It’s a slippery slope imagining what you “deserve” – but there’s a point in life where you do realize what you need and that should be completely congruent with what you actually do expect to get out of the ones you call “friend.“
A few of those things may include loyalty, consideration, kindness…if you’re lucky add generosity of time and resources.
So what happens in our relationships when our basic needs of loyalty and consideration are forgotten, disregarded, or considered “unwarranted” by the ones we most expect them to be seen from?
They suffer. They change. They degrade and downward spiral. They need conversation and healing and time does not fix that shit. Hard conversations, vulnerability, and the talent to see a concept just beyond your peripheral vision does.
Taking the time to took left and right into your blind spaces of the friendships you cherish is an outstanding quality in a human. May we all have the energy to do so and may we all be afforded the time….and when we are afforded those words may we respond with truth and transparency.
If you’ve lived long enough as an adult, you’ve experienced some relationships that just seem to accumulate debt. The kind where the other person took more than they deserved or maybe didn’t give enough to keep their relational credit up.
But what about the new relationships? The ones where you don’t have any debts or overdue bills…No long pattern of unmet expectations to suffocate your need to be seen or heard.
Be cautious not to allow a bad debt affect another person’s chance to build credit with you. Learn the red flags but don’t get so wrapped up in expecting to be disappointed that you miss a whole chance to be loved well and finally charge off the bad debt from those old relational accounts.
You’ll be happier when you learn to look for and appreciate the good qualities instead of magnifying the flaws or maybe even making them up.
Greenwashing is when when companies make misleading statements about their actions to appear more environmentally friendly than they actually are. Usually they do this so they can get something passed with the government (or maybe it is the actual government) so they’re supported by the public and affiliates.
In our private lives, it’s called virtue-signaling. Being vague about our flaws, which we all have, signaling others to our good deeds and virtuous behavior because it feels good and fills the need for affirmation as a basic human desire to be accepted and supported.
We. Have. All. Done. This. I don’t know one person who is passionate about their stance who doesn’t want people to buy into it with them as a show of majority support. It feels good to have a team behind us. Feels good to be chosen. Feels good to think we’re absolutely correct.
So what’s the responsibility of the ones being signaled? Listen. Question. Verify. Usually the truth is hidden so deep in the middle we render ourselves wrong if we align too closely with one myopic viewpoint. It’s basically a burden of self control to repress emotions in cases like these. What if the one signaling is someone we love? A close friend or family member? What if we’re unintentionally siding with something destructive or in cooperate cases, actually damaging?
Due diligence is the act of taking a comprehensive (including all elements) look at something before you buy it. If you don’t do this in real estate, you’re stuck with those problems after you close. “Caveat” (warning) “Emptor” (purchaser) is what the state of Alabama adopted, meaning you’re taking a big risk not looking into things before you buy them.
Or in life…before you buy into them. So our responsibility is to do our best to pray for discernment, discover truth, eliminate hate, promote healing, and not make things worse. And this is probably the biggest human burden of all…because sometimes it’s not what’s easy or fun or even convenient.
So when we signal…if we have those people in our lives who do question and verify our motives…keep us in check and on a path of truth and healing…we should consider ourselves blessed and fortunate even if it feels bad that they don’t pile on.
a person whose personality has a balance of extrovert and introvert features.
The outgoing introvert. We can get tired from socializing too much. We can be super flexible and are used to things changing. We love people but we don’t need to be on the go.
I don’t have a “taco Tuesday” or a favorite color. I don’t have a favorite anything, really. It’s hard to get me to commit to something outside of work and you’ll NEVER get me to plan ahead just to socialize. Basically because I just might not want to and I’d rather not hurt your feelings trying to explain that.
I LOVE an impromptu good time and I love people who have high energy but don’t drain the room with it. I love meeting people and getting to know them and I LOVE my job.
I NEED to laugh…if I can’t laugh with you I would rather sit with my dog and not laugh with him. And what I’ve noticed the most about this dichotomy of a personality I have is when I’m around uninspiring people, it drains me. It’s why those closest to me are in kill what you eat professions…they’ve learned to read the room and react accordingly for the best outcome.
So thank you to all my people who can laugh and find humor in life, who understand every second doesn’t need to be filled with talking for no reason, who love big ideas and strategies….And especially the ones who aren’t bothered by the fact that when I just Irish exit out the back door it has nothing to do with them.
In Sweden, this is called “döstädning” – organizing your life before you pass away. This is more than making sure the floors and countertops are wiped down…this is about making sure the loved ones you leave behind to deal with all of your belongings don’t have a big headache, wondering what’s important to you and what wasn’t.
But let’s talk about what you can do from beyond the grave when you’re dead and they’re not. Not a damn thing. So if it’s truly important to you who gets what and what goes where, a will is a good way to state your wishes of where your life’s earnings, real estate, and personal property go and who’s tasked with making sure your actual written wishes are met (aka the executor), but sometimes that is even not enough.
Did you know after you die the ones who think they deserve more can sue the estate with their claims of entitlement? Did you know it will be the money you leave behind that will pay the attorneys to defend your written wishes, eating away to you your actual life savings? Did you know the one you chose to be in charge of your estate can be challenged against your own calcululated wishes? Did you know that at that point it will be left up to a judge, who didn’t even know you, to decide who gets what and can actually overturn what YOU carefully wrote down after you’re not here to speak for yourself?
So what do you do about it? You CAN deed over your properties to who you want to have them and get a “life estate”…meaning you live there until you die and the deal’s already done. You can put your other properties in a trust with enough support to sustain those expenses for as many years as you like. You can give your jewelry and keepsakes to the ones you want to have each piece and do that face to face. You can write checks to the charities of your choice and people of your choice. Cash out your stocks or transfer them while you’re alive and keep enough money in your bank account to live off of comfortably. THEN make one simple bank account that is split how you want it to be split. It’s normal to have a loved one on your bank accounts in case you’re too sick to pay your bills, or even healthy and not where you can pay things. Be careful who you put on that bank account, because when you die they can claim that the money they never deposited a dollar into is theirs unless you’re specific it’s not. Just be overly specific about everything to be safe.
So if your estate is complex and you have multiple heirs…you may be creating the fall of the legacy you spent your life creating if you aren’t strategic with it’s future. If that’s important to you, that your family stay a family, especially if some were reliant on you financially, you will its survival rate dramatically unless you’re specific and have these conversations with those left behind about what you want.
Heirs…if the only thing you did was BE BORN…. anything your predecessors chose to gift you is just that…..a gift. Make your own way, provide for your own life, sustain your own business, support your own kids. Your parents don’t “owe” you anything past your launch and defying them one last time is not something you want to be known for.
“I can’t make anyone happy” “I’m just ruining everything“ “I’ll just quit”
No. What you need to do is stop being such a baby when someone calls you out on your bullshit and accept some responsibility. Self proclaiming yourself as the victim is lazy. And it’s annoying.
Don’t like where you are, CHANGE IT. Don’t like being called out for your oversights and mistakes, STOP making them or at least learn from them.
But don’t bait someone into consoling you off a cliff because you decided to walk there. You did it, you own it, you fix it.
Don’t know how? Just ask. You could probably ask the same person you just tried to manipulate into being the cohost of your pity party and I bet they could give you some great insight…or you could spend a hot minute doing some internal auditing and identify why you are the common denominator to your bunk situation.
I think we’ve all made a siphon. Pull water from a tank into the hose (or gas if you’re super red), put the other end lower, and just watch cohesive energy and gravity do their thing in the vacuum. It sucks it right out until it’s empty or is equal to the level of where it’s going.
Some people are the same for us. They tap into our energy supply….we might push a little to them to get things going, make them feel better, but then if we’re not careful while they’re not putting effort back in to replace our spent energy – we get all tapped out. On E.
So how do we fix this? Boundaries and the art of saying no. Honing in on that discernment that tells us when we’re getting low. Identifying if what we’re pouring into is even a legit source of energy for us or if we’re just making endless deposits. Valuing our time and resources and treating them like assets we expect a return on. How are we replacing it?
Because otherwise…we’ll just run on E, feeling depleted. The ideal matches of energy are pairings that are equal but different. Different brains, iron sharpening iron, and different perspectives, all of those things can have the same energy level and make equal deposits.
Weighing our risks vs our rewards and being confident that what we offer will either be replenished by watching it multiply or be renewed.
That’s where the magic happens. So before you get siphoned dry or end up at a less than level of energy you never intended to be at (search: “codependent”)…set some “will not go below“ limits for your own self.
Redacted information is manipulation. We’ve all done it. Tell a story a certain way when you want people to agree with you, conveniently leave out little bits of it so you can control the opinion, spin doctor the outcome….Put ourselves in the light, the right, and generate a pile on of support.
But are we really doing ourselves any favors by winning favor with half truths? Is it we don’t want correction because correction won’t align with our motives?
I like to believe I surround myself with people who have pure enough intentions and are insightful enough to catch me on my spins…the ones who say “feel like there’s something missing” “Are you sure” or maybe even “have you thought about this”, but I’m sure I’ve used a conversation with limited presentation to feel better about a bad call…used my relationships as medicine before.
When we do that, it’s a mistake. It’s undercutting the whole purpose of having people, and it’s not fair to the integrity of those relationships. On the flip, if the ONLY people we have in our lives are ones who believe our spin and don’t see our blindspots – we probably need more independent thinking people around.
Bottom line is: trust your people enough with the whole truth and let them decide for themselves what they think about it. If we’re afraid of losing their spot in our life because of who we actually are….maybe revisit who you are or revisit your relationships…whichever gets us closer to living in our truth by way of trust.
Mistakes and issues are two very different things. A mistake is something we know we did wrong, something we regret, and likely a flub that won’t happen again because when we made it, we were careless or not paying attention. It’s something we don’t want to happen again and we see the error. It’s how we learn and grow.
Having an issue is a bit different. An issue will likely play on repeat, an issue isn’t something we come and say “I’m sorry” for because we don’t acknowledge the effect it had. An issue is a problem.
So when you’re choosing who to align yourself with and taking that relational inventory…really think about things that happen that cause you stress and discern if they were just a mistake or an actual issue. A mistake can be easily forgiven, maybe even overlooked with the right amount of grace…but those issues are likely there to stay unless that person puts in some work that you can’t do for them.
So if you’re choosing to involve yourself with people with unaddressed issues that affect you, the ones that give you PTSD and make you want to jump into a ceiling fan…. There’s your own issue to start putting the work into correcting.
Deeper Than a Puddle 