No matter how many years you’ve been besties, sometimes even the longest friendships can come to an end. And while you may not have been romantically involved, this doesn’t mean that the termination of your friendship doesn’t hurt like hell.
Friendship breakups can be particularly challenging because a close friend is someone who you rely on for emotional support, continuity, socialisation, and processing. So when friendships can become too damaging to continue, it makes sense that it can be difficult to cut ties.
If you’re distancing yourself from a friend that you’d normally text or see every day, you kiiinda owe them an explanation for your (lack of) action. Easier said than done, but not impossible. To get some insight from the experts, we spoke to mindfulness meditation expert, doctor trained in psychiatry, social entrepreneur and founder of Mindful in May Dr Elise Biaylew.
What can you do when you’re feeling really hurt by a friend?
Dr Elise Biaylew: For so many of us, having difficult conversations and managing conflict is so uncomfortable. We often don’t get taught how to navigate difficult conversations which is a real shame, because it could lead to a relationship being repaired and even enhanced rather than the relationship ending.
Humans are complex and communication is an art that needs to be developed. In friendships, it’s so easy for us to make assumptions about what the other person is thinking and jump to conclusions without actually exploring our thoughts and beliefs.
Friendship is an interesting dance between two people who each come to the relationship with their own unique life story, patterns of thought and reactivity and wounds. We all have our own sensitive spots and vulnerabilities, so friendship is really about getting to know and understand each other and developing enough trust so that when things don’t go well, and you go through a friend breakup, you have the ability to work through it.
It’s not always easy to meet people who you truly connect with, so it’s worth learning how to navigate difficult conversations so you can deepen friendship intimacy rather than ending friendships too quickly when conflict arises.
Mindfulness is a powerful tool that can help us cut through confusion and have the clarity and courage to have difficult conversations.
How can you tell it’s time for a friendship breakup instead of trying to make it work?
If you’ve raised issues with your friend in a calm and compassionate way and things don’t improve, it could be time to review the friendship. Are you aligned in what you both value? Do you feel your friend is reciprocating your efforts in friendship? Is this person not responding to you in the way you’d like because they are going through a particularly difficult time or is this more of a pervasive pattern that you need to recognise?
We have a limited time in our days and lives and spending it with people that aren’t aligned with what we value and who don’t reciprocate will deplete us.
Brene Brown tells a powerful story about friendship to her children which I think can be applied to us adults too. She explains, that we all have a special flame inside us, it’s our soul and our spirit. In life, there are people who keep our flame burning bright and there are the “candle-blower-outers”.
When evaluating our friendships we need to ask ourselves is our friend a “candle blower outer” or are they helping keep our flame burning bright?
Do you have any advice on how to have a difficult conversation with a friend?
Before you have the conversation take a moment to reflect on what you are actually feeling. For example, it can be easy to feel angry and miss the sense of hurt or shame that you might feel underneath. You can use the mindful R.A.I.N practice to help you tune into your emotions and get a deeper understanding of yourself and others. With this clarity we can communicate more effectively when we need to have difficult conversations.
The RAIN exercise:
The acronym RAIN is an easy-to-remember tool for bringing mindfulness and compassion to emotional difficulty.
R—Recognise what’s going on.
Recognising means consciously acknowledging, in any given moment, the thoughts, feelings, and behaviours that are affecting you. This can be done with a simple mental whisper, noting what you are most aware of.
A—Allow the experience to be there, just as it is.
Allowing means letting the thoughts, emotions, feelings, or sensations you have recognised simply be there, without trying to fix or avoid anything. You might recognise sadness or hurt, and allow it by mentally whispering, “it’s okay”, “this belongs”, or “yes”. Allowing creates a pause that makes it possible to deepen attention.
I—Investigate with interest and care.
To investigate, activate your natural curiosity. You can ask yourself: “What needs attention? How do I feel this emotion in my body? What stories am I telling myself?”
N—Nurture with self-compassion.
Self-compassion is really relating to yourself like a kind friend. Recognise you are suffering and offer yourself some words of comfort. Be your own best friend.
Once you have done the mindful RAIN practice and worked out what you are feeling you can have a conversation with your friend.
When having the conversation, share how you are feeling and see if you can tune into the deeper more vulnerable feelings within you like hurt, rather than anger. When we speak from vulnerability, it’s easier for the other person to listen and receive. If we speak from the more surface feeling of anger, the other person can easily feel attacked and close down and become defensive.
As you are having the difficult conversation remember to tune into your breath and not be afraid to pause as you need.
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You can read Dr Elise Biaylew’s #1 Amazon bestseller The Happiness Plan here, or check out her online program The Power of Presence here.
