After having
talked about friendships that inspire us, and that give us energy, it is time
to take a look at the dark side. Let’s try to see what kind of energy-draining
friendships there are…
1. The Leech:
Also called the ‘very draining people’. They swallow up ones passions,
and they are fully immersed in the victim-role. They try to transfer all kinds
of responsibilities over to you. Often they have developed some kind of
kindness, which allows them to bind themselves to you. But overall they mostly
seek your pity. And when they have won you over for their pettiness, they don’t let go easily, and they will cost
you more and more energy.
2. The Discourager:
These are people that mostly see the negative, and
that keep on emphasizing it. These people do not offer hope, but only sow
doubt, and secretively enjoy your failure. We aren’t talking about somewhat of a
pessimist, but about a notorious pessimist through and through.
3. The excessive critic:
These are the ones that really enjoy discovering
little mistakes that you make. Their communication is all about your
weaknesses, and nearly never about your skills or successes. This stems from a
morbid nature of constantly wanting to better or change others. It is typical
for people that are strongly dissatisfied with themselves and everything around
them, but it can also be a form of pride or even narcissism.
4. The manipulator:
These are almost artists in getting you to do
something for them. So-called friends that try to make you depended of them by
spoiling you or by trying to embed you in their web. They are relatively easy
to recognize, as they seem to leave a bad taste in your mouth after they leave.
They work with various very subtle forms of fear, that can even paralyze you,
or put you into a deadlock. And so, you become afraid to openly commend to
their misconduct.
5. The aggressor:
An aggressive attitude, a certain vocabulary,
pressuring and belittling others, these are all really typical for ‘the aggressor’: often alpha males or females who
can’t really handle their own energy
well. Actually, aggressors can be relative easy guests, as long as you meet
their energy clearly and in the right way. You have to be clear about boundaries,
and it helps to point out that they are not really allocating their energy in a
positive or constructive way. If they don’t response to that it might be a
good idea to distance yourself from them, of (even better) to encourage them to
find a coach.
Perhaps you are wondering: well, well!! Is it not a
little bit exaggerated – all of this? It is a good idea to, first, ask yourself in what manners
you might actually be such a ‘friend from the dark-side’. Evaluate yourself on a scale from 1 to 10, in regard to each of ‘the 5 friends from the dark-side’ (1= not at all me, 10= ups, that
does really sound like me). Afterwards it might be really worthwhile to discuss
your findings with a good friend.
Subsequently
you can start to think of ‘friends’ that might qualify for one of these 5
categories. Following you should bring these findings up, discuss them with
these ‘friends of the dark-side’, hopefully this might lead to better
understanding and perhaps even some clear agreements. In some instances it
might be better though, to take – in a polite manner – some distance from that
‘friend’. It becomes really unfortunate when you are living with such a
‘friend’ in one house. In such cases help from outside is probably a really
good idea. If none of this is any good, than sometimes the only thing you can
do is to relativise warmheartedly.
Enough about the ‘dark side’! Next week we’ll have another happier blog for
you!
Paul Donders
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