Investing In Friendships

We’re all so busy, aren’t we? Seems we’re constantly rushing from here to there — gotta get home, to the office, to the kids’ soccer game, gotta take the elderly parents to all their appointments. The dog needs to go to the vet, then there are groceries, laundry, doctors, commitments, obligations, this, that, the other zillion things — and a ton of stress.

Some people tell me that they’re so busy doing all this stuff that they can’t make time for their friends. And making new friends? Forget about it. “No one makes new friends after 40,” said one woman.

Yet, who’s happiest? Research has shown that it’s people with the largest social networks. How’s your friend factor? Have all you need? All you want? Are you making time to invest in your friendships, and insure your own happiness?

If not, don’t worry. There are four things you can do right now to grow your social network.

Make contact: Email is a great tool for nurturing friendships. Though your great-grandmother might be appalled that you’re not penning brilliant little missives on tasteful monogrammed stationery using a fountain pen with blue-black ink… contact is contact. Let your friends know what you’re up to with a quick email. Or, a simple “I’m thinking of you” can brighten a day. And, if you receive a message from a friend, take the time to respond, even it’s just a few lines. Of course, a phone call is swell and a “date” is even better. Read on.

Make time: Regardless of where you work — The White House or your house — schedule something with at least one friend at least once a week. Coffee, lunch, cocktails, cow-tipping, or whatever you enjoy doing together. I sense quite a few spit-takes at that suggestion. Wipe off your computer monitor and keep reading. Sure you’re busy. Are you so busy, then, that you have no time to be happy? When you make time for a friend, you grow and nurture that relationship. Ignore the care and feeding of friendships until you need them — and they may not be there.

Be yourself: The best friends are those who accept and enjoy you despite your flaws and shortcomings. Postponing friendships until you lose weight, or have a partner, or that nasty rash clears up — is just fear talking. Real friends will love having you around, regardless. And if you have to pretend to be someone you’re not around a person or group of people? They ain’t your friends.

Remember: Memorizing birthdays and astrological signs is not required. However, please try to remember the names of your friend’s spouse, and their children. Building a friendship means you need to know your friend’s preferences — when you continually suggest meeting for a nice juicy steak to your vegan friend… you are actually telling them that they aren’t quite important enough for you to remember who they are.

And, want to know the single best thing you can do to bring some new people into your life? Volunteer for something. Yep, volunteering — whether at your job or in your community — creates bonds with others based on shared experiences and interests. The sense of pride and accomplishment plus the satisfaction of giving back are all great side benefits.

Friendships bring joy, comfort and zest to life. Relationships are a fundamental building block of happiness. Staying too busy to have friends and human connection is simply a way of denying yourself the happiness that’s your birthright.

And where’s the joy in that?

Fear Itself

Every once in a while there’s that confluence of stuff that comes together in your life and you see things so much more clearly. It’s a perfect storm of change.

And that happened for me this week.

First, I heard that writer Marianne Williamson is hosting a year-long audio class on The Course in Miracles on Oprah.com, so I clicked over and checked it out. This will tell you a lot about me — the course is designed so that you listen to a daily message, then reflect and do exercises. You are to do one lesson daily. Only one, no more.

Of course, I listened to nine lessons the first day. Then skipped over to lesson 48. Then back to lesson 11. What can I say? I’m curious.

Then, the thoughtful, sensible writer-coach Cheryl Richardson recommended a movie called “You Can Heal Your Life”, so I watched that online. The film, based on the work of Louise Hay, explores the power of thoughts. Like the course Marianne Williamson is teaching, the overarching idea is that your thoughts create your reality — but your thoughts are not always based in what’s happening now. They are often reactions to what’s happened in the past.

I know all this stuff. See, I do personal development work for a living. All day, everyday, I challenge people to look at things in new ways and to try new things. And every assignment I ever give a client is something I’ve done myself. So, given all that, I was pretty confident (smug) of my own enlightenment.

At some point as the film rolled, I realized my jaw was hanging open and I hastily grabbed a pencil stub and the back side of someone’s homework and began taking notes.

And as my mind exploded, I wrote these questions:

• What do I complain about most?
• When are things uncomfortable for me?
• What do I resent?
• Where is my thinking not helping me?

Great questions, huh? Willing to answer them yourself?

Because when you do, you will see something really important and useful.

The root of most of our unhappy thoughts is fear. Fear that we’re not good enough. Fear that we won’t have enough. Fear that we’ll be abandoned. Fear that we’ll literally or figuratively die.

When I looked at where my thinking was not helping me, I laughed out loud. Wanna know why? Next month I’m going on a trip with my kids. A trip which will require bathing suits and shorts. I absolutely convinced myself that due to a period of relative inactivity (hey! I hurt my ankle!) I am so fat that none of last year’s summer clothes would possibly fit. In fact, it was likely I’d have to trade those size 10s for, oh, size 18s. If I dieted.

So, yesterday when no one was home but me, I took a deep breath and tried on last year’s shorts. Amazingly, they fit. Like a little gopher popping out of her hole, I sat up and took notice. Feeling brave, I pulled the swimsuits out of their hiding place under an old bathrobe. In front of a full length mirror, ladies, I tried them on.

They fit, too.

It was only my thoughts about my body that had created an environment where I felt plain bad about myself. The reality was something much different.

And at the bottom of it was our old friend, fear. Fear of being flabby. Fear of being less than. Fear of not being good enough. Maybe fear of getting older. The sweet spot to explore is this: why was that fear working for me? Because it must have been working on some level, or I wouldn’t have held on to it.

When you objectively look at your thoughts and completely understand where they come from, then and only then can you change them into something more inspiring, more embracing, more…true.

Who would you allow yourself to be if you had no fear? A nearly 48 year old woman in a bikini, perhaps? Hey, to paraphrase Franklin Roosevelt, all you have to fear is your thoughts, themselves.

Saying Goodbye

It’s hard to say goodbye. As Shakespeare so aptly put it, “Parting is such sweet sorrow.” And in this life there is much to be parted from, often with much grief.

One man becomes suddenly, critically ill and must part with the idea of his youth and vigor.

One young mother loses her own mother, and must part with the idea of herself as someone’s beloved child.

One man parts with his wedding ring after his wife’s death, and lets go of the idea of himself as someone’s husband.

One woman parts with her home and possessions and adjusts to the idea that she won’t live independently for the rest of her life.

I’ve written about crisis and how it can change lives. Crisis forces a redefinition of who we are, and what’s important to us. Altering those fundamental views about ourselves is, no surprise, life changing.

Catalytic crisis requires us to move from the cocoon of “known-self” to “unknown-self”. Embracing the unknown is not something many of us handle particularly well… so, in the alternative, we cling fearfully, ferociously to our known-self.

Known-self may have worked for years. We’re comfortable with all the rules in known-self — and we can anticipate with confidence how we and others will act. Even if we know we’re unhappy in our known-self, at least we know what to expect! Who wants to upset the apple cart? But when clinging to known-self feels like pain, you will change it. Sometimes it seems it takes a crisis to show us just how ill-fitting known-self has become.

The prospect of unknown-self is murky, and for those with control issues, it’s precisely the unknowing that’s so hard. Parting with a definition that really doesn’t work should be, on its face, easy to do. However, parting with the known in favor of the unknown — that seems scary. It’s like emerging from the cocoon we’ve constructed as a worm and learning to live as a butterfly. None of the old rules seem to apply.

So, in those moments, remember: “parting is such sweet sorrow.”

When you say goodbye to something old that no longer fits, you open space for something new. It’s the opportunity for “new-self”. Which could be something nicer, better, happier. Could be something that helps you live more fully. Could be something sweet.

Be open to the opportunity for change that life brings. Welcome it. Because it’s your chance to flap your butterfly wings… and fly.

I Am, I Said

It’s nice to have friends. It’s especially nice to have friends like Lauri and Anne — the kind of friends who drop by for tea and bring great ideas. Oh, and cookies. We cannot overlook the importance of cookies.

We sat the other day, sipping, munching thoughtfully, until Anne piped up with: “OK, so we were talking about something in the car on the way over and wanted to hear what you think.”

I was actually thinking that the cookies were really good. But I’m often able to stretch my brain just a bit. “Uhmrrgh,” I responded, through cookie crumbles, which means, “Bring it on.”

“Ever notice how often we say ‘I’m not’ and how infrequently we say ‘I am’?” Anne asked.

I was struck speechless by the simplicity of Anne’s point.

Boy, we spend so much time thinking about what we’re not.

Coming from “I’m not” is coming from a lack, or a deficit. “I’m not” means not enough — not tall enough, not thin enough, not young enough, not rich enough, not smart enough, not anything enough.

“I’m not” keeps us in a continual state of stress, feeling like we haven’t/can’t/won’t get it all done. And we won’t. Because we’re not enough.

But if we could shift all those “I’m nots” to “I ams”… think of the difference. Owning your own strengths. Standing in your own power. Relying on what you’ve got, rather than what you haven’t.

“I am”… good at taking care of my aging parents. “I am” … a good mentor. “I am” … a good friend. “I am” … alive.

Recently I taught a teleclass to a group of students and heard myself saying, “I’m pretty good at networking.” And I caught myself, internally, doing a self-check: was I bragging? Didn’t Mama say, “Don’t get too big for your britches. You’re no better than anyone else?”

She sure did. But it didn’t feel like bragging. It felt like truth. And, guess what? It is.

Make a list of your “I ams”. Own your “I ams”. Treasure them. They’re your truths. They’re what makes you, you.

And every time you find yourself stuck in “I’m not”, turn it around and say a quick “I am”. Such as, “OK, I’m not a 25 year old supermodel with more money than sense and no responsibilities, but I am…“

Go ahead — fill in your own blank.

The Wizard of Oz & Other Narcissists

Ever had a relationship with Dr. Jekyll? Or was that Mr. Hyde? Whether it’s your boss, your brother or your spouse, if you think you could be dealing with a narcissist you need to read The Wizard of Oz and Other Narcissists: Coping with the One-Way Relationship in Work, Love, and Familyby Eleanor Payson. Ellie was kind enough to answer some questions for me — hopefully, you’ll have an “Aha!” moment and know what to do:

How do you define narcissism to someone when they ask you “Hey, Ellie, I heard you wrote a book? What’s it about?”

When people use the word narcissist, or narcissistic in the informal context he/she may simply be referring to someone who is behaving selfishly or is self-absorbed in a given circumstance. On the other hand, in a more pathological sense narcissism references a pervasive preoccupation with self that is out of balance with a healthy give and take in his/her relationships. I should qualify here that this is particularly true of those inner circle relationships such as a significant other, close friends, or family members. In essence pathological degrees of narcissism reflect a disturbance that distorts a person’s relationship between “self and other.” The narcissistic individual is someone who has an undeveloped self, an immature “I,” and is compensating by striving to prop up a grandiose “me” (the false self of the narcissist.) In other words, his/her preoccupation with maintaining a grandiose me distorts and overrides an ability to give genuine consideration and regard for other(s).

When we think of the resources that are called narcissistic supplies we can begin to get a handle on what this means. Narcissistic supplies are those exchanges between people that foster the well being of each person in a relationship – well being that comes from knowing that we are individuals of value, special and important just because we breathe, just because we exist. A person with a healthy self is able to exchange an unconditional regard (verbally and nonverbally) in his/her relationships. This presence of unconditional regard may be seen in the admiring gleam in our eyes, a spoken appreciation, an effortful listening that seeks to understand and empathize, a willingness to hold ourselves accountable for injuries we may have caused, and so on. Someone who is narcissistically defended inevitably requires many more “strokes” of affirmation, recognition, efforts at understanding, support, etc., than they are able to give. In fact, there is a kind of obliviousness to the recognition of these exchanges in the unconditional sense. This is because the narcissistic individual is externally focused on conditional realities for maintaining the grandiose me such as; how much power and status one has, how beautiful or handsome one is, how effective in his/her career one is, etc. These external realities become the source of pseudo affirmation, and the narcissist is inevitably desperately attached to the maintenance of these external realities for self-worth. The individual with narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) can barely acknowledge what is meant by unconditional regard of self and other. Consequently, the narcissist requires an endless supply of affirmation to keep his/her false, or substitute self, intact. Ironically, the narcissist is unable to make use of unconditional affirmation as true nourishment and similarly unable to give it.

How does a narcissist tip his hand? How do you know he’s a narcissist and not just a jerk?

Often the slang expressions of “jerk,” and perhaps more colorful terms, do seem to be the layperson’s language for describing narcissistic traits in a person. However, once we have “vented our spleen” we may want to take a deeper look at the person and our relationship so that we can act wisely and at times with the imperative for self-preservation. We may discover that there is more healthy substance to the person than we thought, or perhaps the opposite. The surface presentation of a person can appear to have any quality – from “jerk” to “charmer” to “sophisticate, intellectual, drama queen/king, officious professional,” etc. It is what exists under the surface (or perhaps more to the point – what does not exist under the surface) that we want to recognize. Developing discernment in taking the full measure of a person and the full measure of ourselves is what we must learn if we want to have more fulfilling and mature relationships. The misleading facade of individuals with personality disorders is the danger to be on the lookout for, and we can be tantalizingly tempted to forego the effortful discovery process. If we miss the presence of a deeper disturbance such as the narcissistic personality disorder in a person, we may end up struggling for our very psychological, financial, or even physical survival.

A few of the clues that I cite in my book are:
Excessively:
- Requires attention, admiration, special consideration, recognition
- Demonstrates a grandiose sense of entitlement
- Manipulates and pursues his/her agenda (often relentlessly, tenaciously)
- Criticizes self and others
- Holds unrealistic expectations of self and others, alongside an over-estimation of self and his/her needs
- Demonstrates an all or nothing approach to life — win/lose

Limited ability to:
- Fulfill mutually held “understandings.” Agreements seem to morph over time with creative “revisionist” ability
- Self-reflect and take ownership of a problem
- Tolerate anything perceived as criticism, or oversight
- Feel genuine or deep empathy for others
- Recognize the needs of others (except superficially)
- Recognize others as independent agents (separate selves)

These deeper limitations and disturbing defenses are inevitably camouflaged by the façade of some impressive or competent surface presentation mentioned earlier. The greatest danger here is that the outer demeanor often has a powerful aura of seduction emanating from a personality that projects the promise of larger than life charm, power, competence, originality, etc. The potency of this seduction is often so captivating that we can be induced into a kind of suspension of belief where our critical faculties for noticing distortions and inconsistencies are switched off. This is the crossroads, so to speak, of our own codependent tendencies that are necessary to heal if we really expect to steer clear of these dangerous relationships, or navigate them safely.

So, is narcissism treatable with therapy or drugs?

As far as the neurobiological issues that are involved, this is in many ways unchartered territory. However, I am always skeptical of individuals or approaches that lay claim to having all the answers from either the neurobiological side or the psychological side. In truth, we are a complex mix of both. Many individuals with a mental illness or a mental disorder will have what are called co-morbid issues, such as depression, anxiety, attention deficit disorder, that are in need of evaluation and treatment. Once we achieve relief from one or more of these conditions (sometimes through effective psychotropic medications) we stand a much better chance to develop a more effective self-observing ego that can allow greater possibilities for growth and change. Individuals with narcissistic personality disorder almost without doubt have any number of co- morbid issues that once treated would allow him/her to function more appropriately.

What should someone who’s in a relationship with a narcissist do?

The first thing to do is reach out and get help and not stop until you feel that you have found someone who can validate and understand what you are going through. If the therapist is overly anxious and quick to dismiss the possibility that you are involved with someone with severe narcissism or perhaps full blown NPD then move on until you find a therapist who can appreciate the illusive nature of recognizing the realities of the problem. Then, second, commit to therapy to deal with your own issues (codependency, or a mix of narcissistic and codependency issues, etc.) and stay in the healing process as you utilize all the normal tools of therapy including books that can help with insight and empowerment. In therapy we need to be willing to work through our own blind spots, our shadow self as Carl Jung would call it. This is the only way out of our tendency to idealize which is often unconscious and compulsive. If there is any way of finding a support group or forming one, this is another invaluable tool.

Learning some immediate tools for asserting boundaries to create safety in these relationships is a must, and for this I believe, Where to Draw the Line: How to Set Healthy Boundaries Every Day by Anne Katherine is a must read. Since my book came out, I discovered books that I wish I had listed in my bibliography such as The Verbally Abusive Relationship: How to Recognize it and How to Respond by Patricia Evans, and other books that have been published recently. Amazon.com offers excellent reviews for selecting these. On the home stretch of the healing process, coaching can be an invaluable tool for maintaining self-care and goals that lead to empowerment. Working with a coach like yourself, Michele, who is familiar with the depth of the issues and the importance for ongoing healing work is a true bonus.

Thanks for the plug, Ellie. To find out more about Eleanor Payson and her work, go to www.eleanorpayson.com

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