August 9, 2006A Funny Way of Mending Fences
Telling someone you don’t like what they did or even what you don’t like about them can seem like a strange way to reach out, but sometime it works that way.
My friend and I were too close for me not to notice when she changed how she related to me and almost dropped out of my life when a new man dropped in to hers. She had every right to invest her time and attention where she wanted to I had every right to decide the changes meant our friendship no longer worked for me. We might have just drifted apart…I could have acted as cool as I felt when she did call, but instead I told her I wasn’t enjoying our connection any more and I wanted to take a break rather that continue our unsatisfying interactions. I suggested we renegotiate our friendship after a month to see if there was enough common ground to continue. When the time had passed my friend was ready to start back up, but I felt the need for more clarity.
I didn’t want an apology. I didn’t want her to feel guilty. I wanted her to understand my experience of the change in how she related and for us to decide together if we could move forward. I also wanted to know if she cared enough to let me go through the process of telling her what I hadn’t been able to say in her months of inattentiveness. At first she resisted, but when she realized I was reaching out, not pushing her away, she stopped taking what I was telling her personally and was able to be present for me. When our time together was over, she said, “I’m so grateful you were willing to tell me the truth and give our friendship a chance to heal.” I told her how grateful I was that she was able to hear me.
I came home that night to watch a Frasier rerun where Niles and Daphne were in early courtship. Niles had been secretly in love with Daphne for seven years, and Daphne was worried that he was in love with a fantasy, blind to her flaws, and that he would have a change of heart once he experienced the real Daphne. Niles resisted the idea for a while, but then one evening he declared to Daphne that he hated her cooking and always had. Soon they were hurling insults at each other. She was too tall, he was too short. He was pompous. She had no taste. With each disclosure their desire and passion built.
I’m not suggesting that you go around tearing people down or hurling insults at them, but I am telling you that there are times when risky conversations that reveal uncomfortable truths can be what the communication doctor ordered. In the movie A Few Good Men, Colonel Jessep said “You can’t handle the truth.” I say more often it’s the lies and silence people can’t handle. I’ll take a difficult truth over an easy lie any day. And fortunately for me, so would my friend with whom I am happy to be reunited.
Do you have a “former friend”? Perhaps you drifted because you thought they couldn’t handle the truth when in fact they couldn’t handle the lack of it. It might be worth investigating.
1 Comment »
RSS feed for comments on this post.
| TrackBack URI
You can also bookmark
this on del.icio.us or check the cosmos
My one main comment to this is “to have a friend you have to be one”. I have gone through the same situation. If you get “unconcerned feedback” in a friendship, (as mine has) I do 3 things. Walk away, try again, and pray for them. Sometimes there are things we don’t know, no matter how close we are to that friend, and only they have the power to change.
“There are friends for a reason, friends for a season, and friends for a lifetime.”
Comment by Laura Wilson — August 15, 2006 @ 4:07 pm