Better to be honest!
Why rejections strengthen friendships
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If you cancel appointments with friends, your guilty conscience kicks in. No more: Our editor finds that rejections actually strengthen friendships.
I had a date with my best friend this evening. Loose. We usually do it that way – something can come up. Nothing came between me. I just don’t feel like driving across town tonight, but more like putting my feet up.Netflix on. I turned her down. I still don’t have a bad conscience.
A date during the lunch break, a drink after work
That was not always so. Not long ago I planned out my days. After all, every person I care about had to have their place. A date during the lunch break, a drink after work. Don’t disappoint anyone, please everyone. Except for himself. You can imagine how that ended. By the weekend when I finally had the time I needed, I either had a migraine – or felt so burnt out that all I wanted to do was hide under the covers alone.
Today I say it more and more often appointments away. This is not only good for me, but also for my friendships. Why?
When it comes to friendships, quantity is not quality
Actually the answer is so simple: quantity does not equal quality. It just often takes a long time to become aware of it. If you squeeze appointments into an already busy everyday life, appointments become obligations. And commitments are rarely fun.
At the same time, they don’t do justice to friends. Nobody wants to be checked off as a time slot like an annoying item on the to-do list. Because if you would actually rather be somewhere else, you rarely get involved with the other person. You are not really there, even if you are physically present. And you can tell.
In fact, I think friendships actually suffer if you see them once a week for the half hour when you’d rather be in bed than for four hours every four weeks – or even a whole day?
Don’t make time for a date, make time for a person
How much time is a person worth to you? Give it to him. But only when you have taken care of yourself. Very important at this point: You don’t need stress to feel stressed. In addition to working a 40-hour week, some people can do sports, meet friends, visit family, do housework and even write a book at the same time. But others need more time for themselves. If we insist so much on individualization, let’s also allow everyone to have their own individual feelings of stress.
Real friendships can tolerate rejection
If you cancel dates when you don’t feel like it, you’ll strengthen your friendship threefold. Number one: By opening up – and honestly admitting that you don’t have the time or just don’t feel like it.
Number two: By signaling to your date that she is too important to you to brush her off when it doesn’t really suit you. This not only shows respect, but also appreciation.
Number three: By rejecting each other, you build trust that takes all the pressure off your friendship. You know you like each other, you know you want to see each other, you know you’ll make it – but you also know that you have reasons if it doesn’t work out. And that no one holds it against you.
If someone doesn’t show understanding, that person may not be a real friend. This is how you distinguish true from false friends.
Don’t be afraid to cancel appointments
Of course you have to maintain relationships, be they of a family, friendship or romantic nature. But if so, please do it correctly. And not every flower needs water every day to survive. What I want to say: Real friends stay even if you don’t see them for a while. Friendships inevitably change over the years. That is normal.
From where I know this? My best friends are, absurdly, the people in my life that I see the least. This summer I went to the sea with two of them. I haven’t seen one of them for six months and the other for weeks, even though we live in the same city. This weekend was just ours. We consciously decided to spend this time together and do nothing better. And what do you always notice at such meetings? True friendships are not measured by how often you see each other – but by the fact that each time it feels like it was yesterday.