![]() Most people have, if not standards, then at least a wish list for their friends, of qualities that differentiate them from strangers. Of course, it’s reasonable to hold a friendship to certain expectations. You don’t need a guide for breaking up with your friends, because you don’t need to break up with your friends. Psychologists tell me there is a kinder, more realistic way to maneuver through a friendship that’s lacking in some area. The massive paragraph of text, though not a friend breakup per se, often reads like one-and leads to one. ![]() One TikTok therapist suggested that you tell your erstwhile friend “you don’t have the capacity to invest” in the friendship any longer, like you’re a frazzled broker and they’re a fading stock. Online guides abound for “ how to break up with a friend,” as though the struggle is in what to say, rather than whether to do it. Nevertheless, advice is proliferating on how to aggressively confront, or even abandon, friends who disappoint us. Friendship, in general, is less common: People are spending much less time with friends than before, and the surgeon general now calls loneliness an “epidemic.” In past eras, friendship seemed much more intense, judging by the florid letters Victorians wrote to their pals: “The divine magnet is in you,” Herman Melville once gushed to Nathaniel Hawthorne, “and my magnet responds.” These days, you’d be lucky to get a “slay, queen.” Some therapists have the sense these types of friendship performance reviews are becoming more common, but there’s no way to know if that’s true. Read: The six forces that fuel friendship “I’m doing the best that I can,” I wrote back, guilty, flummoxed, a synchronized diver who belly flopped. Texting as an act of friendship, to me, is like invoicing as an act of love.) Another text block said I haven’t initiated enough hangouts. One massive paragraph informed me that I’m not texting my friend enough. “Some of my female clients are getting these-you’ve probably experienced this-massive paragraphs of text about things that they’re doing wrong or perceived slights,” Shannon Barrett, a licensed clinical social worker in Germantown, Maryland, told me recently. And then, all too often, comes what is known in therapy circles as the “giant block of text.” They’re all small things, of course, but like, she always does this. ![]() Periodically, the heart emoji interjects.Įventually, though, comes a minor affront, a misunderstanding, a misalignment-then another, and another. Together, you and your new friend weave text threads scheduling coffee and reassuring each other that you’re being normal and that those other people are being crazy. Sign up for it here.įirst comes the spark of affinity at the group hang: You loved the Ferrante novels too? Then come the bottomless brunches, if you don’t have kids, or playground dates, if you do. This article was featured in One Story to Read Today, a newsletter in which our editors recommend a single must-read from The Atlantic, Monday through Friday. ![]()
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