Happiness is: Declining Obligations

Friends, greetings from Boynton Beach, Florida, where your good friend Sarah is halfway through an audit before heading back to my new third hometown of New York City to formally begin my work at the restaurant.  I am counting the MOMENTS.

 

Today I am thinking about Friendships and obligations, though, and I wanted to write a little bit about that as the thoughts circle in my head.

 

Recently a very close Friendship came to a crossroads, and by mutual, unspoken decision, the Friendship ended.  I am not sad about it, I am not angry about it.  I think I have come to the place in my life where I understand myself well enough and have learned enough about life itself to be able to understand why and when people not only come into our lives, but also out of them.  I could have chased it, talked the situation to death and whined to all my Friends about it.  I could have been passive aggressive and put cryptic things on Facebook or Twitter, but I instead took time to myself to reflect on what I really wanted from the situation, and I got the guts to be clear and communicate it.  It was much less hard than I thought it was going to be, and it sure saved a lot of time and energy by first figuring out what I wanted before I opened my mouth to say it.  I feel like I got it “right” and saved a lot of woulda coulda been drama.  Having avoided that, and being careful to be clear on what I expected and wanted from this Friendship was important to me, and I feel like I took good care of myself through that situation.  This is new for me---I much prefer to take care of everyone else, first. 

 

Too often I see Friendships being these surface-y goings-through-motions.  (Hm. Apparently I’ve started talking as if I am auditioning for Dances With Wolves 2. Consider it to be your Throwback Thursday present.  You’re welcome.) 

 

Back to it…so, if you do not know this about me yet, you will, and quickly.  I do not do all of the things everyone else thinks I am supposed to do.  One day, I finally just had enough of spending time with people I did not want to spend time with, and I had enough of spending time doing things I did not want to do.  Finally, I realized that all the time I spent agonizing over not wanting to do something could instead just be spoken aloud, and so, I started doing that.

 

I started saying, “I will not be joining you for this event, but I am sending a cake,” or “I am so sorry that I simply do not have enough time in the day to keep up with everything, and so I am intentionally dropping the ball and will make this up to you.”  By taking time to realize that I had anxiety or grumpy feelings about an upcoming appointment on my calendar, I gave myself the much-needed space and quiet and distance I needed from a few situations until I figured out two things:  1) what I felt, and 2) what I wanted to do about it.  It’s not rocket science, no, but is it not the crux of so much wasted energy we could be putting towards something joyful?  Yes.  It is, I promise you.

 

Today as you think about your own Friendships, and as we edge ever-towards another holiday season, I am going to encourage you to refrain from the complaining about something you don’t want to do, and just…don’t do it.  Save yourself the anxiety and the angst and your Friends having to listen you to kvetch about things and just…grow a pair and do not do what you do not want to do.  Because you know what will happen?  The event will still take place, the sun will go down, and the sun will come up, and you will still be you.  Some Friendships will end and make room for new ones.  Some people you never really enjoyed in the first place will be gently nudged aside.  There is no reason to get along with everyone.  There is no reason to always do what “everyone” or “the group” thinks you should do.  I encourage you to step back, take a little quiet time and figure out 1) what you feel, and 2) what you want to do about it.  Figure out what outcome you want, and go make that happen, because only you can, and it’s about time that you did.  Stop worrying so much about making everyone else happy, and make us happy by making yourself happy.  Remind me to print that sentence out and tape it onto my bathroom mirror to remind my own self about that, please.

And so, my dear Friends, the Sass Cobra in me is once again stepping up, perhaps with its more polite face on, but nonetheless, getting ready to say, “No, I will not be coming/going/doing that for/with you/them/us.”  Just knowing I have the power to do that makes me feel much better about the holidays ahead, and that’s what makes me happy today.  Wishing you a stress-reduced, happier week of countdown to our first holiday of the season. 

Hugs from humid, sticky Florida, soon to be NYC, and then Budapest,

Your Good Friend Sarah