I recently listened to research professor Brené Brown’s interview on Oprah Winfrey’s SuperSoul Conversations podcast and it got me to thinking about my current struggles with friendships. In Brené’s interview, she talks about what she learned when studying shame and vulnerability in human beings and reflected on her book, The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You’re Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are. In the book, Brené opens up about the difficulty of building real and comfortable friendships and she points out how tough it can be to find a friend who is truly and selflessly willing to be there for us during our struggles in the journey of living.
She breaks it down like this: Imagine you realize you made a “mistake” with something in your life and you’re feeling out of control, scared, and disappointed in yourself. You’re basically wrapping yourself in shame. Perhaps you failed a test at school or cheated on your significant other or feel you totally tanked a job interview for an incredible career opportunity. It really doesn’t matter what it is, what matters is that you’re feeling shameful and distraught and you need a friend. If you’re like most of us, when you reach out to someone to tell them about your concerning situation, you will encounter one of the following types of friends:
(*The following definitions were taken directly from the book: The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You’re Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are by Brené Brown)
- The friend who hears the story and actually feels shame for you. He or she gasps and confirms how horrified you should be. Then there is awkward silence. Then you have to make him or her feel better.
- The friend who responds with sympathy (I feel so sorry for you) rather than empathy (I get it, I feel with you, and I’ve been there). He or she may say, “Oh, you poor thing” or the incredibly-passive aggressive southern version of sympathy: “Bless your heart.”
- The friend who needs you to be the pillar of worthiness and authenticity. He or she can’t help because he or she’s disappointed in your imperfections. You’ve let him or her down.
- The friend who is so uncomfortable with vulnerability that he or she scolds you: “How did you let this happen?” “What were you thinking?” Or he or she looks for someone to blame: “Who was that guy? We’ll kick his ass.”
- The friend who is all about making it better and, out of his or her own discomfort, refuses to acknowledge that you can actually be crazy and make terrible choices: “You’re exaggerating. It wasn’t that bad. You rock. You’re perfect. Everyone loves you.”
- The friend who confuses “connection” with the opportunity to one-up you: “That’s nothing. Listen to what happened to me this one time!”
We usually end up coming across these types of friends several times over the course of our lifetime. We’ll also be the ones being these types of friends to others. As vulnerable and imperfect human beings, the way we react to certain situations in life depends on what we’ve been through and how we see things, but what Brené tries to make us think about by coming up with her analyzation of friend types is the level we’re at in terms of our ability to be compassionate to others. That level changes depending on our ability to be compassionate with ourselves. If we’re struggling with our own authenticity or worthiness, being compassionate to others, even those we feel we deeply care about, will be a challenge. When we are looking for compassion, we are looking for someone “who embraces us for our strengths and our struggles”, according to Brené. This can definitely be hard to be and hard to find.
Over the last few years, I’ve experienced both difficulties. I’ve found it hard to be compassionate toward some people and I’ve found it hard to find compassion and reliability in others. As a 34-year-old single woman living away from my family and the town I grew up in, where everyone knows everyone, and living in a big city of “dreamers” from all over the world instead, it’s not always easy to find a sense of “belonging”. I’ve always believed that in the end, we’re always our own best friend or own worst enemy, and I feel I’ve experienced that more than ever since living on my own. After learning about myself more and healing some wounds over the past couple of years, I’ve leaned more toward being my own friend than enemy, but if I’m being honest with myself, it varies from day to day.
Let’s talk about “friends”.
At this point in my life, when I make new friends, it usually doesn’t last, and trying to maintain a relationship with old friends is incredibly difficult. Most of the new “friends” I’ve encountered in Los Angeles were really just people I happened to meet along the way who eventually faded off somewhere into the fog of Hollywood, never to be heard from again. Not because I wanted them to and not because I didn’t try to keep it going, but because they, whether intentionally or unintentionally, made the decision to let the friendship go. I’ve realized that there are certain types of people, especially those who are competing to make it big in the City of Angels, who don’t really want to be your friend, or if they do, it usually comes with certain – dare I say it – selfish “terms”, and once you don’t meet those “terms”, they’re out the door. What’s fascinating though, is sometimes some of these people don’t even realize they have the “terms”, but they definitely subconsciously judge you based on them. Over the course of my six and a half years of living in L.A., I’ve met a lot of these “friends”.
I’ve had a “friend” do a 180 the second I stopped asking her for advice about the spotlight and instead stepped into it. Instead of the joy and support I was hoping she’d share with me after I earned my spotlight opportunity, she shared an angry attitude and tried to point out the ways in which I failed. She took my excitement about compliments I received from others and somehow turned it into proof that I was being “fake” and showy.
I’ve had a “friend” who always had an excuse for not being able to hang out the second he realized I didn’t want to just “hook up” with no strings attached. Instead of the honesty I was hoping he’d give me, I received the good ole “I’m too busy” lie. No more explanation needed.
I’ve had a “friend” who was quick to leave the second I confronted her about not following through with plans that were important to me more than once. Instead of the understanding and consideration I was hoping she’d give me, I was told, “it wasn’t that important to me” and “you need to get over yourself.” A week after the confrontation, she told me she needed space from me in her life. This was just two days after I sat with her in my apartment for hours and comforted her because some guy brought her to tears with his own inconsideration and lies.
Then, there are the friends(?) who are only friends when they need a friend.
I’ve had a friend(?) who would hang out with me multiple times a week, who I took in when he needed a place to stay, who was a great listener and support system when I needed it most, but soon after he got into a serious relationship, my text messages and phone calls were suddenly ignored. Instead of the openness and joy I was hoping he’d share after finding someone to love, I was treated like I no longer existed.
I’ve had a friend(?) I knew for years who showed me love and support the same way I showed it to him up until he also got into a relationship and then totally disappeared. He stopped answering my messages the day we were supposed to meet up after not seeing each other for 17 years. Instead of the happy reunion or courtesy cancellation that I was hoping he’d give me, I received a no-show and even a lack of an apology.
I’ve had a friend(?) who reconnected with me after not speaking to me for many years. He boasted about how great I was and vented to me about how he just got out of a relationship with a “psycho negative ex” who “used her kid to maintain power and control” over him, until one day he suddenly stopped returning phone calls and messages from me, the girl he “really cared for”, with no explanation whatsoever. What’s the term for that nowadays? “Ghosted”? Well, let’s just say he was a ghost who disappeared right into the arms of that same “psycho negative ex” who “used her kid to maintain power and control” over him. Instead of honesty and the steady friendship I was hoping we’d have, I received total silence that held no consideration for my feelings.
Finally, there are the friends who are friends but on a totally different life path than you, which makes it very difficult to be on the same page.
At my age, there are many friends who are married and are starting families, so what used to be regular hangouts and/or calls slowly but surely turns into yearly hangouts and/or calls and sometimes unreturned messages. Although I care deeply for many of these people, I feel I have to admit to myself that they are no longer reliable on the same level they used to be and don’t have the time or the means to listen to my “single life” problems anymore.
If I’m completely honest with myself, sometimes I get angry at these friends, angry that they don’t seem to care enough to take a minute to show interest in my life or that they no longer show a desire to still have me in their lives. Maybe the anger stems from the mourning I feel I’m going through after the death of the pre-family friendships we once had. Maybe it stems from my own desire to want what they have but have had so much trouble finding. Maybe it stems from both at the same time. Sometimes I feel guilty for feeling these feelings, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that I still feel them, and we all have felt them about various friends at different times in our lives.
I’m not writing about all these friends, “friends” and friends(?) situations because I want sympathy, I’m writing about them because it shows that my feelings about these situations are purely based on the observations that I’ve made. All these stories are coming from my perspective only and I can guarantee that a lot of the people I mentioned probably see the same situation in a completely different way than I do. This is life, this is the definition of being an imperfect human being who is vulnerable to the circumstances he or she grew up in, vulnerable to the things we encountered that were out of our control and the false beliefs we may have learned.
All of the situations I mentioned could have probably been made better if there was a real sense of open and honest communication between myself and the other people, and a willingness to be compassionate. But sometimes, as Brené expresses in her book, if we still need to work on ourselves and learn to develop a strong sense of worthiness, being understanding and compassionate is something we just don’t know how to be. It’s also impossible to always understand others’ actions. I may never know why some of those people who are no longer in my life chose to do what they did, and that’s OK. I may think certain actions are because of one reason and then find out it’s because of another. This is also OK. I may reconnect with some of these people and communicate in a way we couldn’t before, and have it lead to a better, stronger, compassionate friendship. I just don’t know and that’s OK.
Being compassionate is something we learn how to do every single day. It’s a process, not a mastered skill we’re suddenly always capable of doing. Even when we get better at loving ourselves and deeming ourselves worthy, we will not always get compassion right and the ego will automatically take front and center. Something could happen in our lives that test our emotions and someone’s situation could trigger something that previously hurt us and we will be quick to judge, quick to get angry and accusatory. You never know what another person is going through if you don’t ask. If they choose to open up about it, great, if not, that’s fine too. We don’t always have control over whether or not we can find compassion or give compassion, but if we’re aware of this, we can at least know that other people’s actions and feelings have nothing to do with us. Just as our actions and feelings have nothing to do with them. The best we can do is give others the compassion we want most for ourselves when we get the opportunity to do so, but it starts with ourselves.
Let’s be our own trustworthy, compassionate, true friend to the end. Or at least do our best in trying to do so. And let’s be grateful for the friends, “friends” and friends(?) we’ve had, have, and will have in our lives. They shed light on the opportunity to look within.