Friends vs Family Part 1

Hello everyone,

Several months ago, my sister-in-law, CO, sent me an email regarding why sometimes our relationships with our friends are more successful than our relationships with our family.  This is a little long so I am going to break it up in parts.  I think she has some pretty insightful things to say.

CO-
Friendships vs. Family Relationships
Why is one more successful over the other?

This is a difficult topic to write about, because many of my opinions would vary depending on the friend or family member I am relating these opinions too, but I am going to try to generalize some of what I am writing.

I believe that friends are more accepting of who we are as people. They are less likely to be judgmental of our everyday lives and as the old saying goes "Birds of a feather flock together." Our friends tend to be of a like mind with the things we believe or the actions we typically carry out in our lives. Unfortunately our friendships also tend to be forged from within our own social statuses. It would be difficult (not impossible) for a friendship to be forged from two separate environments socially.

Have you ever noticed how we grow out of some friendships and they fall away after some time? For example, I noticed when I married how the majority of my friends fell to the wayside and given time I had to develop other friends after my new social standing changed. The difference was I was now married and no longer a part of the single crowd. My single friends only wanted to go bar happing, drink, and various other "single minded" activities. I could no longer take part in these things with them. So naturally I no longer fit into these peoples lives. Their interest in me quickly faded, and visa versa due to the lack of common ground that we once shared. Other instances change our social status such as having children, church involvement, financial gain and or loss, and I could go on but I think we get the point. Of course these friends were generally more superficial and the so called love we shared only went skin deep so to speak. The ease in the termination of these friendships also causes me to wonder if we were every really friends in the first place, but that would be another topic all together.

(Let me add that I do think some friends are put in our lives for a short time and some are for a long time.  If you find your friendships changing over time.  That's OK.  I think this agrees with what CO is saying.)
I have had a blessing in life to have a friend that I consider to be more my family than anything. By family I mean that this person will always love me and be a part of my life regardless of the direction my life takes. (Good or bad) Our friendship is successful do to the fact that we completely accept one another, flaws and all. Even when we disagree with one another we have a mutual understanding that the disagreement does not change our acceptance of the other. We respect one another and value each others presences in our lives. There have been times when I have seen this friend making choices that may not have been the smartest thing to do. Being that we are as close as we are, I am able to voice my concerns with her. However, that does not mean she will take my advice or warning. The only thing I can do if things go badly for her is be there for her, be encouraging, and sometimes help pick up the pieces in love. What else are friends truly for except to be there for one another in bad times and enjoy them in the good times? Enjoying their company is only a benefit of friendship but not its purpose when it comes to being that close to a friend.

I believe true friends are bound by a type of love. We have a successful friendship because we choose to act in love toward one another, and a big part of that is not being judgmental toward each other when we mess up. We also do not hold grudges and even forgive each other easily when we have said or done something to offend each other. I am an only child in my family, so I do not know what it is like to have a brother or sister. I imagine for myself that this friend is probably the closest thing I will ever have to a sibling. We have known each other since junior high school and we have been close for longer than P and I have been married. Just as much as I could not imagine my life without P, I also could not imagine not having this friend in my life. It is also nice to be able to talk to someone I can trust about problems that is not on the inside of my family circle. Sometimes it is good to discuss problems with someone that can stay objective because they are not on the inside of what is going on in my world.

To Be Continued.....
The Minion

Why is It Always About You?

This is the title of a book I read on something called narcissism.  One definition of this word is an unhealthy love for ones' self.  Here's what I found really interesting about this.  According to the Bible, in the last days (before Jesus returns) people will be lover's of themselves.

Before I go any further, let me quickly say that I don't have one clue when Jesus will return.  I don't think the world is going to blow up tomorrow or that aliens are plotting with President Obama and the Chinese to overthrow Luxembourg or any of the other crazy rumors you hear these days.  I will also let you in on another secret.  I am not all that anxious for the Lord to return.  Let me tell you why.  Most of the people that I hear today who are anxiously awaiting God's return are also broke down, busted and disgusted people.  I don't want to be chased off this planet with my tail between my legs in Christ's return.  I want to finish my course and when I have been successful at everything that the Lord has for me here, then and only then will I be ready to move to Heaven.

However, I do believe that we are getting close to the return of Christ.  When will that be?  The bible says that God hasn't even told Jesus the exact time.  So if He hasn't confided the exact time in Jesus, I think it's a pretty safe bet that He isn't going to tell me either.

But I think I now understand what this whole concept of people being lovers of themselves means.  It means they will be narcissistic.  Is this a bad thing?  Yes.  Why am I bringing it up?  Because being around these types of people can be extremely unhealthy and there are going to be more and more of them on the earth.  If you are around friends who are like this, you may want to consider whether or not it makes sense to continue to hang around with them.  Also, we all need to check ourselves from time to time to see if we are acting this way.

The reason I find this so interesting is because I have talked to several people lately who were in counseling sessions (no, I am not a counselor) with other people who were diagnosed with this problem.  There is a healthy form of narcissism and I think we need to understand that it is OK to think about yourself and to take care of yourself.  But what we are talking about here is an unhealthy situation.

So let me give you a few things that are characteristics of narcissism:
1.  Like the title of the blog, for some people everything in their life has to be about them.  They can never talk or do anything that doesn't relate to themselves.  They also have to be first priority over everyone else.
2.  Most of the time, they don't apologize when they do something wrong or their apology is a very sarcastic one.  The reason this happens is that a narcissist believes their world is completely perfect and that they are perfect.  They have a hard time understanding that it's OK to have imperfections.  But like we have discussed before, no one is perfect.
3.  They project anything negative onto other people.  This sort of goes hand in hand with number 2.  If someone tells them that they are wrong about anything, someone else is always to blame for them being wrong.  For example, if you tell a narcissist that they were rude to a store clerk, the narcissist will always blame someone else for why they were rude.
4.  They rarely have the ability to make anyone else happy unless they are completely happy.
5.  Because they have to keep their world perfect, you cannot tell them that they are a narcissist because it would mean that they have an imperfection.

There are others and if you feel like someone in your life really has this problem, I encourage you to get the book with that title and read it.

So why am I telling you all this you ask?  Because these types of people can be very draining.  If you have friends like that, you might want to seriously consider whether or not the friendship is worth it.  If we stay in friendships like that, they are very draining on us and can ultimately do us a lot of emotional harm.

But here is the other reason I wanted to write about this.  I want you to take a look at those five items again.  Now this is going to be very hard because if you have a problem, then it will be difficult for you to admit to this particular one.  But I want you to ask yourself honestly if any of those things apply to you.  I don't want you to be overly critical of yourself.  Just because you came up with an excuse for something you did yesterday doesn't make you a narcissist.  However, if you can't admit that you are wrong, you do have a big problem.

See I was like that for a long time in a couple of areas.  I could not admit that I had a problem with food and I could not admit that I had a problem spending money.  Both were true but this was especially true with money.  I was a financial disaster.  It hurt not only me but also my family and I could not admit to myself that I had a problem.  Finally for me, I had an incident happen that actually woke me up.



That's another Opinion of the Minion