Hello dear world. Today's post is about new friendships.
When meeting someone new what should we do? The usual answer is be yourself. Well the majority of the time people don't really want yourself, they want a polite almost perfect bubbly person. I mean how many times have you been going through stuff and you decide to take a chance on the new person? Most the time they might feel bad for you but they don't really want to talk about that. They don't care that much about you. This isn't a story where you read the first chapter and you are automatically hooked into the hero/heroine. As much as we all think about our lives that way. You have to get to know someone first and after months of getting to know them you finally know what you can confide in them and what you can't. How many friends do we have that we can tell everything and anything to? I can think of 3 that I know I can trust with anything. They are amazing friends. all of my other friends I can talk to about most things, but not everything.
The next question is how did we get those amazing friends? Well the first thing that comes to mind is I didn't meet them over the internet and we were friends before there was texting. So what am I saying? Am I saying I think we should throw the internet and texting into a pile of fire? No I am not. Sometimes we need to remember that old fashioned is not always a bad thing. I got the amazing friends I have from meeting them in person, making dates to go to lunch or just hang out with each other for the day. My point is in order to make and keep good friends you have to be around them face to face. If you don't meet them in person you will never really know if you can be good friends or not.
Why shouldn't we text or facebook new friends when we are first getting to know them? Well we aren't actually getting to know them. What do I mean we aren't getting to know them? We may be reading their opinions but we aren't hearing their voices, we aren't seeing their reactions, we can't even tell how passionate they are or aren't about the topic we are discussing. This is not getting to know someone. Yes, it is hard not to be like oh add me on facebook or here is my number text me. But imagine all the better relationships you will have if you wait and gradually get to know them at work, or invite them to do things in groups. You'll get to know the person, the real person inside what makes them laugh, what makes them mad, how they handle grief, how they deal with stress, what makes them sad and if they cry. You will be able to really know and enjoy the person.
The point in all of this? To be yourself or not be yourself when meeting new people? If you are facebooking or texting these new people then do not be yourself. do not have long conversations limit your text messages to one page responses. If you need more than one page to respond then call them. Calling someone should not be a thing of the past but should be embraced. If you are having a serious conversation on facebook and you can't tell how they are actually feeling about it then Skype them, tell them to call you to discuss it, or make a time to talk about it later. Be yourself always but hold back when you are not meeting them in person.
