Not sparking joy, but goodbye isn't an option

March 21, 2019 5:18 AM

I've always been a bit of a pushover in relationships. Recently (aided in no small part by diligent reading of Ask.Me) I've started drawing better boundaries about what behaviour I find acceptable and what I would walk away from. I've no doubt that this would be a great thing long-term, but the short term sorta sucks and I would appreciate some help in navigating it. Details below the jump.

(a) A lot of people I'm friendly with come from the same tightly knit social and professional circle and lifting myself clean out of it is not an option I have.
(b) Enforcing boundaries has been a lonely, fraught exercise as I don't even have the luxury of cutting the person entirely out of my life, because of (a).
(c) The worst part of this situation is that it's like a wound that is never given a chance to heal. I run into the same people, often unexpectedly, wherein, as an adult, I am expected to be gracious and polite where all I want to do is remove myself from the situation. This is something that WILL happen over and over.
(d) every time (c) happens, I go back to brooding over how the person treated me, or how things went wrong, and how I am the only one seemingly paying the price. Never has the saying 'living rent-free in someone's head' seemed more appropriate.
I want to reclaim my headspace. I want to be able to even be grateful for these people (for whatever positive or negative experience they added to my life, becaus both happened), but I'd settle for not letting my life pass me by because I'm brooding over theirs. Please help me do that.
Thank you.

posted by Nieshka to Human Relations (8 answers total)

It sounds like you need to expand your pool of people you interact with. I know you have a tight social circle, but one of the cool things about socializing is that you can go meet and hang out with other people whenever you choose to. So maybe find some other things you like to do, where the intersections of people you know and would rather not see don't happen so often (if at all) and start building bonds there.
posted by xingcat at 5:38 AM on March 21, 2019 [4 favorites]

For (c), maybe it will help you to reframe what exactly "as an adult" means. To me, it means be decent, polite, and respectful. It doesn't mean that I have to soothe other people's feelings, or do their emotional labor, or lubricate the social machinery. The phrase you should remember here is "return awkward to sender". A situation is uncomfortable because someone violated your clearly stated boundary? Not your problem. Someone acts like a jerk and expects you to deal with it? You can deal with it by leaving the situation. You've set up a dynamic where you do all the heavy lifting for them, and that's self-reinforcing. But you do have the power to set down their baggage. You can clearly point out when someone crosses a line, and if they justify/argue/defend/explain, you can point out that that is actually orthogonal to your original complaint. The second time they take that same action, you reiterate your point and ask them if they can stop doing that? The third time they do it, you point out their behavior, excuse yourself, and walk away.

Yes, it's limiting. People will talk about you behind your back. And the message that they'll eventually carry to other people is "don't do [actions] around Nieshka". Which is what you want. Some people won't want to deal with you as much, because they can't get away with being an asshole towards you any more. Which is also what you want. And the people that are left will actually be the behaviorally decent people you deserve.
posted by disconnect at 7:11 AM on March 21, 2019 [5 favorites]

This is the kind of thing that therapy was made for. If that is not an option, you might take a meditation course that could help you let things go so you don't get sucked back into things that happened in the past when you unexpectedly bump into people. You can also expand your horizons locally by making friends outside this group so the bad aspects don't take up so much of the space in your brain, or consider moving somewhere new.
posted by *s at 7:39 AM on March 21, 2019

There are so many options out there if you take the chance. New people, new interests. Just look for things that are happening locally and choose one new thing every now and then. Broadening your horizons can only help.
posted by h00py at 8:53 AM on March 21, 2019 [2 favorites]

Response by poster: Perhaps I should've been clearer, but even if I cleave out a separate social existence (which has largely happened), some of these folks run in the same professional circles where avoiding them is next to impossible without it becoming a Big Deal. And often these encounters happen without notice (damn, they were attending the same conference, and so on), so prepping for them seems hard. And I am very good at brooding. Sigh.
Thank you for the perspectives so far.
posted by Nieshka at 9:04 AM on March 21, 2019

(d) every time (c) happens, I go back to brooding over how the person treated me, or how things went wrong, and how I am the only one seemingly paying the price. Never has the saying 'living rent-free in someone's head' seemed more appropriate.

So I think you’ve worked out that this is the only thing you can control here. And also that it can be very hard to do. Some suggestions:

• As per AskMe tradition: short term therapy. A therapist will have a much better chance of helping you find coping strategies than strangers on the internet
• Crowd out the issue. One reason for meeting new people is so that you can incur all new trauma to replace the existing stuff :-)
• Seek out enlightment, or at least internal peace. Meditation can help you make great strides towards managing your thoughts. In particular it can help you learn to back off when you’re obsessing over something.
• Give it time. It hurts now and it will continue to hurt for a while longer. Making that process shorter is a good thing but the hurt will heal up eventually.

I hope you’re able to sort things out soon. It sounds like an uncomfortable way to live.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 9:19 PM on March 21, 2019

Agree with Tell Me No Lies - (d) is the place to start. Another option is to think of this rumination as a bad habit like biting your nails. Make a new rule for yourself - Stop renting headspace to these folks! Make a plan (or more likely a whole series of different options) for what to do when you catch yourself doing this.

Aside from generic strategies (self-talk, distraction) try literally making them (the thoughts, not the people) pay rent. Set up a virtual "rent" jar - either real or virtual. Every time you catch yourself ruminating on this, put money in the rent jar (or at least record that you owe yourself the "rent". When you collect enough, use the money to give yourself a treat. A couple of benefits - the act of recording the "rent"is a distraction that break the cycle of thoughts as well as a reminder you don't want to do it. And you win either way - either you don't think those others so much or you pay yourself to do something nice with the "rent" money.
posted by metahawk at 9:48 AM on March 22, 2019

And I am very good at brooding.

The brooding is the thing, not the people. If these people are were all magically replaced en masse with new people and you are a practiced ruminator, you will ruminate about something else.

So since you are good at brooding and brooding is not good for you, then an anxiety-focused therapist can help you find and develop the tools you need to rethink how you think.

Also, if it's up your alley, a zen buddhism practice can help you transform resentment/fear/negative thoughts about the other person into gratitude.
posted by headnsouth at 11:23 AM on March 22, 2019