In my last blog, I wrote about high-maintenance friends and, if you read that, you might have decided to draw back from some of the people in your life. If that’s the case, perhaps you found Christmas a bit odd because you’re lonely, missing them (even if they were a negative influence!) and would like to make new friends to fill the space that’s left in your life.

Research shows that happiness and mental health are closely linked to friendships, but as I explored in my last blog, some friends are just too high-maintenance to continue going along with the same old patterns.

Often, going into a New Year, I write about resolutions but so do many other bloggers, so I thought I’d try a new theme going into 2023.

So, how to go about making new friends in this coming year?

It starts with making the decision to change – contrary to what a lot of us like to believe, good friendships don’t always ‘just happen’ so sometimes we have to change what we do and how we do it to make more successful friendships.

Next, think about the people that you work with; sometimes you have more in common with them than your working environment and you can take that further. If you find someone else shares your love of dancing, workouts or walking, invite them to join you in one of these. The advantage of working with someone is that you’ve had a chance to get to know them, albeit in a working environment, so you have a heads-up about whether they’re kind, principled or moody at times. If you find them difficult to work with, don’t pursue a friendship with them though!

Even if you start bonding with some of your colleagues, try something outside of work too: join a group of some kind. This could be a book group, a badminton or squash club or a running group. Try to join a group that meets regularly – weekly or monthly contact is important so that you can get to know the other group members really well.

Another great way of meeting like-minded people, who have the potential to become friends, is to volunteer locally. There are lots of volunteering opportunities – it could be working at a dog-rescue centre, litter-picking or visiting older people in a Care Home. Whatever you choose, there will almost certainly be at least one person that you ‘click’ with.

Take some responsibility for organising get-togethers and, if you say you’ll text someone about meeting up, make sure that you do it.

Friendships change and grow and it’s important to remember that all sorts of different friendships can brighten up our lives.

Lastly, don’t take it personally if some new friendships don’t really take off – people are busy and sometimes have things going on in their lives that we know nothing about.

Hopefully you’ve enjoyed reading this blog and, if so, you can see my blogs as soon as they are published (usually on Wednesdays) by pressing the ‘follow’ button and you can share them with your friends. You can also find me on LinkedIn, Instagram (samebutdifferent) and read my FB posts every week at Same But Different #samebutdifferent #relationships # issues #bloggerforever #lovewriting #livingchange #makeitcount #canidothis #canyoudothis #ukblogger #femaleblogger

Hoping that you all have a bright, happy Christmas enjoying a peaceful time with your loved-ones and friends.

I think that most of us have, or have had, a high-maintenance friend – the person, male or female, who calls several times each day, texts you and expects a reply within the hour and doesn’t seem to realise that you need some time with your partner and family or just want some down time on your own.

Although they can be a huge amount of fun at times and you feel that they add something to your life that no-one else does, you might have got to the point where you feel that all the drama of long phone calls and even longer meet-ups isn’t worth it after all.

If you want to carry on the friendship though, you’ll need to develop some firm boundaries and ideally these need to be sooner rather than later, otherwise you’ll get the almost inevitable response “but you’ve never minded before”.

Before you make any sort of decision think about whether you haven’t said something before because you were scared of saying “no” to them, especially if they’ve been going through a tough time. There’s also the fear of offending them – they might simply be vulnerable although there’s also the possibility that their vulnerability can make them manipulative too. There’s something else too -maybe you get lonely and their friendship with all of its demands makes you feel needed and useful.

If you decide that you do want to carry on seeing them, despite some drawbacks, then try the following:

• Remember everything that’s good about them – it will be easier to set some boundaries if you can remind yourself about all the good things that you’re trying to preserve.
• If you don’t want to meet up or it’s simply not convenient, trying suggesting an alternative like “I’m hoping to go out to the pub with Emma and Joe next week – could you come along too?”.
• Set your boundaries whilst safeguarding other friendships – try saying firmly something along the lines of “I love spending time with you but this time I’m seeing Jenny alone. You and I can go out together another time”.
• If you’re finding it hard, practice before talking to your (high maintenance) friend.
• They almost certainly won’t like it – a lot of people won’t stand up to  high-maintenance friends, instead ignoring them and going out of their way to avoid them. Be prepared for even more drama whilst you’re setting these new boundaries.
• Most of all, be consistent as well as firm and patient. It will take time but hopefully your friend will eventually accept these new boundaries.  If not, maybe it’s time to come to terms with it and let the friendship go.

Hopefully you’ve enjoyed reading this blog and, if so, you can see my blogs as soon as they are published (usually on Wednesdays) by pressing the ‘follow’ button and you can share them with your friends. You can also find me on LinkedIn, Instagram (samebutdifferent) and read my FB posts every week at Same But Different #samebutdifferent #relationships # issues #bloggerforever #lovewriting #livingchange #makeitcount #canidothis #canyoudothis #ukblogger #femaleblogger

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If you’re interested in this question, it’s quite possible that someone (a partner or friend) has disappointed you and, yet again, you feel disappointed. A lot of us pride ourselves on not settling for less than we feel we deserve but does that mean that we end up too ‘picky’?

Having high expectations is often seen as a negative, as if you’re selfish, unbending or someone who takes too much. There’s always a context to this though and it may be that you have reasonable requests but a manipulative person twists these, making out that you’re needy or expecting too much from them. Still, if you often feel alone and misunderstood, it’s a good time to look at your needs and how they fit into your relationships.

There might be subconscious insecurities going on which lead you to have a long list of criteria that other people have to meet. This can lead to you being overly critical of people and if there was a need that wasn’t met in your childhood, this can be projected into your adult relationships. This shows up in your choice of partners or friends – subconsciously you want them to make up the shortfall that you experienced as a child. This is a negative self-fulfilling prophecy because it’s unlikely that anyone will be able to fulfil this for you.

Having done some soul-searching and you think that this might be the case, it’s time to try to look at things in a different way. This doesn’t mean lowering your standards so that you’re often put-upon and disrespected, but having less expectations of others might well prove a positive experience for you and them!

Try to forgive people when you feel let down by them – everyone is busy with their own lives and don’t always sense what we need at a particular time. If they’re usually there for you, recognise that they too are human and have their ‘off days’

Let yourself be more vulnerable without letting people take advantage of you. This doesn’t mean that someone has to ‘fix’ things for you, more that you’re open about some of your feelings and thoughts.

Think about the intimacy in your relationships and ask yourself if there could be more mutual sharing of confidences and feelings – open up and encourage the other person to open up too.

Do your best and hope that other people will too but try to be flexible if they can’t sometimes.

If you do all of the above and mostly it works well plus you can honestly say that you don’t expect too much, then stick with your relationship-expectations and don’t settle for less than you really want.

Hopefully you’ve enjoyed reading this blog and, if so, you can see my blogs as soon as they are published (usually on Wednesdays) by pressing the ‘follow’ button and you can share them with your friends. You can also find me on LinkedIn, Instagram (samebutdifferent) and read my FB posts every week at Same But Different #samebutdifferent #relationships # issues #bloggerforever #lovewriting #livingchange #makeitcount #canidothis #canyoudothis #ukblogger #femaleblogger