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mind your own business

Sometimes the way I operate works.

If I'm mad at someone, or think their behavior was not good, even by the person's own standards, I often try to give them the opportunity to defend themselves, and explain why they acted the way they did.

What's good about this is that a lot of times I learn what the person's rationale was, or I learn some factors that I didn't know about. Then instead of having harbored resentment for a long time, I know what the score really is, and the person feels like I dealt with them squarely...without a twist.

Or they just apologize, or say that they just didn't consider it that way and that they appreciate the insight.

Sometimes it doesn't work.

I end up sounding self-righteous and like I'm "pointing out the speck in someone else's eye before romoving the plank from my own".

The person gets defensive, and I realize what a jerk I was, I and I end up ruining that person's trust in me.

As I've gotten older, I think I've gotten a little more wise. I actually do try to let people make their own mistakes, and only say something when they have broken some kind of committment, or crossed some kind of boundary with me personally...then I feel a little more like I have a leg to stand on.

But what do you do when you can hardly look at a friend, because you feel so much animosity about the way they've treated other people? Should you bite it down and just let your friendship drift away? Try to generate some kind of understanding?

When do you say, "Look, you're my friend, and the way you treated someone else, and the way you're operating seems really odious to me, and as your friend I just want to give you some feedback and a chance to explain yourself."

I guess anything can be said if it's said properly, but sometimes if something's really stuck in my craw, it's tough for me to keep my cool in the heat of the moment. So there I am...not trusting myself enough to say something for fear of lashing out, and feeling really grouchy at the person and not knowing how to feel close to them again without communicating.

It's a bitch!

Comments

my sis has a punching bag(for kickboxing) at home. When she's pissed she spends some time with it before confronting whoever pissed her off. I think it's really helped her relationships, she's a firey lass and has to release some of that massive emotional overload before she can talk in a focused, less angry and offensive way.

It's really really hard to take any kind of negative feedback about ones behavior and exponentially harder to take it when the person giving it comes off all agro-it's too easy just to chalk it up to THEIR anger and issues rather than being able to see any spark of truth about ones own possible failings.

It's hard, but definately worth addressing. Friendships deepen if problems can be aired and spoken of in the right way.

Hmm... Maybe we shoulod get you a nerf bat?

I don't know if you remember my old methods of dealing with things like this, but it was along the lines of "fuck them, they don't matter anyway". This almost cost you and I our friendship once, and that was the most insane bullshit ever.

Now I have better ways, like you do, I actually talk to people about what bugs me and such. And on dealing with frustration, art seems to be my coping skill of choice. When I'm "in a mood", I paint or write some music.

There has to be a foundation for why they would listen in the first place. You mention this happening with a friend, so I think you've already filtered out that it's never a good idea to try to help "improve" an acquaintance like this.

I have a threshold for friends' jerk-ness, above which the They Might Be Giants tune "Racist Friend" starts playing in my head and I have to speak up. The three or four times I've done so, the friend has at some point (whether immediately or after reflection) agreed they were a jerk.

So for me, it seems effective when the offense is really extreme--not merely annoying or rude, but flat-out immoral.

- quote -
This is where the party ends
I can't stand here listening to you
And your racist friend
I know politics bore you
But I feel like a hypocrite talking to you
And your racist friend

(full lyrics at http://tinyurl.com/2kac5
)