Comments on: Pondering…One-Sided Relationships (or Maybe it’s just Friendship I’m Thinking About)

By: Ashley

Ashley — Fri, 26 May 2006 15:27:19 +0000

I am sorry it has taken me so long to comment. But what you said really made me stop and think. And even though it’s been a couple of days, I still didn’t quite have my comment put together until we talked about this topic at bible study. I just want to let you know that I appreciate you putting yourself out there. It is a very vulnerable place to be. I may not know much about your past, but I consider you one of my closest friends. You have been there more for me than you probably know. Thanks for being such a good friend.

And I totally understand the whole friends that are needy thing. I’m kind of dealing with that now and I haven’t found a good resolution to the problem. If I do, I’ll let you know Of course, I’ve realized that I have probably been that type of friend to someone, the needy one. All I can do is try to remember that and move on.

Here’s to good friends

By: Rachel

Rachel — Fri, 26 May 2006 13:53:29 +0000

Sharing yourself is seldom easy… atleast in my opinion. It requires you to put yourself out there. And I think you’ve done just that in your blog. Everyone longs for a deep relationship; one that’s authentic, genuine, understanding. We’ve all experienced disappointment, pain, maybe even betrayal and disloyalty. That, too, I believe is a conondrum. Call it human existence, call it sin, call it an existential quandry. We live in a both/and world.

You’re doing a beautiful job of it, if sheerly by your reflections.

By: Imperfect Mirror

Imperfect Mirror — Thu, 25 May 2006 18:36:16 +0000

Our Relationships Are Fractured Because We Love Imperfectly

Misty wrote a heartfelt entry about friendships and issues with them the other day, and I want to snip out a bit of it, because I was trying not to go all Bible-Ass Man in her comments:
Maybe it’s because I don’t share myself easily. I feel like I …

By: Emily Short

Emily Short — Wed, 24 May 2006 21:20:12 +0000

There was one particularly bad instance of this that happened to me in college, where I had a friend who I think saw me as a kind of substitute companionship for the boyfriend she didn’t have — she’d call me at all kinds of weird hours and want to go out a lot. Which was usually fun, except it was my senior year and I had a lot to do, and she was monopolizing my social time so much that I didn’t get to see my other friends very much. I tried to back her off gently a bit, but she was kind of a spoiled person and didn’t take well to being told no, on any given occasion. (Once she called me up when I was studying to say she needed to see me really urgently, and it turned out that this urgent thing — I thought there was a disaster in her family or something — was that she wanted me to rearrange the photos on her dorm room wall because she thought I had better design sense than she did.)

Anyway, I didn’t really know how to deal with this very well, and there came a point where I was studying for finals where I just did all my studying at the library where she couldn’t reach me. Which was good for the exams, but not so good for the friendship. After we graduated, she stopped answering my email at all. I have always felt bad about that, but it was one of those situations where I couldn’t think of a good way to balance what she needed and what I needed.

Ah well. Long rambly story that doesn’t really give much insight, but I do know what you mean about the one-sided thing.

By: LB

LB — Wed, 24 May 2006 20:41:17 +0000

There’s always “Wind Beneath my Wings” if you’re going to nix “Friends.”

By: Misty

Misty — Wed, 24 May 2006 20:36:53 +0000

There’s unsaved which is certainly a form of broken I take really seriously but here I’m talking about psychological damage or poor coping skills or just plain ol’ bad behavior.

I know plenty of people who are unsaved but still manage to have good interpersonal skills and the opposite as well, saved people who can’t communicate or can’t deal with their past very well.

Thanks for saying we’re a good influence. I promise not to ever ruin that influence by singing “Friends are Friends Forever” in any circumstance.

By: Geof F. Morris

Geof F. Morris — Wed, 24 May 2006 20:08:33 +0000

Maybe it’s because so many of us are just broken.

Theologically, I’d argue that we’re all broken.

I’ll also take a moment and refer you to Dunbar’s number as to why there’s a realistic limit of how many people we can well and truly know.

But then I’ll say this: I still feel like I’m getting to know you two as we all tell stories and experience things together. So it’s definitely all a process.

I want my impact to be a good one.

The impact of the both of you, individually and corporately, on me is invaluable. I literally thank the Good Lord that y’all are in my life.

But if you break out the Michael W. Smith and start humming “Friends Are Friends Forever”, well … we’re gonna have to throw down!