When I was little, my best friend was a boy named Jack. We were thick as thieves from 1st grade all the way through 5th, when he transferred to a different school. I haven’t seen or spoken with him since then–almost 30 years–but if I ran into him in the grocery store tomorrow my first impulse would be to give him a big, warm hug.
It recently occured to me that this probably isn’t normal.
I get very attached to the people I like. If I really like someone, I don’t stop feeling close just because we’ve gone a measly little decade or three without speaking–if we get in touch again, I go right back to treating them like a best friend.
Understandably, this can be off-putting to people who no longer feel the same way!
It’s incredible how many background variables our minds take for granted. If it had ever consciously occured to me to question this assumption, I would have discarded it immediately. But because I never noticed the assumption, I continued to take it as given that people I was still attached to would have some attachment to me.
It also helps explain why I struggle with casual relationships with people like coworkers, neighbors, and acquaintances: it’s hard for me to remain engaged and friendly without a strong emotional connection, but building that connection takes a lot of work and can only be done with certain people. I used to be better at this–probably because I had more energy to devote to maintaining the appearance of an emotional connection, even when I didn’t really feel one.* Or perhaps I was better at building small, temporary connections that weren’t as big an investment. Or maybe both! After all, when it comes to certain mental traits (like confidence or friendliness), sometimes “fake it till you make it” is really just another way of saying “practice makes perfect” or “exercise makes you stronger.”
I guess one takeaway for me is that I’m out of practice at being friendly. Better start exercising!
*Not that I didn’t care about the people I was talking to! I care a lot about everybody! In a way, that’s kind of the problem!
In Search of Secrets 