Saturday, June 9, 2012
talking it out
Perhaps when things are too big and too stale and far too difficult to deal with, it is better to write it out than talk it out. It lets you formulate the responses appropriately, without having the messiness of emotions cause hate and anger. Sticky notes allow you to put some logic to illogical thoughts. I made a collage on my table while discussing big things with someone I know. I don't know how it will turn out, but so far it seems OK.
Friday, June 8, 2012
Tuesday, April 17, 2012
The Awkward Conversation
The Awkward Conversation could consist of a few different things. Here, though, I am more concerned about the conversation between good friends. How does one bring up that they are either interested in their good friend?
In fact, should it even be brought up?
I find it rather amusing as an outsider to watch two best friends skirt around each other and dance the pretend dance of friendship when it is clear to everone else that they are madly in love with each other. My mind immediately screams to me: 'why don't they just tell each other how they feel?'. To me, it seemed very logical that if two people like each other, they should just explain that and fall into a happy and healthy relationship like it happens in the movies.
Life isn't like the movies. Or that's my opinion anyway.
Let's say that for my example, that he is fawning after her, but she is currently in a relationship? It gets rocky here. If she decides that she likes him too (which I am in no doubt that he would prefer) and she decides to leave her current relationship in favour of this new beau, it would leave a few problems floating in the air.
First off, perhaps the new couple find out that they were much better suited as friends. If that is the case, perhaps they saved their friendhsip long-term. However in the short term, after a few moments of trials while they discover this case, they are stuck in that awkward phase where the feelings each other have need to be reverted from relationship to friendship. In theory it sounds easy but in practice I beg to differ. I have watched many relationships crumble and the resulting singles battle their tormenting emotions while they struggle to regain their once-amazing friendship. It rarely, if ever, is the same after that brief joining of hearts.
Say it all works out between the friends and they have realised that they are really soul-mates. Great! They found their soul-mate! But I believe that the niggling thought would play in the back of his mind - she left her previous partner at the drop of a hat because I came along and confessed my undying love to her. And he, no doubt, would think, what if she leaves me when or if someone else professes the same? I am hesitant to say the couple would live in pure bliss if that scenario occured.
If she heard him out and politely turned him down, would seem the most likely option. After all, she is with her current partner and one would assume it is because she adores him. )However there could always be other motivating factors which I will not discuss here). To have something that heavy thrust upon a friendship is quite dangerous - or at least that is what we are lead to believe. But when I think about it, if my best friend said to me that he loves me I doubt I could ever look at him the same way again, even if I tried extremely hard. We may be 99% the same as before the news broke, but there would always be that knowledge that he dreams of seeing you naked.
So, one would be forgiven if they are to think at this point that to mention one's feelings in this scenario. However, assuming that no feeling were confessed and the trio continued to live as one would expect: a happy couple, good friends, and a man in pain. No crush is easy, indeed it does crush your heart, soul and the very fibre of your being to be so madly attached to one you can't have. Or maybe that's just the butterflies and knots in your stomache. Whichever it is - it hurts. His pain would logically feed into the friendship and perhaps teint the relationship between the two friends.
If he has felt this way for sometime, she probably even knows that he feels this way, or at least suspects it. It would put a strain on the relationship both between her and her friend and also her an her partner. And indeed, if the two men are friends, there would be some strain on that relationship as well.
Presuming she finds the courage or decides it to be logical to bring up the situation with her friend. She could either clear the air with the weight off both of their minds and the above situations would ensue. Or the weight of the fresh knowledge would wedge them apart.
What if her suspicions were wrong and he wasn't romantically inclined with her but she was just reading too deeply into their friendship.
It's risky business... not to mention a truly awkward conversation.
In fact, should it even be brought up?
I find it rather amusing as an outsider to watch two best friends skirt around each other and dance the pretend dance of friendship when it is clear to everone else that they are madly in love with each other. My mind immediately screams to me: 'why don't they just tell each other how they feel?'. To me, it seemed very logical that if two people like each other, they should just explain that and fall into a happy and healthy relationship like it happens in the movies.
Life isn't like the movies. Or that's my opinion anyway.
Let's say that for my example, that he is fawning after her, but she is currently in a relationship? It gets rocky here. If she decides that she likes him too (which I am in no doubt that he would prefer) and she decides to leave her current relationship in favour of this new beau, it would leave a few problems floating in the air.
First off, perhaps the new couple find out that they were much better suited as friends. If that is the case, perhaps they saved their friendhsip long-term. However in the short term, after a few moments of trials while they discover this case, they are stuck in that awkward phase where the feelings each other have need to be reverted from relationship to friendship. In theory it sounds easy but in practice I beg to differ. I have watched many relationships crumble and the resulting singles battle their tormenting emotions while they struggle to regain their once-amazing friendship. It rarely, if ever, is the same after that brief joining of hearts.
Say it all works out between the friends and they have realised that they are really soul-mates. Great! They found their soul-mate! But I believe that the niggling thought would play in the back of his mind - she left her previous partner at the drop of a hat because I came along and confessed my undying love to her. And he, no doubt, would think, what if she leaves me when or if someone else professes the same? I am hesitant to say the couple would live in pure bliss if that scenario occured.
If she heard him out and politely turned him down, would seem the most likely option. After all, she is with her current partner and one would assume it is because she adores him. )However there could always be other motivating factors which I will not discuss here). To have something that heavy thrust upon a friendship is quite dangerous - or at least that is what we are lead to believe. But when I think about it, if my best friend said to me that he loves me I doubt I could ever look at him the same way again, even if I tried extremely hard. We may be 99% the same as before the news broke, but there would always be that knowledge that he dreams of seeing you naked.
So, one would be forgiven if they are to think at this point that to mention one's feelings in this scenario. However, assuming that no feeling were confessed and the trio continued to live as one would expect: a happy couple, good friends, and a man in pain. No crush is easy, indeed it does crush your heart, soul and the very fibre of your being to be so madly attached to one you can't have. Or maybe that's just the butterflies and knots in your stomache. Whichever it is - it hurts. His pain would logically feed into the friendship and perhaps teint the relationship between the two friends.
If he has felt this way for sometime, she probably even knows that he feels this way, or at least suspects it. It would put a strain on the relationship both between her and her friend and also her an her partner. And indeed, if the two men are friends, there would be some strain on that relationship as well.
Presuming she finds the courage or decides it to be logical to bring up the situation with her friend. She could either clear the air with the weight off both of their minds and the above situations would ensue. Or the weight of the fresh knowledge would wedge them apart.
What if her suspicions were wrong and he wasn't romantically inclined with her but she was just reading too deeply into their friendship.
It's risky business... not to mention a truly awkward conversation.
Thursday, April 12, 2012
The First and Last
Hi there, consider this the first post of hopefully a lasting blog.
Last night I went out with a few of my friends in the beautiful city of Melbourne, Australia. Since leaving home, school and moving on with our lives, my friends and I have found it harder to get together and enjoy each others company. As the years progress, this seems to be harder and harder each year.
Once we all had our little "cliques" or as we called them at school - "table groups". Namely they were called this as we sat together at the table at lunch time. It didn't always mean you hung out with them in classes, study breaks or after school, but you had to hang with them at school. It was like some unwritten rule of my school to reamin with that group.
I moved around between table groups a lot. But as gossip spreads like wildfire (yes, we were an "all girl" school) you avoided shifting table groups to hopefully duck under the gossip radar. I don't really want to know what stories the other girls spent their spare time inventing in response to my continual movement between groups. I shouldn't say that I don't care though.
Anyway, it was taboo to leave your table group and move to another one unless something big had happened. Usually then there was cause to gossip, even if the stories were a long way from the truth. That's how it was in school. Not so much now, it appears.
When I moved states to attend University, every holiday I aimed to come back to my home town and catch up with my supposed friends. The first few years it worked really well. Everyone was keen to go out for dinner and other seemingly exciting social adventures whenever I organised them. Very few were unable to attend and even so they always respond and give some legitimate excuse for their absence.
Not so anymore
Perhaps it is the way we are getting old, maturing, moving on or just plain lazy. I am not too sure which it is. But these days I seem to be lucky if I get a response from 15% of those invited, and usually only about half that respond actually attend. I wonder if it is the lack of care for social conventions in our increasingly technological society or perhaps the speed in whcih our lives seem to be running at the current time which lends itself to no-RSVP. Regardless of which it is, I find it, as a social person who enjoys organising fun activities with the people I usually hang out with, rather annoying. It is very difficult to try and book a table at a restaurant if no one responds, or if they do it happens to be at the last minute.
Admittedly I do most of the 'organising' via the wonderful social medium known as Facebook. Event creation is very quick and easy and often lends itself to group discussions on transport options. It also seems to be useful for the back pocket when the "old" method of communication was to call or message people using actual dollars on your phone account.
Reflecting on the minimal response to unvites for my amazing social adventures, I think I shall decline to continue using a social medium such as Facebook to do the hard-work of organising social gatherings for me.
Last night I went out with a few of my friends in the beautiful city of Melbourne, Australia. Since leaving home, school and moving on with our lives, my friends and I have found it harder to get together and enjoy each others company. As the years progress, this seems to be harder and harder each year.
Once we all had our little "cliques" or as we called them at school - "table groups". Namely they were called this as we sat together at the table at lunch time. It didn't always mean you hung out with them in classes, study breaks or after school, but you had to hang with them at school. It was like some unwritten rule of my school to reamin with that group.
I moved around between table groups a lot. But as gossip spreads like wildfire (yes, we were an "all girl" school) you avoided shifting table groups to hopefully duck under the gossip radar. I don't really want to know what stories the other girls spent their spare time inventing in response to my continual movement between groups. I shouldn't say that I don't care though.
Anyway, it was taboo to leave your table group and move to another one unless something big had happened. Usually then there was cause to gossip, even if the stories were a long way from the truth. That's how it was in school. Not so much now, it appears.
When I moved states to attend University, every holiday I aimed to come back to my home town and catch up with my supposed friends. The first few years it worked really well. Everyone was keen to go out for dinner and other seemingly exciting social adventures whenever I organised them. Very few were unable to attend and even so they always respond and give some legitimate excuse for their absence.
Not so anymore
Perhaps it is the way we are getting old, maturing, moving on or just plain lazy. I am not too sure which it is. But these days I seem to be lucky if I get a response from 15% of those invited, and usually only about half that respond actually attend. I wonder if it is the lack of care for social conventions in our increasingly technological society or perhaps the speed in whcih our lives seem to be running at the current time which lends itself to no-RSVP. Regardless of which it is, I find it, as a social person who enjoys organising fun activities with the people I usually hang out with, rather annoying. It is very difficult to try and book a table at a restaurant if no one responds, or if they do it happens to be at the last minute.
Admittedly I do most of the 'organising' via the wonderful social medium known as Facebook. Event creation is very quick and easy and often lends itself to group discussions on transport options. It also seems to be useful for the back pocket when the "old" method of communication was to call or message people using actual dollars on your phone account.
Reflecting on the minimal response to unvites for my amazing social adventures, I think I shall decline to continue using a social medium such as Facebook to do the hard-work of organising social gatherings for me.
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