Ken Solin discusses what it means to outgrow a friendship.
One of the most difficult issues I’ve had to face in midlife is letting go of an old friend. I’ve invested considerable time and energy in my men friends over the years, and our support for each other has never wavered. We’ve been there for each other through my devastation of losing a son and their worst times as well. Friendships are forever, right? Apparently not.
Because I don’t take losing a friend casually, I struggled for a few years before finally feeling I had to let Jason go. I was aware that husbands and wives move apart, typically when one outgrows the other emotionally, but I hadn’t considered that friends sometimes outgrow each other, too.
Jason and I met in college and had known each other for four decades. Although we’d lived on opposite sides of the country for most of that time and didn’t see each other much, we frequently talked on the phone.
When I started my men’s group 20 years ago, Jason dismissed it out-of-hand, insisting that men can’t change, especially without the help of a therapist. He was skeptical and unsupportive when I began facing my issues, anger and the inability to sustain intimate relationships. As I worked through my issues with women, he seemed disappointed. He’d always enjoyed my stories about the long line of women and failed relationships I left behind; and it felt like he wanted that screwed-up guy back. The more emotional baggage I shed and the healthier and happier I became, the more he distanced himself. Frankly, I couldn’t understand why he wasn’t pleased for me. I’d cheered all his successes, but Jason clearly wasn’t cheering mine.
The last time I mentioned my inner work, Jason’s comment said everything about how he viewed change and growth. “You’re always reinventing yourself, but I’m still the same guy I’ve been for 40 years.” While I’d been facing down my demons and continue to free myself from them, he still hadn’t opened his Pandora’s box of issues, and was furiously hammering nails into it to keep it closed.
And no wonder. Jason had major issues. He’d been too terrified to get on a plane for decades, was a hypochondriac, controlled his adult children, was generally miserable, and seemed more afraid of living than dying.
As my friendships with other men deepened, he insisted he didn’t need friends. When I asked him who he talked with regularly about his life, he flippantly replied, “A couple of guys I know on Wall Street.” Pressed to name guys other than business relationships, he said nastily, “No one. I don’t need anyone and I’m bored listening to you talk about how important friends are.” As his only long-time friend, all I could say was, “Ouch!”
I wanted to hang in with Jason and urged him to consider working toward changing his life. I was living proof that men can change—an angry man who learned to control his rage, a loner who found the courage to trust other men, a relationship failure who finally discovered how to open his heart to a woman. But Jason dismissed all that. His refusal to change wasn’t being steady; it was being stubborn—especially since his life wasn’t working.
The last time I talked with him was when, after 25 years of not being able to commit to a woman, I was getting married. In response, he yelled at me, insisting that I was making a mistake—even though he’d never met my fiancé—and that I should live with her instead of marrying her. He treated me like a teenage boy and became so obnoxious and ungracious about one of the happiest events in my life, that I felt compelled to say good-bye. A friend doesn’t rain on a friend’s parade, ever.
All Jason had to offer me was unsolicited advice—no support, no joy. He was stuck in a time warp, wanting to keep me where I was because my growth made him uncomfortable. Not supporting a friend’s growth is the worst insult you can hurl at him—and it marked the end of our friendship.
Still, leaving him behind hurt because we shared a lot of history. Letting go is painful. But sometimes friends outgrow each other, and sometimes there’s no alternative.
Originally appeared at Huffington Post.
—Photo roman.petruniak/Flickr
About Ken Solin
Vocalyze
Thank you for this! I assure you, this is hardly a “guy” thing. I have had to divest myself of many friendships with women for the precise same reasons, and yes, some after decades of friendship. Personal growth costs… But for everything we forego, some much comes in to fill us again. Congratulations on dumping Jason! Here’s to time better spent!!
Personal growth does cost and I lost a friend today because of it and because I have better boundaries. It still hurts and I grieve, yet, I did the right thing to distance myself from him.
Making friends does not come easy for me, so this is a big loss. I live in a rural setting and although I travel about, many of the men I meet are either married or prefer to go home at night and be alone.
I wonder how men make friends, and where they meet men who are conscious, aware, doing the inner work, wanting to share and be open and connect?
Thanks for your article. The timely was good!
My husband had to end a 15 year+ relationship with a close friend this past year….His friend was so close and he even bought a house one block down from ours (I can hardly drive by his old friend’s house without feeling annoyance!)…
His friend and his 2nd wife even lived with us for a couple of months (which was probably a poor judgment call, although at the time his friend asked me and I was sure I could do anything to help a friend….my mistake!)….While they were with us, they used to argue and bicker back and forth….they seemed jealous of our relationship, of our kid, our friends, anything and everything…My husband’s friend used to drag him out to drink and to talk, which initially I was fine with until it became excessive…and until I was excluded….The tension rose higher and higher as the wife got close to her expecting date (with their first child)….When she was 8 months pregnant and very uncomfortable, I could feel the husband’s annoyance and anger and frustration getting higher and higher…but I tried to stay neutral and supportive because the wife was in need….Eventually, the husband verbally attacked me out of nowhere…and then I had to sever relations with them….That was 6 years ago….
My husband finally severed relations with this friend (he divorced his 2nd wife), who came back from overseas to live in the house down the block….it’s sad…but I felt that if my husband didn’t divorce his friend, then my husband and I would end up divorced….his friend was so poisonous…
Thanks for this article…very illuminating…sometimes you outgrow your friends….or you realize they really don’t want friendship…they just want company in their misery…
Wow, this really resonates. I’ve recently had to let go of a friend after 20 years and this is the first thing I’ve seen relating to this issue since it happened.
Friends get involved with us for who we are when we meet them, for the most part. If and when we change, whether by growing or by slipping down a deep hole, that old self ceases to be. If that old self is gone, the glue that held the friendship together can all too often weaken or break as well. Thus, we outgrow a friendship. This also holds true in a marriage. All too frequently, one partner subtly , or even overtly sabotages any efforts by the other to make significant changes, whether physical or emotional. It is a rare and true friend indeed who will embrace the new you emerging from your inner work and growth. Sadly, change scares the daylights out of quite a few people.
“While I’d been facing down my demons and continue to free myself from them, he still hadn’t opened his Pandora’s box of issues, and was furiously hammering nails into it to keep it closed.”
Your friend blamed you for opening your box. Did you blame him for keeping his closed? I was a much happier man before I opnened my box.
One perfectly valid way to deal with a Pandora’s box is to let it die with you. When your body confronts a toxin or irritant, it will attempt to excrete or neutralize it. If this is not possible, the alternative is to permanently isolate the threat, until death solves the problem for you. Western culture rejects this solution because we want to think that life lasts forever. It does not. Life is short, and if you spend 40 years dealing with the contents of a Pandora’s box, it might have been better to leave it locked.
Maybe you judged your friend … perhapse even before he judged you.
Your suggestion to leave the lid on your Pandora’s Box of issues and die at the same level of emotional health and well being you developed over a lifetime is reminiscent of ignorance is bliss. I don’t believe either ignorance or emotional unconsciousness are preferable to living in integrity with yourself.
No man need accept life as it is today if it isn’t everything he hoped and dreamed it would be. That’s giving up and while easier that doing the work, there’s no benefit.
I’m not sure how any man can avoid his issues and then fool himself into believing he’s doing the best he can in life. And I also don’t know why any man wouldn’t want to do his best.
Friendships with other men are critical in terms of peer support, and there’s no place where that’s more abundant than in a men’s group. It takes courage to face down your demons with other men. It takes no courage at all to accept dysfunctional behavior as the best you can do.
Sorry, but suggesting men are better off not resolving their issues seems less like living than dying. Death resolves nothing, and if a man dies with all his unresolved issues still unresolved, I can’t see the silver lining in that, particularly when the quality of his life could have been better.
Thanks for taking the time to comment, and best of luck.
Ken
Could it be that observing a guy for many years, and watching his failed relationships do damage, simply made your friend concerned about you? There is a difference between being realistic and being foolishly optimistic. I think people want to believe the best about themselves – and usually this is the big lie that they’ve changed. You might heal. But change? Highly unlikely. In any case, there is a plethora of evidence that getting married is a foolish act and unnecessary in a modern society in the absence of a land transaction or business alliance. Your long term friend was rightfully angry and concerned for your welfare, especially given your horrible track record of relationships and all the emotional baggage you’ve carried on your journey.
I was an angry man who raged out of control, frequently. I haven’t lost it like that in a decade. That’s real change, not imagined.
I never had a decent relationship with a woman because of my trust issues. I worked on my trust issues with women and married, and that’s change.
I was friendless until I looked at my fear around opening up with other men. I have several close, caring friends now. That’s change.
When I hear other men insist that change is impossible, I hear defeat. MEN CAN CHANGE!
Very nice article, Ken.
Anyone going through this now, should look up a song called, “Where You Want to Be” by Darren Hayes. It is thought by many that Darren is addressing is old partner, from the band Savage Garden in this song. A very touching song indeed.
I haven’t seen a lot of material addressing this, but I have gone through this myself with friends and sadly, family. My grandfather was all right when I was a kid, but as an adult. He was more than happy to go out of his way to offer unsolicited advice (I understand as a parent or grandparent you will make suggestions to your children/ grandchildren) but he always addressed it as, “Here’s how it is and you are stupid if you don’t agree with how I think.”
If I ever had a different opinion I got yelled at by him. When I was like 20, I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life, he’d yell at me for that, too. Yeah, I know 20 is so old…How dare I not have the entire game of Life figured out by then and my life plans set in stone 2 years after high school!
I moved out of my dad’s house at 21, and cut my grandfather out of my life until recently…
A cousin of mine, now grown, had confided in me that he had molested her. I wasn’t going to take that to the grave, so since it was late at night when I found out, the next day I told her father and he blew up and called her and she confessed. Long story short, we confronted my grandfather and told him we are done with him. I knew he was a horrible person and I finally had the solid proof I needed to convey my feelings about him were dead on to the rest of the family, who was wondering why I had been so distant in years past.
But their my grandfather was as I was growing up, always preaching to others about how they needed to get God in their lives, how they were getting out of shape (even with his big belly), how he was a financial wiz (even though my dad trusted his advice and lost money numerous times before), etc. It just never ended with him. He always knew best, and when he was proven wrong he could pull an excuse for it out of his ass at a moment’s notice…
I am 25 now, and I think telling people you are too busy for their crap is a skill you either have or don’t have, and the sooner you get it the better you are. I got mine when I was about 21, when I moved into my own house and became independent.
I’ve also gone through this with numerous friends. Some just feel into a bad way of living, and like my grandfather, if you ever called them on their toxic behavior, it wasn’t them with a problem. It was you and you were crazy for seeing it that way.
In metaphysical terms, these people are called, “Energy vampires” and no matter family or friend, you need to love yourself the most, no one is going to take care of you as an adult, and get them out of your life. Life is too short to be around miserable people. If you can’t tell them off, stop talking to them. If they want to hang out, tell them you are just too busy and don’t have the time right now bc of school, work, kids, etc. Time and space will take care of the problem.
I still have some old friends. But both of them understand we live a couple of minutes apart now and have significant others and clashing work schedules. I don’t see them much, but their friendship is worth holding onto. The one guy is into video games a little too much for my taste, I still play them casually sometimes but it was never a major thing with me, so we don’t really ever hang out because we are different people now.
There was a time when he became a miserable person and I told him what he did that upset and he denied it all the way. I was done with him then and ready to find new friends. Finally, one day he apologized for it and we’ve been on good pretty good terms since then. That’s another thing, the people worth keeping around can apologize when they screw up, but sadly, most people would rather die than admit they were in the wrong.
i want true love,
Thank you for sharing your journey with us.