What am I looking for?

[cjsmith]

What am I looking for in a friend or a group of friends / social circle?

I need to be visible. I do not ever again want to leave a group of friends and find out that they do not remember until I mention it that it's the last time I'm going to dance with them. I don't know what I do to be so invisible, but that's just pathetic. I will figure out my side of this dynamic and *fix it*. (This transition is going to be good for me in a lot of ways. Too bad I had to lose the feet to start looking at all this.)

I'd like someone to hang out with. People with whom I can be myself, and people who feel comfortable being themselves around me.

I'd like fun times. Laughter. Things to do, things to learn, things to talk about.

I'd like the opportunity to do nice things for others. I remember when I was having a crampy-doom day and wooddragon got me a chocolate muffin-cake-thing. She rocks. I remember crazyladynocats' cookies and rampling's cheese and indyansel's chocolate. Those were wonderful. Because I love it so much when people do stuff like that for me, I also want to be able to do things like that for them, too. (And no, it doesn't always have to be food. I sure do remember all the food, though, don't I? Heh!)

Ideally, for close friendships, I'd like someone who will call me -- gently -- on my shit, and who will challenge me to improve.

I might need to learn how to do my part to keep up friendships. I already know I don't reach out much. I will work on that. It may very well be that I don't pay attention in person. If so, I will fix it. That sort of thing.

What draws me to befriend someone online?

Intelligence, amusing or interesting things to say, humor, friendliness, at least something in common with me, supportiveness / caring, some level of self-awareness / taking responsibility for self, lack of need to put me down or order me around, ability to befriend me back even if we don't agree on everything.

Hi, everyone on my friendslist. Every one of you has some or all of this, at least in my eyes. :-)

What draws me to befriend someone in person?

Many of the same things, although they'll show up differently. We see each other on LJ through the written word, so people who are good at wordsmithing appear more intelligent. In person, spelling and grammar don't matter as much. Some people use LJ to vent and whine (I know I do) and thus may seem to be victims by temperament when they're less like that in person. Some people are very caring and supportive in LJ's many-separate-conversations environment, while others may not seem so because they're not necessarily sure what to type; but in person I perceive folks as supportive based on facial expresson and body language and whether they're willing to give me half the air time in a conversation.

Do I know anyone like this?

Hell yeah. Lots of 'em, and quite a few live within ten minutes of me. It's time for me to reach out to coworkers, regain contact with ex-coworkers, wave and smile at my neighbors, attend that block party. Time to show up at flying club activities; time to show up at W&S occasionally to get more face time with my LJ-friends farther away. Time to decide what my new big hobby will be (that'll take a while). And if I feel myself slipping into invisibility, maybe I'll urge all these people to get LJ accounts! :-)

Comments

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's probably very true. So one step I'd take is setting up one-on-one time.

I wish I even knew *what it is people do* to make themselves visible and memorable. I mean, I could dye my hair purple, but most folk don't have to; what is it that they're doing that I don't perceive? If I could answer that, I might be able to pick and choose a few things that were comfortable for me to do.

[kennita.livejournal.com]

Are you really so invisible? I might not remember that it was the last time I would dance with you, but then I don't remember a lot of important things. I'm probably not qualified to talk about this, given that I'm an Extrovert in spades and physically distinctive, as well as having an unusual name, but: perhaps as a shy person (your description) at least part of you would sometimes like to be invisible, but I don't think that as an attractive person you could quite pull that off. I'd have to see more examples of "invisible" before I was sure it wasn't something that couldn't actually have been the other person thinking "I'd better not stare" or "She's taken" or "I wouldn't have a chance" or "What do I say?" or something like that. And I'm tripping over my proverbial tongue so I should go to bed now....

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Maybe I just THINK I'm very invisible, but it's selective noticing. (I notice strongly the times I'm invisible and then don't notice the times I feel like part of a group.) Hard to say.

I admit that I too don't remember a lot of important things, often things very important to others, so that's something I can think about when musing on friendship. If I'm not remembering what's going on in so-and-so's life, then are we close enough that I should expect him to remember mine? Having reasonable expectations is probably key.

[kennita.livejournal.com]

I'm real good at the selective noticing thing myself. "why don't you ever...?" "But I did; this time and that time and the other time ..." (sheepishly) "Oh."

For me, this isn't limited to people I'm not "close enough" to. I can even forget things important to my SO -- the saving grace is that he's usually there to remind me. YMMV.

IMHO, reasonable expectations are DEFINITELY key. It can often work best to have no expectations at all, if you can manage it. That way, anything negative that happens is interesting, and anything positive that happens is serendipity.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

(sheepishly) "Oh."

Yeah. That. :-)

It can often work best to have no expectations at all, if you can manage it.

Indeed, that would be best. I suspect I'm a little too human still... haven't reached that level of serenity about life... but that's where I'd like to be one day.

[kennita.livejournal.com]

that human thing. Sometimes I don't evennotice that I have expectations until they aren't met.

When I don't have them, it's often not about serenity; it's about having no clue what to expect and throwing up my hands. Possibilities-R-Us, and somewhere in "what might they do?", "why might they do it?", what might the consequences be?", "how might I/they/other people respond?", etc., the combinatorial explosion overwhelms me and I end up back at my basic world view: "I don't know what's going on -- even when I think I do.".