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新年前夜，我花了很多时间和一个一直在抱怨朋友们的人闲聊。就因为A对B做什么了，B对C说什么了，C就不原谅A了，之后又对B怨恨了，因为D又怎么着了。这特么谁能管的了啊！在这个本应该和人出去玩的假期，我听着这个人滔滔不绝地说着他们的问题，不禁想到底是什么让他能有如此时间和精力能够梳理并去解决这么多问题。人们常说有很多问题的人都乐在其中，或者沉溺于戏剧中，但这个人显然沉溺于抱怨之中了。这帮人从没遇到过没有隔夜仇的朋友。 通常我是不会把人划分到“有害”类别中，但我的一室友想到个更恰当的类别。我们都认识一位姑娘，很漂亮也很风趣，但她谈起自己的问题时真是能让人窒息。这种人的生活就像是宏大的歌剧似的——男朋友从不打电话之歌；男朋友B之歌；她配得上B这样的男人之歌；古老宫颈感染之歌；为什么每个人都是那么可恶之歌等等。你总是能被淹没在她的问题中，以至于你自己都没问题了。为了总结她的这些光荣事迹，室友称她为“情绪吸血鬼”。她就是靠吸食情绪活着的。即使身边没有这种人，你也会多多少少讨论他们或者对他们的生活感到困扰。这样，你便成了Regina的Gretchen Weiners。（二人均为电影《贱女孩》中的角色） 《贱女孩》 这种人并不是坏人，损友亦或是有害的，他们只是严于律人，宽于律己罢了。没人想和无聊的人做朋友，这人还总是抱怨生活和身边的人，身处痛苦之中。当遇见这样的人，我们也会变成这样，因为近墨者黑。我们应该去结交一些和我们一样热爱生活的人，与他们为伴时感受到幸福，真正的关心他们的问题，而不是跟他们喋喋不休或者一言不发等对方开口。如果觉得你的朋友对你无益且不搭调，那还和他做个什么朋友？忍受别人对你的伤害有什么意义？没人强迫你和他做朋友嘛。 我知道与人绝交是很难的，尤其是在你们一起经历了一些之后。这也是为什么有人能忍受糟糕的男朋友数年之久，好莱坞还在继续做奈特·沙马兰的电影。有时候很难说出不。想想那些从高中就混在一起的人，并不是说他们有多少共同点，只是因为他们懒得去或者不敢去结识新朋友罢了。就是惰性导致了缺少朋友的这种局面。打破常规，在未知领域寻找朋友是需要付出努力的，但人们不想付出努力。如果人们想，那么《好汉两个半》（美国情景喜剧）就不会那么火了。面前有两条路。要么维持你这死气沉沉的圈子，要么就去找个能让你不再抱怨、使你意识到其实你还能得到更好的圈子。其实你是可以选择不再抱怨并且去做些努力。 我是不会提出一些毫无根据的建议的。根据我个人的经验，这很有效，朋友之间的绝交对于双方来说也成了件好事。几年以前，一位老友和我都厌倦了对方。我们一见面就吵架，事实上我在朋友们身上花的时间太多，以至于忘记了友情的真谛。在一次吵架过后，我决定还是不再维持这种病态的友谊了，早死早超生。并不是因为我恨她或者她是个对我生活指手画脚的贱人。我们只是不能让彼此开心，是时候离开去找其他人了。 最近，我在一个咖啡馆里碰见了她，形同陌路之后多年的一次偶遇。时间太长以至于我都忘了当初为什么和她绝交。她问我写作的情况，过得怎么样。我问她艺术搞得怎样，还被她艺术视野的所见给吸引了。我想起来以前和她一起去买奇形怪状的绘画用品，在店里找颜料——这些点点滴滴让我觉得和她做了回朋友很值。我并不是在怀旧，这些只是反映出我们当初做朋友的缘由。喝完咖啡，我们交换了电话号（其实我还留着她的号码，我从来不删东西）。几周后又在一起吃晚饭。 席间，我终于在故事之外见到了她妹妹，长得和我这个失而复得朋友一模一样。戴着顶大帽子，就像是朋友大一时候的克隆版。相似的吓人，就像是阿诺德·施瓦辛格的电影，但还是很漂亮——发现了我这个永久朋友新的美丽之处。这就是友谊的真谛。在失而复得之后，我才发现我丢了什么。  This New Year’s Eve, I spent a great deal of time with a casual acquaintance who insisted on complaining about his friend group situation — because A had done something to B who said something to C who had never forgiven A for this and that but was harboring resentment toward B about D and who the hell gives a shit. As I listened to this person wax on and on about their problems — on a holiday in which we were supposed to be finding people to make out with — I wondered what could possibly possess this person to devote so much time and energy to hashing all of this out or (even worse) dealing with this crap all the time. They say that most people who have lots of personal problems like having them, or are addicted to drama, but this person just seemed addicted to complaining. They never met a friend they couldn’t have a grudge against two days later. I generally dislike labeling people as “toxic, ” and an old roommate of mine came up with a better term. We both knew this girl — who while being charming and incredibly interesting — seemed to suck up all the oxygen in the room with her personal problems. This was the kind of person whose life attracts “grand dramas” — the Ballad of the Boyfriend Who Never Calls, the Operetta of the B- When She Deserved a B, the Rhyme of the Ancient Yeast Infection, the Dirty Limerick of Why Everyone Is Terrible — and when you were around her, you were always so wrapped up in her problems you could never focus on your own. To encapsulate her glory, my roommate called her an “emotional vampire.” She feeds on feelings. Even when you’re not around this type of person, you have a way of talking about them or obsessing about their life. You become the Gretchen Weiners to their Regina. It’s not that people like this are bad people, bad friends or toxic friends; they just require more work to be friends with than what is emotionally healthy. No one wants to be around a person who finds so little joy in their life, who complains incessantly about their life or everyone around them, who is in the business of misery. When we are with people like this, we become more like them — because we are what we surround ourselves with. We should be surrounded by people who love life as much as we do, feel blessed to be in the company of their friends and are genuinely interested in their problems — rather than steamrolling them or just waiting for their turn to speak. And if you’re friends with someone who isn’t good for you or isn’t compatible, why be friends with them? What’s the point in putting up with someone who bleeds you dry? No one’s forcing you to be friends. I know it can be difficult to “cut people off” — especially when you have a history together. It’s why people put up with terrible boyfriends for years and why Hollywood keeps making M. Night Shyamalan movies. It’s hard to say no sometimes. Think about those people you know who have been friends with the same group of people since high school, not necessarily because they have that much in common but because they’re too lazy or scared to find new friends. It’s inertia, the path of least friend resistance. Breaking out and seeking friends outside of what you’ve known takes effort, and people hate effort. If people liked effort, Two and a Half Men wouldn’t be so popular. But you can either keep enabling your own circle of emotional death or get to that point where you can’t complain anymore and decide you deserve better. You can stop kvetching and do something about it. Because I don’t give advice without backing it up, I have empirical proof that this works and friend break-ups can actually be good for everyone. A few years ago, a longtime friend of mine and I were at the point where we were just sick of each other. We spent more time fighting over my schedule or the fact that I “was too busy for my friends” than actually being friends. And after one quarrel too many, I decided to just shoot our ailing, disease-ridden friendship in the head. I put it out of its misery. It wasn’t that I hated this person or found her to be scum sucking rode whore who was ruining my life. We just weren’t making each other happy anymore, and it was time to move on and see other people. And recently, I ran into this person at a coffee shop, years after the end of our first friendship. It had been so long that I actually couldn’t remember why we broke up in the first place. She asked me about my writing and what I was doing with myself and I asked her about her art, genuinely interested in where her vision had taken her. I remembered going to buy weird art supplies with her and finding materials in package stores — the small moments that made being friends with her worth it. I wasn’t feeling nostalgia, just a reflection of all of the reasons we were friends in the first place. After getting coffee, we exchanged numbers again (although I still had hers, because I never delete things) and met up again a few weeks later for dinner. At this dinner, I finally met her sister for the first time — despite having heard about her in stories — and she looked so much like my friend that I was taken aback. It was like my friend had been cloned as a college freshman who wore floppy hats. I found it a little creepy, like an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie, but also beautiful — the discovering a new part of someone I’d known forever. This is what friendship was really like. I didn’t even know what I was missing until I found it. You should like Thought Catalog on Facebook here. |
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