Friends - DVD segment 11
by Lezlie Gomes
We are social
beings who are meant to be in relationship with other people. Whether with our parents, friends or
romantic partners, relationships are an important part of our lives. Over these next three segments we will be
discussing our relationships with the different people in our lives. We’ll
consider what makes a relationship healthy or unhealthy, the consequences of
healthy and unhealthy relationships, and how our relationships affect how we
feel about ourselves.
In this segment
we discuss relationships with our friends.
Here is what some of the women in our survey and on the video have to
say on the topic:
“A healthy relationship with my peers consists of things such as trust, respect, compassion, understanding, forgiveness, and equality. I know that all relationships are not perfect or stress free but fighting should be a minimum with the ability to communicate feelings…”104“Healthy relationships are with people you enjoy being around. They’re encouraging and supportive. If you have healthy relationships with peers you’ll be able to argue and accept the other person’s point of view. Healthy relationships are also built on trust and honest. People in healthy relationships accept the other the way they are and do not pressure them into unwelcome situations”168“…there comes a point in friendships where you decide it’s a partnership…you are going to give and take and that come what may I’m going to be here for you and you’re going to be here for me and we know that and understand that…” Tina on video“I thought it was a good friendship…then I noticed that the friendship started going wrong and unhealthy when I was being held back and I felt like I was trapped and couldn’t do the things I wanted to do and this person didn’t understand me anymore. They were getting mad for me talking to other people and I thought to myself, that’s unhealthy…I had to break away from that…”Katherine on video
|
|
|
Supportive |
Unsupportive |
|
Friend
encourages you to maintain and develop friendships with others |
Friend becomes
angry when you talk to others or make new friends |
|
Allows you
space to grow and discover who you are |
Feel trapped in
the friendship |
|
Spending time
with friend makes you feel good about yourself |
Your often
leave conversations feeling bad about yourself |
|
Communication
is based on trust and honesty |
Friends lie to
you and talk about you behind your back |
|
Friend makes
you feel that you are an important part of his/her life |
Feel sad,
angry, frightened, anxious around friend |
|
Mutual respect |
You don’t feel
respected or appreciated |
|
You enjoy spending time with the other
person |
You feel pressured into spending time with the
other person |
|
Mutual give and
take |
You feel that
you give more than you receive in the friendship |
|
Decisions are
made by all parties |
Friend makes
all decisions |
|
Friend does not
pressure you to do or be something you are not okay with |
You will do
anything to be accepted and belong |
|
You feel accepted
and safe |
You feel unsafe |
The Friends We Become
We learn much about our relationships from adults in our lives,
especially our parents and guardians.
In many ways, parents teach us what we may come to expect from others
and what others can expect from us. In
childhood and adolescence, our friends become increasingly important in our
lives. You’ve come to depend on your
friends or on one particular friend to be there for you when you need
them. That friend may also trust you to
be there for him or her. In
psychological terms, friends become a secure base for each other, a safe
place. Tina on the video uses the term
“resting place” to describe how she feels about her best friend who lives
thousands of kilometres away. This term
truly describes what it is like to have and to be a secure base for someone.
“My best friend…we have that connection…she knows my heart and she knows what I’m going through. Even if we don’t talk to each other, it’s like we’re still connected by that bond that we do share. It’s definitely a comfort to have that resting place with someone”Tina on video
Although you may not realize it, you will likely use your experience
received from your early childhood secure base (e.g., your caregivers) in your
close friendships. Just as your early relationships with your parents and
caregivers have shaped how you view relationships, your friendships will also
solidify your expectations for relationships. “Am I going to be loved or
rejected? Can I trust this person? Can I talk to this person about anything?”
You may discover that your parents were possibly not there for you in
the ways that you needed for them to be.
On the other hand, you may discover that although your parents love you
without any strings attached, your friends’ love is conditional. Whatever you discover through your
relationships, you will grow. You don’t
have to have it all figured out or know exactly who you are at this point in your
life. It’s a process and we all
continue to be shaped by our relationships. The important thing is that we surround ourselves with people who
support us, encourage us, challenge us, and allow us to grow and become the
strong women we are meant to be.
As you’ve most
likely come to understand, your relationships have helped shape the person that
you become. When we surround ourselves with healthy relationships, we become
healthier people. As Tina on the video
puts it,
Prisms: Discovering Yourself Through Others
As you’ve most
likely come to understand, your relationships have helped shape the person that
you become. When we surround ourselves with healthy relationships, we become
healthier people. As Tina on the video
puts it,
“we’re like prisms…we are still one prism, but there are different lights that get complemented once we encounter different people and we share common goals, interests, passions, freedoms and just beauty… and there is beauty in that. It’s not necessarily a matter of being confused or lost and wondering who we are, it’s just like embracing that all these different aspects to who I am make up this one thing and that’s cool and that’s beautiful.”
What Tina is
saying is that different people in our lives bring out different qualities and
aspects of who we are and that this is not only okay, but a beautiful
thing. It’s alright not to share all
the same interests with your closest friends.
Likewise, it’s okay to share interests with people who are not in your
regular group of friends. By stepping
out and forming new relationships, you may come to discover something new and
beautiful about yourself.
If you have
discovered that some of your relationships are unhealthy, it may be time to
walk away. Leaving a friendship may be
really difficult, especially if you’ve come to depend on the relationship for
acceptance and a sense of belonging.
Karen on the
video found that she stayed in some unhealthy friendships for this exact
reason. The “reward” of acceptance for her far outweighed the costs of the
friendship even though she felt “trapped”.
In her group of friends, she had to be “friends” with everyone or she
was the one “on the out” because they “all talk”. Being accepted was what kept
her in these unhealthy friendships.
For Kat, the cool,
popular clique of girls gained significant power and control over her life and
her happiness. Some days they welcomed
her in and she “fit” and other days she didn’t. She hated the stress. At
the end of the day she would either be “crying or on cloud 9”.
Do Karen and
Kat’s stories sound familiar? Are you
sacrificing some of yourself to be accepted and to belong? How can you reclaim control over your life
and your emotions?
Nikki on the
video has found that over time, she has discovered who she is, what she likes
and doesn’t like. She now feels that
she has a solid base of core values so she doesn’t have to change herself to
feel comfortable in certain social situations.
If she doesn’t feel comfortable in a situation, she knows it’s not for
her and she can just leave. Feeling
that you need to change depending on your situation is stressful and as Nikki
says, “plays with your mind”.
Having this mindset has helped her to move more easily through the world
and make decisions that are best for her.
Guy Friends, Girl Friends and No Friends
Your peer group
may consist of primarily females, a mix of males and females, or you may find
yourself as Kat did at one point in her life, with a male peer group. She grew up with boys and male interaction,
playing road hockey. As she discusses
in the video, she consequently did not deal with female relationships very well
and often got hurt. She lost her trust
in female companionship so she surrounded herself with guys, her buddies that
she didn’t have to go “deep down on [her] feelings”. Kat has, over time, come to realize that
it’s also important it is to have a female voice, one who is completely
non-judgemental.
Leaving an Unhealthy Relationship
“You have the ability to pick and choose who you want to surround you in your entire journey in life. You’re going to get hurt. You grow from that. It’s trial and error. That’s what life’s is all about…it’s going to suck to walk away from someone you thought you had these solid genuine feelings for so long, but things change, people change…it’s inevitable that’ll happen, that it will break your heart sometimes. That’s when you gotta pick up, you gotta move on.”Kat on video
Guy Friends, Girl Friends and No Friends
Your peer group
may consist of primarily females, a mix of males and females, or you may find
yourself as Kat did at one point in her life, with a male peer group. She grew up with boys and male interaction,
playing road hockey. As she discusses
in the video, she consequently did not deal with female relationships very well
and often got hurt. She lost her trust
in female companionship so she surrounded herself with guys, her buddies that
she didn’t have to go “deep down on [her] feelings”. Kat has, over time, come to realize that
it’s also important it is to have a female voice, one who is completely
non-judgemental.
You may find
yourself in a situation where you don’t really have any close friends. Although it may be lonely at times, it’s
better to not have any close friends than to surround yourself with unhealthy
friendships. Don’t sacrifice yourself
for relationships in which you feel you need to be someone you are not. Other people should not have control over
your life or your happiness. This may
be the perfect opportunity to discover more about who you are, what you enjoy,
what you believe and stand for. When a
good friend does come along, you will be solid enough in who you are to be able
to give to and receive freely from that person. Hold out for solid, healthy
relationships based on honesty and mutual respect. You deserve it!