friends

I spend a lot of my time at _www.answerology.com, and it's a topic I've been bashing around. This ties in with Ladder Theory, which you can search for online.
LT is preposterous stuff, but it makes good sense when you think about it.
LT's premise is that men rate women for desirability on a single "Ladder" scale. Women have TWO "Ladders"-- one for potential lovers, and one for "Friends". Men and women alike can land on a woman's Friends Ladder. How is this? Easy: Consider the PURPOSE most of those Friends get used for... Validation! It's why we see so many young women who never go anywhere without a cellphone in front of them... Their "friends" might call! Friends are EVERYTHING to many women, young ones especially.
Friends aren't about companionship and socializing.
Friends provide them VALIDATION, and men can be sucked into this role as well. No man wants to trapped on a woman's Friends Ladder, if he knows what that means. Reaching the top of her Friends Ladder will not bring an invitation to her bed.
What so many young women don't understand is, their friends' lives are often just as hollow and meaningless as their own. They sense this intuitively, but cannot quite come to grips with it. So, they continue their search for validation, never quite finding it: INSIDE THEMSELVES.
Lacking a real sense-of-self, it's imperative to have as many "friends" as possible, even if they're merely online figments.
We're often asked why young men find older women so desirable, and what I've finally arrived at is this: After a failed marriage and a couple of kids, most women discover what their real source of validation is: themselves! They're so much easier to get along with, not the sucking bottomless pits of NEED for validation that their daughters often are.
The part of LT that applies to men is a lot simpler, sort of... Why do men possess only one Ladder? Easy: We're raised to a social standard that frees us from the neediness that women have. It's as if the Y-chromosome imparts us with instant self esteem and self confidence. Men are BORN knowing which to turn a wrench.
We don't need a second Ladder.
Mature women discover, they don't NEED a Friends Ladder, either!
 
Hi bluenorther, what you've written here sounds very simplistic. I'm curious if you've read the Wave Series yet? I'd also suggest that you look into our recommended reading list here - there is a lot of psychology material that will give you much more accurate insight into human behavior.
 
Hello all,

yes, yes, I'm alone as well. Just me and my cat now. Thankfully we are living in the internet era, so no stacked newspapers blocking the corridors here. We're both pretty tidy generally.

I've come out of an abusive relationship, one that took a close, long term friend with it, and I lost another in the trauma and fall out.

There was a lot of 'drama' in my life at that time, and many people want to avoid that in their lives, so I lost some friends. Ironically, when I could do with friends the most, they left me - my life just didn't fit into their super fancy happy occasions, my 'dramas' put a too heavy burden on them, like they might've been infected with my grief, or something.

I love the truth, I love to get to the bottom of things to find out what's really going on. In my ignorance I took it for granted that we are all on the same wonderful adventure of uncovering the truth. Big, big, fall and wake up to discover there are folks out there with other - and sometimes even antithetical - agendas. Others just want fluff, which is ok sometimes, but after a while it's like a high-carb diet.

These days I hope to find friendships within common interests in activities such as tennis, I was thinking of taking up dancing too. I think these are good things to do, and much rewarding contact with others can derive from these fun activities. However, it is just on a friendly/bodily/pack kind of way, really just a balm, for I believe it is the intimacy that my soul requires.

I sometimes feel like a wilting flower with the lack of human intimacy around me, and I don't mean romantic necessarily but just being in the room with people, or a person that knows me would be nice, where the relationship has developed to that level of intimate companionship, where the trust and understanding had been well established. I've grown weary from beginning new associations and going through the formalities of introductory evaluation where I can sometimes feel like I am being sized-up as to what I have to offer and how useful I might be to someone else. I'd rather skip that and partake in an authentic exchange of heart. It's a consumer society and people don't have relationships anymore, they consume eachother, a parallel I've noticed anyhow. It's can be most tiresome.

I don't have siblings or family, I often feel unsteady from a lack of personal rapport with others, sometimes I feel like I don't even exist.

Hope this makes you feel better ;)
 
Anart-- That's a long list! I've been working my way into it, though.

I do believe we should consider adding Richard Restak's books to it.
 
Hi iloveyoghurt,

It doesn't make me feel better at all that you are having a difficult time. I think most of us have been through tough times, and no one else wants to know.
Please keep us posted about your situation, and all the best!
 
Hi Cassandra,

That's funny; I have always kind of felt this way....the last job I had, I worked with alot of people. All they would talk about is things like, "American Idol" or "Lady Gaga" or who had the prettiest face or hottest body amongst our coworkers (topics along these lines), when they weren't talking "smack" about others, which I don't engage in. Since I don't really see people that way, I had a hard time including myself in these convos. I am always nice to others and make some kind of talk, but I really don't find myself having a lot in common with most people that I run across, when it gets down to deeper levels, IF it gets down to deeper levels (beliefs). The most I usually get from others is that something in this world is not "right", but I can tell that people get unnerved about my thoughts and opinions (which lean towards the truth of this world). Many people are asleep and/or scared; I have finally just resorted to improving myself, reading, etc. When I do talk to friends, I try to keep it on a level that's more comfortable for THEM, as not to scare them off. No! I am not all "doom and gloom"....I try come from a realistic perspective and am really not good at small talk. In other words, people that know me seem to like me, but it's hard to find a common ground beyond the superfical with many of them, though I try. I have also realized that in most relationships I've ever had, I usually end up feeling "oppressed", so I am defintely not "good" at choosing men to have LTRs with, apparently. The couple of LTR relationships I had with someone "like-minded" didn't last for different reasons. One of them was because his family was working "against" me and he wouldn't (couldn't?) intervene, the other is with someone who wasn't "ready" to be committed seriously, but continues to contact me to talk, every now and again. We have met up and still get along great; when I have met his friends, in the past, they say he talks me up and was in love with me; I don't get it. We both see other people at this point and we have no desire to "cheat" with each other, so that is not an option....the world is a confusing place, sometimes.
 
Yes, people are very unnerved by conversations about diet, the media, politics, etc., but you can tell that you have often touched a nerve... they know something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
 
Yep, you're definitely not alone in feeling alone. I too have never really fit in, always having fleeting friendships, and wondering why everyone else kept best friends and I didn't. It bothered me immensely when I was younger.
In my adult life, I was lucky enough to find two very genuine people I can relate to, in this awful backwards place where I live. I can see a lot of potential in them, and really appreciate the little time I spend with them, because it's a huge relief feeling some sort of freedom of expression, when the rest of my interactions with people are so superficial. Even so, I'm definitely the third wheel and have to show a lot of restraint, which can be disheartening at times.
 
iloveyellow said:
Hello all,

yes, yes, I'm alone as well. Just me and my cat now. Thankfully we are living in the internet era, so no stacked newspapers blocking the corridors here. We're both pretty tidy generally.

I've come out of an abusive relationship, one that took a close, long term friend with it, and I lost another in the trauma and fall out.

There was a lot of 'drama' in my life at that time, and many people want to avoid that in their lives, so I lost some friends. Ironically, when I could do with friends the most, they left me - my life just didn't fit into their super fancy happy occasions, my 'dramas' put a too heavy burden on them, like they might've been infected with my grief, or something.
Click to expand...

Hi Iloveyellow

I think anyone who comes out of an abusive relationship needs all the support and help they can get but one thing to consider, is that when the tide goes out and exposes an abusive relationship for what it really is, this could well be as much a revelation for 'friends' as it is for the victim inside the relationship. It is very difficult as a 'mutual friend' to take a supportive role without being seen to be taking sides. From that perspective, the unfolding 'drama' may as well be 'contagious' because despite the fact you're only a 'friend', from once you've taken that step you are directly involved. And I think that's what turns people away in these situations: preservation of themselves, their state of well-being, their family and their life.

Taking it to an extreme: I have known (and I'm sure most of us have) people who seem to have perpetual dramas in their lives. What you quickly learn is that you can't help them (for as fast as you're resolving one drama for them, they're creating ten more which directly and personally involve you). And also that they universally have a long trail of hapless human wreckage in their history who probably all started out with the same noble, if somewhat egotistical goal: I'm sure I can help make this person's life better.

The point I'm taking the long way around the barn towards, is that in my experience, you only have to open your door to these people and their cyclonic whirlwind of self-induced misery, to end up with your entire life being irreversibly contaminated with their 'drama' and striding down a path towards utter destruction. Drama is contagious, so although in these situations it must be a difficult thing to consider, could it not be the case that during our 'dramas' we ARE unfairly burdening friends by expecting support, rather than reluctance and withdrawal?
 
I recently went "home", for 10 days, after a couple of years on the road, for a reunion of friends coming in from out of town and all the kids and (cough) grand kids. What surprised me was to see how racist some of my "closest friends" are/have become.... How did I miss that before?!?

This is a guy that has the biggest heart and will do anything to help someone, not just in words, but in deeds...(we are all Katrina survivors) but to hear him spew out such hatred based only on race really struck me wrong. It made me wonder how we got to be so close :huh:
 
Yes :) I've dealt with it. There is no arrogance in your attitude, OSIT.

I had similar thoughts caused by people's comments who are not in my situation, so its not that simple that I need friends, really, I like to make friend, very good and close friends, but if there is not the possibility of making even one friend, well... I can't force the world.

:) I just know that sometimes people get across your path, offering a good oportunity.
 
I have been learning that regarding friends depends on the level of confidence, I consider friends everyone I met or know, sometimes that consideration is threatening to people from certain status (mostly family members) working at a family business they –the family have the status quo quite engraving in their personality, I supposed they don't like the idea me making friends with employees and certainly I wont change due to status quo. I like to treat people form what they are not from what they have.

I can say now that I don't have best friends, I used to think I have them, but when such friends talks behind your back or do things, against you, lie to you etc… they just fall into another level, is understandable to me now, if I now realized I am a contradictory person have narcissistic wounded issues, so the others although they had not realized it yet :P …
I have been learning that I can be somehow threatening about what I may say from what I have been learning here on the forum and from sott and I understand also why friends/family do not look for me anymore, sometimes and in family meetings I choose to shut up (from my POV important issues –national, international, cosmic) and hang along with mundane issues, it is like living two realities.

I am reading "Women Who Run With The Wolves" and a couple of weeks back had read already "The Ugly Duckling", from childhood I always identify with it and I felt bad looking for friends here an there but they hadn't had substance? … when I read it I look it from another perspective and now is not in my interest to look for friends, in my point of view, friends “become” I don't buy them at the store as if they are objects.

I do consider here -the forum- a group that I do fit … have been difficult and it will be, but is a part of the learning process, it is very rare worth priceless group friendship :D
 
Saying you are friends with someones is a word that discribes your relationship - therefore you have to look at the individual relationship you have with a person. Every person has a different view of what a friend is. Some people have surface relationships with "friends" some people only have friends that know alot about them its about how you connect with people and what your standard of a friend is. I am not saying this is the way it is but this is my point of view.
 
Megan said:
I would guess that you are not alone in feeling this way. :)

Red pill or blue pill? It seems we have to keep deciding. The more I see of what is happening, though, the less I want to have to pretend like it is not. And the more I hang out with other people, the more I am going to have to pretend.
Click to expand...

Cannot agree more,around True friends is hard.
 
For me friends are people I feel comfortable being myself around. A bond is formed, respect, trust and for me humour are mutual. You also have a feeling of equal give and take. A tall order! :D
 
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