Re-engagement

Let’s face it: times are strange.

People are going every which way.

I feel like relationships move into and out of resonance every few weeks. ..I tend to feel close with certain friends for a little while, then they’ll fade away and others will move into focus, and so on.

I can feel very distant from someone, then all of a sudden one of us will reach out and it’s like we were never apart!

I sometimes struggle with object permanence and just the natural ebb and flow of life, so if I’m not careful, I start to think people are gone forever if I haven’t talked to them in a while.

It’s not really a conscious belief; it’s more of the mind’s attempt to put people in a category: “current friend,” “former friend,” etc, with the goal of determining which relationships to invest in.

This is even less fun than it sounds 🤦‍♀️

. ..I’m working on it 🙃

Over the past 3-ish years, I’ve tried to just focus on being fully present with people when I’m with them, and releasing attachment to anything beyond that.

My current theory is probably the weirdest thing I’ve ever typed, but I tend to attract pretty open-minded readers, so here goes:

It feels like the days are not happening consecutively 😳

Let me explain. I’ll have days that do not feel like they came after the one “before” them. It feels like we’re being looped back through previous time periods or that we’re somehow tapping into a future timeline.

It’s as if interactions with certain friends (not everyone) actually occurred in about a 3 week time span, but got chopped up and dispersed throughout several years.

Another way to describe it is writing a book about two people. It shows the good times, the not so good, and everything in between.

Now imagine it gets pulled apart, and chunks of it get stuck randomly into a much larger book (the entirety of your whole life). So you’re just going along, and there they are again 👊

I actually experienced the opposite of this last year when I was dating someone, and it felt like we lived a whole life in only 2-3 months.

We grew and changed so much and were so present with each other that it seemingly expedited and slowed the time that elapsed simultaneously (both the hours and days/weeks).

It was forever; and it was a flash.

I plan to write more on my perception of time soon, but I wanted to mention it here due to the effects it may have on relationships.

So, anyways with all of this going on (83% of which may only be in my 🧠), how do we know when to re-engage and when to just leave it alone? 🤔

I thought I’d share 3 tips to help when you want to reach back out to someone that you haven’t talked to in a while due to a breakup, or just putting some space in the relationship.

So, here goes:

• Think of what you’re wanting or needing from that person, then see if you can provide it for yourself.
• Reparent the inner child who thinks it will be any different this time.
• Then, DO WHATEVER YOU WANT 🙃 . ..

I used to shame and judge myself for reaching back out to certain people, but I’m trying to let that go. For years, I took a hatchet to relationships I felt were in my way or that I suspected I’d outgrown- and some of them actually did need to go.

However, I’ve realized that in some ways, this was actually an attempt to disown parts of myself I disapproved of.

With this in mind, I now just try to take ownership of myself and my growth, and know that some things will fall away naturally if they need to.

I no longer take 100% responsibility for the relationship (whether that’s keeping it going or ending it), and trust the other person will return the call or text if they want to and if not, then there’s my answer.

It’s not a perfect system, but it’s where I’m at for now 🤷‍♀️

Photo: Panama City Beach, FL February 2023