"Friends" who you don't really like anymore

fuck knows why i'm being so reasonable when my usual approach is "ignore them and hope they go away", but hey.

x-post: great minds etc

That said, logged out, does this guy actively annoy you or do you just not have anything in common with you any more?

this is reminding me of how one of my old school friends HAS BECOME A PRIEST in the locality in which i grew up! I must see if he is game for a lads' night out in Stringfellows when it opens.

Perhaps it's that I'm tightly wound at the moment and don't much like myself, perhaps it's because ~social media~ makes it harder to get space from people, but I'm really starting to dislike some of my friends, and I hate it. These aren't people who've ever wronged me, or people who are particularly malicious or careless with others' feelings. They just... are irritating me, and I'm angry at myself for getting so unreasonably irritated by people whose motives are benign, and angry at them for making me angry at myself, and the whole thing feels unfixable. I can't imagine that I'm ever going to like them as I did, but they're part of my life and it would feel like an insult to cut them out over my own tetchiness.

What do you do, when you start to dislike your friends?

not much of an answer really but if the dislike is coming mostly from their 'online behaviour' or just the volume or frequency of it then a little time away from them both online and in person makes sense (i guess this means hiding their updates in whatever way lol killfile etc, maybe even turning down specific rendezvous with them in person unless that affects other friends, and listening to peter cetera).

I can't imagine that I'm ever going to like them as I did sounds pretty severe tho! most people probably have friends they could never ever live with so maybe just treat it as a variation on that. social media sites or online communities can make this worse due to the compulsion to keep in touch with such a large number of people, especially if it's become harder to see them IRL (due to distance or other life changes).

I don't know.

But having been the person that groups of people decided that they just didn't like any more and dropped too many times in recent history, I've grown a lot less patient with finding time to hang out with friends who wind me up and leave me feeling worse when I'm feeling fragile, or just irritate me.

Of course the net result in the end, is ending up with almost 0 friends, and slowly becoming a paranoid and reclusive shut-in who starts to dread social interaction and dread attending normal events (without a companion because you now have none). So, whatever you do, don't do like I do.

I don't know. The answer is probably to try to do something about your own state of mind, rather than get rid of your well meaning but irritating friends. Are there things you can do to decrease your tightwoundedness? Or at least blow off steam and mitigate it?

Also, I am increasingly becoming convinced of the idea that social media is actually a negative force - that too many times it does not facilitate but instead undermines IRL friendships by giving you insights you did not want, but now cannot ignore. But I don't know what the answer is to that one, either, as being a Facebook refusnik has lost me more social opportunities than it has preserved friendships.

Argh, now I've depressed myself when I really just wanted to cheer you up, C#, because I think you are an awesome A++ person.

i treat friendship like an ebb & flow process, there's times you'll feel closer and more in tune with certain ppl, times you won't. You can give yourself space from people without cutting them off forever, and sometimes it's better to do so rather than forcing a pretense at a relationship that you'd resent. Organic's the word i'm maybe looking for, i've got organic friends.

It's okay to tune people out for a bit, especially if they're good-but-not-really-close friends. Part of being friends with someone is being willing to overlook or tolerate their faults, to an extent, but everyone gets burned out for a bit. I've had friends who I found exasperating after too much time with them and then taken a few months out to spend a bit more time with other people and then found I missed them after all.

I mean social media, and Facebook in general, can show that people you liked in the past actually have some hateful attitudes and opinions but I'm not sure that's really what's being discussed here.

There are definitely people where I've cooled on 'them via the internet' and have to remind myself that they are pretty cool in real life*, and avoiding hanging out with them is foolish. And of course there's people where I'm just Not Feeling It.

* and sometimes the difference in behaviour isn't that much, but the difference in context makes a massive difference.

C Sharp - are you able to fade these people out without it being a big deal? Because in my experience irritation fades and some friendships can be rekindled if you don't burn your bridges first. (apologies for mixed fire metaphor) Social media has made that easier for me - I have plenty of Facebook friends I don't want to see regularly but it's nice knowing they're still there, if only by a thread. Maybe it's just getting older. I used to get far more annoyed and judgemental and now I'm more OK with the ebb and flow process that darraghmac describes. I'm more able to shelve my irritation and let the good outweigh the bad. But obviously I don't know the specifics of your situation.

thanks, guys.

I think I just have to find some way of, yeah, fading them out for a little while so when they come back into view I remember more about liking them than disliking them. Especially if I can use that fading-out period to maybe work a bit on my crabbiness, like WCC says, so I'm better able to be chill. Though I do end up worrying that if I get stuck in a mood like this I might fade people out and fade people out until there's barely anyone left that I remember how to like. (this sounds absurdly extreme! but i don't think of myself as someone who keeps old friends.)