How I Discovered That Change Does Not Mean The Death Of A Friendship

“Happiness is an inside job. Don’t assign anyone else that much power over you.” Mandy Hale

Easy to say but so darn hard to execute. Especially when the person in question happens to be my bestest friend in the whole world. And a world class workaholic to boot.

We used to have the longest conversations late into the night about anything and everything. Literally every topic was fair prey to be discussed, pondered upon or have a good laugh over. My friend has this easy going voice that has a soothing effect on me, a voice perfect for a late night RJ. Wait a minute, did I mention my friend moonlights as a community talk show host?

I believe the words of Virginia Woolf describes the beauty of our friendship the best “Some people go to priests; others to poetry; I to my friends.” Or friend.

How I miss those days.

That’s because nowadays we rarely get the opportunity to talk. Even though we still share the same awesome rapport whenever we connect, it only happens when I do the initiating. It is frustrating and makes me feel like I am imposing on my friend’s time. Believe me, that’s an iffy place to be in.

If I’m honest with myself, I cannot really blame my friend for being busy. Far from it. I know the grueling hours and laser like focus it takes to build a business from scratch. It’s like a baby. Constantly crying to be fed and changed. Colicky in fact.

But what about me??

Now I sound selfish, petulant and perhaps a little callous.

But is it ok for me to feel hurt by the declining emotional reciprocity in this friendship?

Recently I came across an interesting interpretation of the Elliot Wave Principle which can be applied to friendships. This snippet from an article published in Elite Daily describes it like this

“ It asserts crowd behavior ebbs and flows in noticeable trends. Relationships are similar. There will be times when things will be great and other periods where issues will arise. If you feel like you’re being ignored, then chances are, you’re in one of these.”

After spending many hours and a few sleepless nights bemoaning the present state of our friendship and how badly it was affecting me, I decided it was time to take my power back.

The experts on this particular topic are pretty vocal in their advice:

1. Get yourself a new hobby like learning a new language or get busy with other things. In other words, get a life.

2. Stop overreacting and give time a chance to iron out the wrinkles.

3. Prepare yourself for the worst

4. Move on to friends who treat you better.

5. Practice self care and be confident in your abilities so you don’t need another person to validate you.

While I appreciate their pearls of wisdom, it still doesn’t fill that gaping void in my heart that represents the space my friend has exclusive dibs on. It may come across as weird but it really isn’t because that space is like a keepsake box filled with all the wonderful mementoes of our friendship. A space no quick fix solution can erase other than to question the very purpose of seeking out meaningful friendships in the first place.

I for one cannot be happy all by myself on a little island with my self sufficiency for company.

Life Coach, Bill Ferguson’s insight provided me with a more logical approach for getting my power back “ Surrender to the truth of the way your situation is. Then look to see what needs to be done based on the facts. The moment you do this and start taking action, you get your power back.”

So I decided to make a list. On the one side I wrote down the positive qualities of my friend, to remind me why I chose this friendship. On the other hand, I wrote down why I felt this friendship wasn’t working for me anymore.

This in turn led me to ask myself 3 questions:

1.Is my friend genuinely busy? In other words, am I able to trust?

2.Does my friend make the effort to spend quality time with me once in a while?

3.Is my friend present and available for those times when I am actually in need of a shoulder to lean on?

The answers were surprisingly revealing.

Yes, I had made several attempts at gently reminding how important phone calls were to me. Yes, I received several promises in return and it sucks that they never came through on account of a myriad pressing reasons. But what I have realized is that my friend is not ignoring me on purpose and the worst thing I could do in a time like this is add on to the stress by initiating a break up.

If you can’t beat them, join them.

My friendship is too valuable to me to walk away just because it is going through a valley phase right now. So in this situation I chose to stay put. At the same time I took a step back and gave it some room to breathe. I made a conscious decision to obsess less about the lack of communication armed with fresh insight that change does not necessarily equate the worst.

As Elizabeth Foley puts it “The most beautiful discovery true friends make is that they can grow separately without growing apart.”

Nevertheless, I’m not going to give up on trying to communicate to my friend that I need well — more communication. But I’m going to change tactics slightly by taking a break from being a nag and circle back to it at a later time when circumstances are more amenable.

I find that Ardant du Picq’s words provide thoughtful insight when applied in this context “If one does not wish bonds broken, one should make them elastic and thereby strengthen them”.