In our HELP! SITUATION SPOTLIGHT™ series, we shine the light on challenges that community members have shared with me. This episode is, “He hasn’t called! What does it mean?”
Silence. Often a craved for retreat from the noise and chaos of the world. Yet, it can be a perceived enemy depriving us of an opportunity to realize our deepest professional and personal desires. When the phone doesn’t ring, what does it mean? The parallels between our personal and professional lives are helpful and insightful at times. When we are waiting for a call to let us know we have a job (or a second interview) or that we have a second date, it can be stressful and scary. Some people are tempted to turn their anxiety about “waiting for an answer” inwards against themselves. They will criticize and insult what they wore, what they said, how they looked, etc., and begin to place the blame on themselves for the awful silence. Some people escalate the anxiety into inappropriate (or even illegal) behavior and “follow-up” to “make sure” that their desires are known. They send letters, emails, leave phone messages, send text messages, post on social media, go to the office and even to the home of the object of their desire. They think, “I want this job/ date and they have to know how I feel.” This repeated behavior is inappropriate and may even lead to criminal issues regarding stalking. They know how you feel. Stop. Why do people [...] In our HELP! SITUATION SPOTLIGHT™ series, we shine the light on challenges that community members have shared with me. This episode is, “How do I know if someone is really my friend?”
Ah, friendship. The bond that forms where we are safe to share our secrets, fears and dreams. We take off our “masks” that we use with the world (to protect us) and we share our authentic selves. The bliss of spending time with a true friend is one of the best parts of life. Yet, what about the painful experience of letting our guard down, sharing our authentic selves, trusting a person and then later having to face the fact that we were deceived, tricked and manipulated by the person we trusted? We are broken as a person when our trust is broken. How may we ensure that we have “real” friends in our lives while preventing being hurt and made a fool of by “pretend” friends? Q: How do I know if someone is really my friend? A: The behavior of a friend is based on the foundation that your happiness is their happiness. Any behavior to the contrary indicates that they are not (yet or still) a friend. Insults, making fun of you, etc., these are all behaviors that show you the person is not (at this time) your friend. Is it possible that a person was your friend at one time in the past and has changed their mind and is no longer your friend? Yes. Is it possible that someone who is currently not your friend may develop into a “real” friend in the future? Yes. What do we do to [...] In the MYTH WARRIORS™ series we are targeting ideas to begin to assess whether they are credible or not (i.e., they are a myth, fallacy or even a lie). The target for this episode is, “Nobody can teach me who I am.”
“Born in Nigeria in 1930, Chinua Achebe attended the University of Ibadan. In 1958, his groundbreaking novel Things Fall Apart was published. It went on to sell more than 12 million copies and been translated into more than 50 languages. Achebe later served as the David and Marianna Fisher University professor and professor of Africana Studies at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. He died on March 21, 2013, at age 82, in Boston, Massachusetts.” (http://www.biography.com/people/chinua-achebe-20617665#awesm=~oDpf0csGuWAzTf ) The larger quote for our episode is, “Nobody can teach me who I am. You can describe parts of me, but who I am - and what I need - is something I have to find out myself.” Option 1 - People can teach you who you are. Option 2 - Nobody can teach you who you are. Option 1 is seductive as it would be “easier” for someone else to tell me and show me who I am and all I would have to do would be to simply follow their instructions. Option 2 is “harder” as it would require me to do all of the work determining who I am (with no instructions to follow). Yet, if someone else teaches me who I am, then aren’t I simply a reproduction (or copy) of them with no original individuality? It might be [...] In the MYTH WARRIORS™ series we are targeting ideas to begin to assess whether they are credible or not. We are warriors fighting to establish clarity between what is accurate and what is simply a myth (or falsehood) in life. Our topic is, “You wouldn't worry so much about what others think of you if you realized how seldom they do.” - Eleanor Roosevelt (longest serving First Lady of the US)
What do other people really think of me? They don't. This may sound blunt (it is simply direct!) but the obsession with perceptions of what other people think about us is difficult for me to understand. Most of us spend our waking hours on our own lives (what we are doing, feeling, etc.). The belief that we are forefront in the minds of other people (beyond our closest loved ones) is narcissistic. There are stages of human development that we all experience (to some extent) as adolescents where we are learning to define ourselves and are focused on our peer feedback. The continuation of this behavior into adulthood is not going to result in the best possible outcomes. 1) How do you know what other people think at all? You don’t. You only know what they tell you they claim to be thinking (which is not necessarily accurate). If you ask a friend, “How do I look in this dress?” What incentive do they have to tell you anything other than what you want to hear? 2) If other people tell you what they claim to think about you, so what? What does [...] |
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