to be appreciated for who they are and what they contribute
• expresses self clearly and confidently

Sally’s MBTI Description

• tolerant and flexible
• quiet observer
• analytical, problem solving
• practical, logical, objective
• confident, independent, self-determined

You can see a wide range of attractive characteristics in both of us.  Jonalyn brings some color and energy into my world, and she encourages me to share myself without “editing” my “presentation”.  Jonalyn says about me, “Sally shows me how to be more honest about what I feel and believe.  She gives me courage to be more fully myself.”

You are SO….

You are SO....!!!

With such fabulous characteristics, how could our friendship ever experience trouble?  How could such fun and interesting people come up on times when we had hurt feelings over miscommunications or frustrations with the other’s way of operating.

In my friendship with Jonalyn, our differences sometimes land us in a place where it feels like something in our friendship has gone wrong.  These are the times that require us to calm our defensiveness, quiet our anger and insecurities, settle the stress that wells up inside.  And then, we work to embrace who the other is, doing our best to understand our “types”.

How can that happen?  Because any personality is beautiful in itself…any two personalities can bump into each other and create rough spots.  That is why to Jonalyn, I am hard to pin down when scheduling something and sometimes go quiet in big groups and was hard to get to know.  Or to me, she can seem too structured, too matter-of-fact, and a little quick to make decisions.

• Why can’t Sally plan further ahead of schedule?  She is SO hard to get a hold of.  OR
• Why can’t Jonalyn relax for a second?  She is SO quick to jump to conclusions.

My friendship with Jonalyn fairs so much better when we drop the “SO” and instead add some appreciation…choosing to see each other in the best light possible.

• Sally is one of my more open and self-aware friends.  She is always able to make time for me, even though sometimes I have to ask her specifically to be available for a chat.  OR
• I really appreciate that Jonalyn is an organized person who wants me to be a part of her life.  Sometimes she moves more quickly than is comfortable for me, but she does a great job being present when we are together.

For all personality types, there are potential areas for growth and openness to doing things differently:

For Jonalyn’s personality structure, places she could grow might be:

• gathering more information before making decisions
• working harmoniously in less structured situations or settings
• being overly sensitive to situations that upset harmony in a relationship

For me, there are ways that I am challenged to grow in my personality:

• maintaining an emotional, verbal and attentive presence in a difficult situation or relationship
• not postpone decisions
• embrace more structure and organization in situations and relationships

Foreclosure! Friendship For Sale!

Foreclosure!  Friendship For Sale!

Have you had an experienced this with a friend?  Your similarities create great places for you to connect, see eye-to-eye, talk endlessly, and spend time together without feeling guilt or frustration.  But then an instance occurs…something is said or done, and all of a sudden the “happy” feelings seem really far away and the only feelings you can access are defensiveness and irritation.

This is so common!  Many women foreclose on a friendship when differences surface…because those hard situations and conversations can be difficult to get through.

Think “Type”…not “Right”

Personality Type, Not Personality "Right"

One thing about personality, is that we are all made well.  There is no wrong way to be, but definitely some great places to grow.  It is easier to understand and cozy up to our strongest characteristics and offer less openness to another way of doing things.  Personality, and understanding each other as people with a style, a way of doing things and preferences, makes for a better place to breed feelings of appreciation.  Approaching a relationship with an idea of what is the “right” or “better” way to be makes it harder for you to succeed as a friend, and for your friend to succeed in being who they really are.

In an earlier post, I refer to what I call VMV.  Value, Meaning and Validation.  Things we are all looking for, but are often challenged when we reach hard situations.  This is what defensiveness is  - a quick “call-to-arms” to protect who we are and what we think.  Differences are places were we can see personality, characteristics, styles and preferences rather than problems, stubbornness and “right” ways to be.  (look closely at the picture! )

Although old and often forgotten, personalities and friendships fit well into the adage of The Golden Rule, “Treat others as you would want to be treated.”  In a friendship, we feel safe and loved when we can bring our whole selves, our whole “type” to the table…and welcome our friend’s type with open arms.

Interested?  Want to Try it With a Friend?

Interested in content of this post and want to compare types with a friend, spouse or relative? Contact me for more information!

Info credit:  MBTI information adapted from MBTI Manual 3rd ed. (2003).

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“I Just Don’t Like Women…I Find Them Uninteresting…”

I was caught by the phrase when watching The Good Wife (what an irresistible show!).  The main character, Alicia Florrick (Julianna Marguiles), whose life is constantly made public by her philandering politician husband, is having drinks with a colleague…who says,

Julianna Marguiles - The Good Wife

• I just don’t like women.  I find them uninteresting.
• Excuse me?
• I don’t like women.  They’re all competing with me.
• Don’t men compete with you?
• No, they don’t.

While this conversation is rich with content…women as uninteresting is a comment worth laughing at…and calls for a thoughtful pause.  This take on women is common…women not liking women.  Women stereotyping women, not seeing the potential that we have to support and encourage one another despite differences…which can prevent different types of friendships from growing.

There are plenty of women out there that prefer men as friends, think of themselves less as girly-girls and enjoy the company of someone who is less high-maintenance relationally and emotionally or even a little rough around the edges.

We don’t have to be best friends with everyone…or compete for first place…or hide our true selves.  The great part of being women is that friendship can grow out of differences or similarities…there is so much interesting to be discovered in the depth of any person.

The Good Wife – Season 4, Episode 5 “Marthas and Caitlins”, CBS.

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More Than Competition

We were all eating at this small restaurant with a large bar.  My guy friend was making eyes at the waitress, my husband was pretending not to notice and I was annoyed.

When the flirting started in earnest, I protested that she was too old for him.

“You’re just jealous,” he said.  ”All girls have it in for each other,” he muttered to his other friend at our table.

Catfight, girl-vs-girl, the mommy wars, call it what you like, but we’ve got this reputation that the only thing we hate more than a chauvinist is a gorgeous woman.  Men have lots of examples, my friend was about to give me some when I stopped him.

I took a second to pull into my heart and ask myself.

Was I really just jealous of our beautiful waitress?  When I thought it through I realized I wasn’t, instead I was annoyed that my friend was making a fool of himself and distracting our waitress from doing her job.  I felt that I was on her side more than his, advocating for a professional restaurant environment, wanting to give her a chance to show her competence more than her cleavage.

Maybe it was silly given that we were at a bar, but it wasn’t fueled by jealousy. I didn’t want my guy friend’s sexual attention. I wanted him to stop behaving like the dogs on Up, distracted by his “squirrel”.
We were in the middle of a good conversation about the motivations for late term abortion when his nose went up and he sniffed her, “Female!”  I wanted to keep talking and I thought I could sense that our waitress was anything but interested.In Mad Men, AMC’s award-winning series centering on workplace dynamics in the 1960′s, the marketing firm tries to sell Playtex bras.  The begin assuming each woman wears a bra for a man to notice her. Bras are for men.

They make the same mistake my guy friend made, thinking women are around for men’s benefit, forgetting his waitress had a job to do, just like the men on Mad Men forget the very practical points of bra-wearing for women in and of themselves.

My theory is that most of the girl vs. girl animosity out there begins with this false belief: women are around for men’s benefit.  If guys are the prize and your victory with my male friend means my loss, then you are automatically my enemy.

But, if you offer more to this world than a man’s accessory, then you can be more to a woman than her competition.

You can be her friend.

photo credit: webstockpro.com, screenrant.com/mad-men-season-4-premiere-end-date-sandy-55399, downwithsquirrels.blogspot.com/2011/01/great-squirrel-war-beginning.html

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New Beginnings: Trusting Again

Fresh starts.  September is a time of new beginnings with school and crisp weather, January with New Years, the month of April welcomes spring.  New beginnings in friendship can happen at any time of year, in any season.  Our last few posts have dealt with elements of a friendship that might call for a fresh beginning, including a wrongdoing or hurt feelings that call for forgiveness and moving forward. There are a few ways that we might make fresh starts in friendships:

• after a wrongdoing or betrayal
• making a new friend
• making a new friend after losing a friend
• learning to trust again
• breaking out of the same ‘ole, same ‘ole

As I began writing this post, the “learning to trust again” line stuck out to me.  Whether this is with a new friend or an old friend, trust is an element that softens a relationship.  Without trust, interactions and words seem to collide in both small and big ways, sort of banging together while one or both people try to protect themselves.

No Stranger To Pain

We have all been hurt.  We have all hurt someone else.  At times we focus more on how others have hurt us, and gear up for protecting ourselves from others in a “once bitten twice shy” manner.  As Jonalyn described in her vows post, we sometimes plant ourselves firmly in a determined place, declaring “that” will never happen again!

In the book Boundaries: When To Say Yes, How To Say No to Take Control Of Your Life, Cloud and Townsend compare emotional and relational boundaries to a fence.  There are all types of fences – scary barbed wire ones, chain link, white-picket, stone walls….  As women we learn different ways to build protection around us, and some of us end up with heavily guarded fortresses signaling “Enter at Your Own Risk” or run-down yards with an “All Are Welcome” feel.

Is there a way to balance a new beginning to find a way to border your “property” with appropriate fencing, allowing you to let trustworthy friends in and keep more difficult relationships in their proper location, further away from the sweet spots of your life.

Reconciliation & Trust

Reconciliation in a relationship has a lot to do with trust.  In relationships, we might decide to reconcile with someone who has hurt us (or whom we have hurt), or we might decide that the relationship is better if over. In one of my favorite books about health and relationships, Everett Worthington notes about forgiveness and reconciliation that “Reconciliation is restoring trust in a relationship in which trust has been damaged.  Reconciliation requires both people to be trustworthy…Reconciliation is interpersonal.  It is not granted but earned.”

Learning to trust in a relationship requires the knowledge that “The other person can talk back, bring up times when you inflicted hurt, push your buttons and provoke you to a blind rage.  But the other person can also be accommodating, contrite, remorseful and loving.  How you both act will determine the future of the relationship.”

What Now?

How to rebuild trust with a friend or in women in general?

• Work through steps of forgiveness where necessary
• Decide whether this is a relationship to reconcile
• Watch the clock (not moving too fast, not waiting too long) – allow for healing but not hardness

Ways to Reconcile:

• Stop hostilities – decide to move forward and put the decision into action (e.g. bury the hatchet, agree to disagree)
• Come together – get together, plan an activity, enjoy a meal together that includes good conversation
• Keep Forgiveness As An Option (sometimes we have to “re-forgive” if old hurts come up…forgiveness can be a process!)
• Be positive – most hurt people have a wounded ego or wounded pride (that is what most of our energies go toward protecting)…smooth wounds with positive words (e.g. I really love that you…It means a lot to me that you are the type of friend that…You are so great at…)

Building A Bridge

Rebuilding trust between two people is a process; most of us are familiar with the phrase “trust is earned”.  Working toward reconnection through building trust allows two people meet in the middle.  In other words, if one person does all the work, it is not much of a relationship.

• Decide to reconcile
• Discuss what has happened
• Detoxify (work through negative feelings of anger, bitterness, resentment)
• Devote yourself to valuing the new beginning (e.g. not having one foot in the past while trying to move forward)

Whether starting fresh with a new friend, adjusting to the loss of a friend that moved or changed, or reorienting to life after the let down of a break-up ,there is a place for your love and devotion with another friend, space for you to let someone in and give trust another go-around.

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Recipe for Frenemy Cake

Let me tell you about a wicked cake.

We all want to make a great layered cake of friendship, but another rising concoction threatens our time and our love in friendships.

What goes into a frenemy relationship?

Terri Apter, co-author of Best Friends: The Pleasures and Perils of Girls’ and Women’s Friendships writes that “among female friends there is: a wish to offer support and see a friend thrive, on the one hand, and a fear of being left behind or out-shone, on the other.”

Women have love and unkindness mixed into every friendship.  Unkindness fueled by envy or insecurity.

Mix envy into kindness for a friend and you have a frenemy cake. This concoction happens almost spontaneously, rarely intentionally, always insidiously.  As Sally explained in A Gossipy Fine Line, frenemy behavior can be as easy as gossip.

Frenemy in Training

I see the frenemy cake rising in myself.

I come home after a long day spending time with a woman I don’t like. Actually she doesn’t like me, stinging me with little snippy comments, like nettles in my soul.  I hate being insulted without being able to put my finger on the exact insult. Women do that well, smooth as cream even when they’re working against you.

I loathed this woman more each moment I spent with her, wanting to not care, but caring deeply about what she thought of me.

I see layer one rising: insecurity.

I was bound by obligation to remain with her and yet longed to pull out my bag of thistles and give her a taste of my needles.  The battle I fought to not lash out left me mostly silent, often despondent and as my husband told me afterwards, looking like I was trying too hard.

Darn it all!  Why did I even bother trying to be nice when it feels like a losing battle?

Layer two rising on top: disgust with both myself and this “friend.”

So in the evening hours I took refuge in my hotel room with my books and music, my notebook full of observations for a writing project and a bag of cherries soothing my pin-pricked emotions.

I feel all the distaste for my own sex as I check emails, update on blogs, spend time lingering on friend’s updates thinking of things that are too embarrassing to admit.

Unkind things toward those I call friends.

Surely, not ME

Perhaps because I was hoping to outgrow it, I didn’t pay  much close attention to this spongy cake.

But now I’m sure, whenever I’m feeling insecure about who I am, frenemy cake is cooking in the oven.

One way to melt the power of frenemia, to resist the temptation to make my cake and eat it, too, is to throw open the door on the reality in my soul.  If you haven’t faced the frenemy in you, I can guarantee it looks a lot worse than you first expect. And like most messes I’m afraid it’s going to look a lot worse before it’s going to look better.

Confession

As I’ve written (I’m Worse, You’re Better), confession is all about owning things.

Confession is a lost practice.  We rarely do it, or do it only generally (“Yea, I gossip, sometimes).

Confession is like diving naked into a pool, it feels cold and stunning and in the end almost too good to be true.

One reason I follow Jesus is because he came for sick people he wanted to make clean.  As long as I remain convinced that I need to be cleaned up, every day, again and again, I can be a Christ follower.  Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.

In one account of Jesus life I found this: “To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable:

“Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself:

‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’

“But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said,

‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner’ (Luke 18:9-13).

Jesus praised the tax collector.

When I admit I’m insecure and unkind to friends, Jesus is right at my elbow, cheering me onward into honesty.

Like a woman who confessed at a recent retreat “Lord, forgive me for my one-upmanship”, we all can agree we have that problem, too.

Take a moment and consider what provokes you to cook up a frenemy cake in your soul.

What’s your first layer of insecurity?

Your second layer of unkindness?

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I’m Better, You’re Worse: How We Evaluate Ourselves and Others

A longer post with a little activity for you to try…see what you think!

I wrote this blog sitting on a plane…trying to create a great example of what I am writing about.  Only after I spent time type, type, typing away, did I realize I did not have to look that far.

Make sure all electronic devices are in the "off" position...

I had finally found my seat (window, thankfully!).  I put my earphones in without turning on any music…to avoid speaking with anyone (yes, that is something I do).  A woman and her male companion sat next to me, I noticed her – how she dressed, little make-up, not too trendy (mom jeans, to be honest).  When we got the loud notice to turn off all electronic devices that have an on-off switch, she turned to me and asked if I had turned off my phone.  I immediately felt a small bristle, but answered nicely, “Yes, thanks.”  But, my first thought was, “Wow, she’s bossy!”

This situation was ripe with assumptions and a lack of information – she was responding to what looked like (possibly) an irresponsible or rebellious passenger who disobeyed flight instructions and I responded to someone who does not dress like I do and stuck her nose in my business.  We both example something that study after study shows: we attribute others’ characteristics to who they are and give ourselves the padding to be right and not at fault  = the other passenger’s actions are about her as a person (bossy).

There is a term in psychology called the fundamental attribution error.  (Fundamental = basic; attribution = characteristic or trait; error = mistake).

Here, you try.  Note your first thoughts here:  no reason to try and be an angel of humanity that defies natural response…its only you and your computer.

Actor Aaron Eckhart

The first picture – would you let this man keep your children?  Would you be okay with his walking you home on a cold, dark night?  This is the actor Aaron Eckhart in his role as George in the movie Erin Brockovich.

Actress Noomi Rapace

The second picture – Be honest…what did you think when you saw it?  Spooky?  Drug addict?  Evil?  You have recognized her…the character Lisbeth Salandar from the wildly popular The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo novel trilogy by Stieg Larrson.  If you have read the book (I definitely recommend!) you know this character has a rich history and there is more to her than her initial, strange appearance.  This is a picture of Swedish actress Noomi Rapace without her Salandar make-up.

Joaquin Phoenix with David Letterman

This third picture…a laughable reminder of what we all fell for:  Joquin Phoenix as a dissheveled actor who obviously had a breakdown…a shadow of his former handsome and luring self…most of us remember him as Johnny Cash opposite Reese Witherspoon in the movie Walk The Line.  Here is a picture of him now…after he announced that the whole thing was a rouse, all portrayed in the new documentary I’m Still Here.

Yes, I used pop-culture examples, accessible to most of us.  And I focused on thoughts based on appearance and basic media information.  This is something we do in our everyday lives, with the people we know and love, with the people we do not know and/or would rather not love.

So how does this apply to friendships?  Definitely, as you get to know someone, you know more of who they are and more of their actual attributes.

For instance, my close friends know that I am quieter and less likely to speak up when I have an opinion; they know that I struggle with time management and beat myself up over small things.  They know I get crabby and irritable when I am hungry; they know I like myself and don’t mind spending time alone.  These are all things that fall into my delightful personality, but could definitely be misunderstood or misinterpreted (as my earbuds were on the plane, although giving a certain impression).

One of my best friends told me that the first time we met I hardly said three words at the party and all she had heard was great things about me…leaving her to wonder, “What’s so great about her?”  (Ha!  Little did she know!!)  Anyways…my not talking less was equivalent to her idea of boring.  She is one of my extraverted friends, who I think sometimes could stand to stop, look and listen a bit.  See?  We fit together but could definitely be misunderstood without necessary information.

Someone cuts you off...what is your first thought??

But we never fully know, and even with people we know and love, we often give ourselves more room for mistakes (yes, even perfectionists do this) than we do others…and we move mistakes to our outside world (e.g. a bad day) while others are simply and characteristically at fault (e.g. my plane companion = bossy person).  Essentially, we find explanations where we look for them and fit pieces together in our minds; we explain other people according to their appearance and actions.

We instinctively evaluate others – by their size, beauty, attire, possessions, tone of voice, status, mom-jeans, earbuds, etc.  We all do it, and we all do it without even thinking. As Jonalyn offered, many times we elevate others above ourselves in categories we wish we were better; we use others to evaluate ourselves.

Other times though, we elevate ourselves above others without most of the necessary information we need to make an accurate

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Discover a few details...

 

conclusion.  So while we all want the benefit of the doubt, room to give an explanation or make a mistake…we do not do this first.

To me, in friendship, this can be quite damaging…this fundamental attribution error.  This thing we do is ripe full of assumptions (we all know about assumptions…when you assume you make…) and happens quickly.  You might recognize this from being on the hurtful side, your attributes decided by someone lacking critical information.  You might have befriended someone who displayed positive and welcoming characteristics, only to find out that friendly on the outside does not always mean friendly on the inside.

With regard to friendship, something we could all take into consideration.  Although studies do show we make judgments quickly and naturally; it is possible that a bit of information could change our minds and add a person or two to our lives.  Talk over coffee, listen a bit, verify details, ask a few questions.

p.s.  We went on a walk a few days after the party and the rest is friendship history.  We are two peas in a pod, and still often miscalculate one another because we are different.

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I’m Worse, You’re Better – Comparison and Competition

A few years ago, when I had neighbors I could see from my window, I noticed my fashionista neighbor in her short skirt and scoop neck top working outside.  Before I could stop myself, I was comparing.  If I stood next to her, which of us has the better body?  I thought twice about what I’m wearing before going outside to garden, guessing that she might be checking me out from her side window, too.

An Appetite for Competing

Who Gets Brad?

Why do we do this?  Maybe it’s because from a young age, we’re told to compare.  In People or Star we see Angelina Jolie pitted against Jennifer Aniston and realize that if these two perfections of female stardom and sophistication have to compete, then we’re doomed.

In Susan Barash’s book Tripping the Prom Queen: The Truth about Women and Rivalry, she found that in all socio-economic levels and in all friendships women compete against each other, comparing hemselves to “friends, coworkers, sisters, even to their own daughters”.

When Barash interviewed women she found sisters envying each other, single women envied married women, married women having affairs envied their lovers’ wives, or happily married friends.  Stepmothers and mothers envied each other, as did first and second wives.  Divorced women envied those still married.  Married women envied the divorcees who had gone on to find a better life or better man.

One woman said she chose to live in a small town, “So there would be less competition”; other women avoided certain parties.  As she put it, “I don’t want my husband to meet too many single, beautiful women.”

Competing for WHAT?

We’re not always fighting for a man but we often are.  In today’s great recession, jobs are scarce, as are the chances to have some power (to run an organization, a book club, a bible study).  Good female friends are in high demand. If she becomes friends with someone else, will she still have time for me?

Good men are scarce, too (the Jolie/Aniston comparison game was usually over Brad, right?)  It is the repeating problem for women (and I don’t doubt of men, too) of wanting to be noticed by the opposite sex.  How much will we sacrifice to get this attention? In all of Jane Austen’s books she explores just how much a woman’s character kept her from compromise to land a good marriage.

How desperate are we to get what we want?

Hungry for Love

My rivalry swells from my insecurity.  If I hold back and don’t market myself, my books, my blog, my speaking niche, will there be enough of what I need left?

If I believe that you might be better than me in some essential thing I think I need to get ahead, then I will become afraid.  Fear, the opposite of love, ruins too many friendships. This is why John says in 1 John 4:18 “Perfect love casts out all fear.” The opposite is also true, perfect fear casts out love.

Women who are hungry for love fight more viciously for attention, like hungry seagulls fighting for a scrap of food. Envy actually points to our impoverishment.

Despite the women’s movement to change this problem, we still focus our rivalry almost exclusively on each other. The worse part: we rarely admit it.  OTHER women get all catty and into their own drama, but not us. Barash found that most women take several interviews before admitting that they suffer from envy.

Most women claim that they have the best, closest friendships among women.  I agree.

But Barash notes two forces that keep women from being honest:

1- The fear of feminists blaming them for destroying the beautiful picture of female friendship.

2- The pressure to look like the “good girl” who is not suffering from something as childish as an envy problem.

Owning it

I haven’t found a lot of friends eager to admit that they compare themselves with women who are younger, older, more beautiful, more successful, unless someone else admits it first.   We’re not eager to admit that we have salty glances, sour eyes for those in the “sisterhood.”

How can we admit it?

We might be The. Only. One.

But if you have the courage to join me, even with a simple comment (“I compare, too”) watch how many other competitors lay down their arms and step forward.  If you do, thanks for joining us in this sisterhood of confession.

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