I often find myself trusting the wrong people too much and the right people not enough.
I've experienced a major learning experience the last few months and learned that even if you think you do, sometimes you just don't know what you have til it's gone. About 3 months ago I made what seemed like a pretty big mistake, but is slowly turning into a blessing in disguise. I told my best friend at college that I had developed some feelings for him and that a lot of our mutual friends had told me they thought he liked me- only to get the response that not only did he not like me back, but he actually liked this other girl instead. It was easily the most humiliating experience of my life thus far, and you could not pay me enough money to go through that again. After that, our friendship was never the same. He started acting awkward around me, even though I apologized, told him it wasn't a big deal. After days, weeks, an entire month away from each other, waaay past the point when it was blatantly obvious I was over it, he still acted weird, and it was still a very uncomfortable situation. I knew after a rejection like that, our friendship wasn't going to be the same, but I never expected it to be that bad. I felt horrible. Not even about the fact that he didn't like me, I got over that like the next day. I felt horrible because I thought I had single-handedly destroyed our friendship in one conversation. I ruined everything, and that was it, oh well right? It was nice while it lasted? I not only lost my best friend, but I had to find out the hard way who my true friends were. I never expected to lose my other friendships too. You see, there's just something about this guy that everyone likes, he's so friendly and outgoing and funny that everyone wants to be friends with him. I know because I remember feeling the same exact way the first day I hung out with him, I was just so desperate to be friends with him, and apparently a lot of people feel the same way. With the exception of my roommates, there weren't really any of our "mutual" friends who stuck with me. Maybe they were just being nice to me to get to him? Maybe they didn't want to be rude to me because they knew how close we were? Maybe they never liked me at all, I just thought they did because I was always with him, and they wanted to be friends with him, so they hung out with me by association. No matter what the reason is, they aren't friends with me now, but they're all over him.As heartbreaking as it was to lose the majority of my friends, I'm finding that the whole experience was more of a blessing than anything else, for several reasons. The first being that obviously I found out who my real friends are. The people who don't care who you are or aren't friends with, and the people who don't pick "sides" as if its some sort of war. True friends will be there for you just to listen to you whine about it, and tell you that you deserve better anyway. The other incredible thing I've discovered through all of this is that I am awesome. I know I always say I've stopped caring about what other people think of me, and I always feel like I don't, but when it comes down to it, a lot of my happiness is based on other people, and not based on myself and my personal achievements. When I become friends with someone, I'm basically loyal to a fault. I stick with them no matter what, and never really think of how it's affecting me, which is so stupid, because ultimately, my self worth has to be based on ME. I get so caught up in my relationships with others that I forget to work on myself, I don't make goals, I don't study as hard, I just don't care about #1 as much as I should. And in regards to this particular friendship, I was throwing myself under the bus entirely too much. It wasn't just my fault that our friendship was crumbling, because you know what? It takes two people to have a fight. I apologized for what I did. After that, a lot of it was on him, and it took a while for me to tear down this pedestal I'd built for him.
Basically what ended up happening is after some pretty brutal fights, some serious drama, and several attempts to reconcile and fix any sort of friendship we had left, I decided to just write a letter and lay it all out on the table. I dug into old wounds that hadn't been properly stitched up, I brought up new grievances, and basically told him to grow up and decide if he was really going to be my friend or not, and if not, to stop using me for my stuff and for rides. He never responded back to my face or in a letter or anything, but he did tell my roommate at dinner one night that he always appreciated my honesty. He also started saying hello to me every once and a while on campus, and even hugged me once at church. My roommates and put together a little gift basket for him on his birthday, and after thanking me and saying he loved me on a social networking site, it sort of seemed like it might actually work out and we might actually end up friends again. The only problem is that in the past month since our "make up" I've found myself slipping into these old habits that got me into this mess in the first place. Dropping everything to help him out, letting him use my printer with nothing in return, basically letting him use me. He never wants to spend time with me just because he's my friend, and he never talks to me unless he has to. It's abusive, and unhealthy, and not good for either of us. I've given him 3 months now to "earn" me back, and I just don't think he really wants to.
Empowering myself has been hard, especially when going through a loss like that, but like I said before, I can't base my self worth on others anymore, it has to come from me. If this boy doesn't see how awesome I am then he's a gosh dang fool and he doesn't deserve to be my friend anyway. He's content with his friends, and that's fine. I'm just tired of being the toy that he sets down for a while, and then assumes will still be there when he wants to play some more. And you know what? I don't even miss it.
Be careful who you call your friends. I'd rather have 4 quarters than 100 pennies any day.
