A Good Bad Week

Some more lessons I learned this week:

• If a person ten years ago was duplicitous, callous towards the feelings of others, and hypersensitive to any criticism of themselves, a decade is not likely to rehabilitate these traits.
• History repeats itself, especially for those too ignorant to learn from it.
• My mentor's advice to me from 25 years ago on how to disengage from a business or personal relationship with maximum success and minimal damage was proven once again this week: If you want the other person to act in a certain way that may hurt them, you have to make them believe that the decision is theirs. At the end of the day, when you want the “other guy” to walk through a door, you have to open that door for him, give him a reason to walk through it, make certain that he can walk through it with his dignity intact, and when he closes it, make him think he’s closing it on you, not on himself.
• If you've lost respect for the other party to the relationship because you think that they lack fundamental integrity, there is absolutely no upside in being "honest" about your thoughts. In the first place, you might be wrong. In the second place, you might be the kettle calling the pot black. In the third place, there is almost always another alternative that will hurt them a lot less.
•  I can live with the fact that the other person thinks I’m the asshole in any given incident, even if I don't think that I am, because on a number of other levels, they are likely correct.
• That statement that was made many years ago that cratered your previous relationship and that's never been adequately explained by your "partner"? It's not going away.
• When you lose a “close” friend, especially if it’s the result of an argument or misunderstanding over something trivial, it’s a sad occasion. When you lose them because you’ve decided, after not only a great deal of thought, but of prayer, that either they have not been truthful with you about a matter of fundamental importance to your trust in one another, or, that they have been truthful about that matter but that the “truth” demonstrates that the relationship is based upon serious character flaws, the loss of that friend is an occasion for relief.
• Yes, when it comes to learning life's lessons, you are the tortoise and not the hare.
• There is a reason that you slept soundly last night for the first time in a week.

[Edited to remove potentially personally identifiable information]

Comments

[Jogger, Texas Ranger]

I hope these last two entries mean that your coming back to us, Hoss.

Do you deliberately troll the internet looking to make friends with folks you're incompatible with? Jus' askin'...

Here's another lesson for you: time heals all wounds. For guys like us, time's running out. so, get over it and move on.

[Susan]

So this was a woman who was your "close" personal friend? Were you getting too "close" and your conscience engineered a blowup to rescue you from crossing the line? If I'm cold, I'm sorry. If I'm warm, you saved both of you from making a mistake. I'm speaking from personal experience. I know how complex your mind can be and I know that there's always a reason for everything you do even if you don't always understand it yourself.

I'm with Jogger. Post more, please.

[Kevin]

Jogger-- It beats trolling the Internet for porn, which seems to be the motivation for the majority of men. And it's easy for a traffic cop to tell the spectators to a horrific car wreck to "move along now, nothing to see here." It's a whole other matter to tell that to the participants. Jus' sayin'...

Thanks for the advice, though. It's sound.

Susan-- [Sound of Crickets Chirping]

Damn...

You may be right, but if you're right, how would I know? It would be my subconscious mind prodding me. I'm not in touch with that part of me since I am now conscious. I did have a pretty disturbing/amazing dream about my (now former) friend and myself a month or so ago, so maybe you're right. It really doesn't matter what the unconscious "prod" might have been; consciously, I thought I was being lied to about a very important issue to me, and each time I returned to the same ground, the ground shifted. I've been an attorney for more than 38 years, and I can spot misdirection, denial, back-and-fill, and all the other tricks of obfuscation and denial, when all I wanted was the simple truth. One declarative sentence. Instead, I got paragraphs, often contradictory paragraphs. If I was being snowed on that issue, how could I have any confidence I wasn't being snowed by every word out of my (now former) friend's mouth?

At any rate, it's done with. Jogger's right: move on. As I re-read my post, it's filled with some bitterness that betrays my beliefs. I need, for my own sake and my (now former) friend's sake, to "get on down the road."

Thank you both for sticking with me all these years in the wilderness. I appreciate it.

[Carol Bielamowicz]

It sounds like you have had an epic week. I vote that you cut yourself some major slack, do whatever you can to restore, renew and reset. There will no doubt be some major growth come from all you have figured out, so take it easy a bit and give it all a chance to settle.

[Kevin]

Thank you, Carol. I'm more disappointed than anything else. I'm pretty hard shelled. The other person appears to be more sensitive. Let's hope that both parties learn something. I hope you have a good weekend,too.

[Sherry]

There's that "asshole" thing again..;) Kidding

I don't know if this will make any sense but I'm going to give it a good try.

My closest friend who often comments on my facebook (I'm hoping that lets you know who I mean) told me recently that she spotted something in me that I need to change. I was momentarily offended but I knew she wouldn't ever say something to try and hurt me so I had better hear her out. She said that I always try to find a way to take the blame when something goes wrong. She said that she didn't think it was about being in control but more that I have this need to understand every little thing that happens and when I'm not getting the answers that I need or want I will try and shift the blame to myself because if it's my fault then I can figure out what I did and why I did it and how it caused whatever it may have caused to happen. Strangely enough this doesn't always work because sometimes what has happened really isn't my fault. Imagine that.

I thought before I read your post that if there was a definitive moment that ended a relationship whether it's just a friendship or something more that would make you one of the lucky ones because at least then you have some sort of reasoning or closure and can move on. I guess that's not true if that moment seems somewhat manufactured and you can't trust it. I haven't run into that scenario yet but I have a pretty good idea I won't handle it well if I do.

I have no answers for you instead I'm going to walk away from this post with a thousand more questions. I suppose it's time to sharpen that analytical knife yet again.

[Kevin]

Hey, I've got "the asshole thing" down so pat that in some serious works on the philosophy of Plato, I am cited as as close to the platonic ideal form of "asshole" as any material "Being" can "Be."

I think your good friend was spot on. It's a "weakness" that I find much preferable to the polar opposite character trait: always the victim and never at fault.

As always, thanks for sharing your thoughts. None of us who is honest about life ever claims to have definitive answers to these questions, but as long as we're asking the right questions, there's hope.