Non-confrontational? (For want of a better title) – or offering pre-emptive explanations

As I have recently written on this blog, I am extremely busy at the moment. lf anything that was an understatement, which is why I have not been updating this blog as often as I would like to. When I have been updating it, it is almost invariably because I have been “stealing” time away from my other commitments. As I sit here just now I am tempted to implement a new practice of explaining just what I am stealing time away from, making an explanation each time I actually write a post. This time I am in the process of praying for my job, and this blog post occurred to me, and I wanted to at least jot down the basic points so that I do not forget anything…

So what this blog post is actually about is how I handle the process of “downgrading” existing friendships, from perhaps “yes/maybe” friendships where I would essentially, quickly say “yes” to other people’s requests, to “freebie” friendships, which is now the default status of my friendships since I discovered boundaries! A freebie friendship, previously known as a “No” friendship, is one where I only give out what I can comfortably afford to give out for free, ie, without expecting or needing anything in return, and I leave the costly investments of time, effort, money for people who are going to reciprocate in kind, with whom I am consciously building reciprocal, mutually supportive friendships. I am not saying that all friendships were always “Yes” friendships, but there were a handful of people who I considered close, and I tended to give automatic “Yeses” (Yesses?!) to their requests. On reflection however, I realised that these friendships were largely one-sided, and these people might share general values with me, in that they might be Christians, and outspoken about their faith as I am. And yet, they don’t really share deep values with me – and honestly, over time it showed.

Moving forward, when meeting new people, I know now to implement boundaries from the outset, and weigh people before trying to build deep, “yes/maybe” friendships with them. However, when dealing with existing friendships, I have realised that for many of these people I have had to downgrade our friendships from my previous enthusiastic investments of time, and energy, and everything, to now reserve my big energy for truly compatible friendships.

Here is the question though, at the heart of this blog post: in consciously “downgrading” a friendship, should I pro-actively say anything?! [There is a familiarity to these thoughts in my mind and I am now asking myself whether I have already written or drafted out this post, and quite recently too!] That is, should I volunteer it that I don’t want to be as close friends anymore, should I explain the reason why? Actually, let me rephrase all of this – I have already decided that I will not be volunteering an explanation, and in this post I seek to explain why.

Why I would volunteer an explanation?
I’m thinking of how things might seem from the perspective of this other person, seeing your friendship downgraded, and not knowing why, not being offered an explanation.  This is the reason why I would want to at least say something, to salve wounded feelings, to spare people from unnecessary confusion. However, I also balance this against the fact that these people have essentially been using me for years, sometimes decades.  Part of me feels like shrugging and saying “[After all the one-sided investment I have made into these friendships] I don’t owe them nothing!”

Non-confrontational?
You know, despite being very vocal and candid on this blog, I am actually quite non-confrontational in person. And yet, I am actually able to discuss with people. I am able to express frustrations, disappointments, anger.  But only on one condition: I have to trust that the other person will handle this maturely, and not erupt against me in irrational anger. And this is the problem again and again. I have experienced this so many times in my life, where people have responded badly, and it does not get easier. So now, if there is the slightest chance of an angry, ugly row, I will avoid this. [As an aside, because I personally avoid rows as far as I can, it deeply annoys me when people deliberately pull me into silly “power-arguments” where we are not really arguing over anything consequential, or trying to resolve anything but someone is simply having a power tantrum, where they are trying to establish that they are the boss. One way to know this is the case is when you say “OK, let’s agree to disagree”, and they just continue to argue! I am so unimpressed, I cannot even express it. And yes, that invariably provokes my disdain.]

Here’s the thing: when I know that someone deeply shares the same values I do, that is, a true “yes (maybe) friend” I can trust that I can discuss or even argue with them constructively.  You know, with a “yes/maybe friend” we might have a huge, raging row. And yet I can trust that both of us will go away, reflect, apologise as necessary, accept where we have been wrong OR agree to disagree, at least for the meantime and ultimately move on. I can trust that we are both going to be truly honest with ourselves and not hold on to something for the sake of ego, or desperately wanting to be right.

With everyone else I cannot trust this at all. I know that many people will ultimately be holding on to ego, and for absolutely no reason at all. Which is the whole point of ego, it is completely meaningless. And they will continue to argue vociferously with you, just because they don’t want to admit, even to themselves, that they are wrong, or that you could have a point. I don’t have time for that.

A second reason why I never bother to volunteer the info, is because there is simply no point!  Unless someone has already decided that they are going to pursue Christ to that earthshattering extent, then when you tell them “out of the blue” that you don’t really feel that you share the same values and you are therefore downgrading the friendship, that will likely do nothing…except generate an angry argument.  I mean that they are not going to suddenly decide to drop everything to pursue Christ with an insane intensity. If the example of your deep commitment to Christ was having that sort of impact on them, then it would have manifested earlier, and they would not just have used you for years.  As it is, like a surprising number of supposed fellow Christians, they probably think that Christians of your level of commitment (and commitment to integrity) are just silly, naive, and available to be taken advantage of.  Because frankly, this is what many Christians think, that you have to apply the Bible with what Nigerian Christians call “wisdom” (but I would call insincerity); that it just does not do to jump into faith with too much sincerity, or obedience to those radical Christian concepts like love, or forgiveness, because that would just be stupid and make you vulnerable. It is not only Christians that think this, by the way. On realising the extent of my faith, many people have smiled big fake smiles at me, while I can almost visibly see the cogs in their heads turning, as they try to work out how to take advantage of me.

[While we are talking about this subject, let me just gently assert this point: actually, it is a rejection of God that makes you naive.  This is why the Bible says “the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom”.  As a small example, consider how many romantic relationships you might have had, and all the fun and games you have experienced within them. Now compare that to the kind of marriage I confidently expect to have…Someone I talk about so much on this blog because I found her to be so clueless, consistently tried to convince me that I was extremely inexperienced with relationships. And yet this same person sat in front of me and literally cried her eyes out about her ex-boyfriend, because he had…[done something deeply hurtful, that people regrettably do all. the. time.  Especially when they have made no deep commitment to Christlike behaviour. Actually, supposed Christians definitely do this too.]  And then while crying, she sobbed: “I did not know that there were people out there like that!”  Really?! I don’t mean to be harsh or mean about someone’s pain, which is why I have not spelled out what her ex did. “But” (to address her directly “have you really never heard about Reddit?! Why not read through a few AITA posts and you will quickly see that people are sadly capable of doing all manner of dreadful things.  And if you read the Bible, then that will teach you so many more things. The “rules” of the Bible are there to protect us, not constrain us.” Especially as women! It is because of my faith that I am sitting here casually insisting on the very best of husbands, and insisting on the very best from him, letting the world know that I utterly deserve this, and I will accept absolutely nothing else – or I’d rather be single. And I am going to get such a husband too – you just watch me! By the grace of God! Another expression of cluelessness is this: when people are in pain about something, and you offer them a solution. And then they reject your effective solution, and in the meantime try to drag you into their non-solution which has actually not worked for them. I mean, do you honestly think that I want to be sitting down in X years, similarly crying my eyes out about a man, just like you are doing now, after taking your frankly very poor, completely unthought-out advice? I mean, seriously?! Her “advice” was that I should approach relationships the same way she had done, presumably so that I could encounter the same kind of pain that she had encountered.
This is a very long parenthesis! And yet, with a few minutes reflection, I am hit with a reminder for humility, humility and more humility. I do not know everything, I barely know anything. My marriage will not be perfect, as neither my husband nor I will be perfect.  I have to constantly be learning, and growing, otherwise, thinking I have reached a stage of having arrived would be the quickest route to failure.]

If however, they were to ask me, “Tosin, what is going on?” then you know what, I can explain.
The realistic likelihood though is that they will not ask. Because they of course know, have always known, that they have been using me for years, and they have been sitting uneasily, wondering whether I will ever work it out. And now they will attribute it to that – “Oh, she’s finally worked it out!” Actually, I’ve known at least for a few years. What I have not known until now is a better way to approach my friendships.

Also, time and effort is another factor. Remember the whole point about these friendships is that they have been one-sided. I was reflecting recently (which was when I may or may not have previously written this post!) and I was thinking that they never bothered to offer me an explanation about – anything. Perhaps because I usually pursue non-confrontational friendships where in candour we never truly discuss about anything. Sometimes they have done things and taken decisions which I found hurtful, or confusing, but no pre-emptive explanations were forthcoming from them (and I never challenged them). So why should I now have to make the effort and sit down and start drafting emails to make them as gentle and gracious as possible, while communicating my point?  That sounds to me like yet more one-sidedness.

Question: So by not offering them a pre-emptive explanation, am I actually retaliating? No, because my actions are not in direct response to whatever they may have done in the past, but rather the general state of our friendship.  I am merely reflecting back at them the level of “friendship” that they have shown me in the past. Actually, I am not even doing that. I am simply refraining from offering a pre-emptive explanation. And if they were truly honest with themselves, they would accept that they are not in any position whatsoever to demand anything more.  It is like someone has been dispensing freebies, which you have gladly taken advantage of, without offering anything in return, and then they stop dispensing freebies, and yet you expect them to pre-emptively explain to you why they have stopped.