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Hypocritical Relationship Advice Giver.
lolwuthalp
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Hey forum. whats up? bad thread title? hmmmm...
me and my girlfriend are going through a rough patch that started a month ago. We're not together, but we are together? Its silly. I understand that everyone feels like they are the only person thats been through this etc. Thats not what I am here for. I wont go into details about the situation, but in summary, she feels that she needs some time to sort herself out. There is no definite timeline or outcome. She just needs some space.
I've been pretty pathetic with not calling/texting her. I think out of the month maybe a total of 5 days have passed that we havent talked. We keep running into each other at the pub or in the street and talking about the same stuff. Its one giant loop and its not helping either of us.
Now, two nights ago I caught up with an old friend who happened to be going through the same thing. Shes not a huge talker though, so I ended up holding up the conversation. We talked over a few cups of coffee pretty much strictly about her current relationship situation.
Why is it that I was capable of giving her advice for certain scenarios and felt totally confident in doing it, but when I am confronted with these problems, I cant follow my own advice?
If I cant follow my own advice and help myself, should I be attempting to help others? I feel Im a bad person. Shed some light.
is it as simple as things are easier said than done?
me and my girlfriend are going through a rough patch that started a month ago. We're not together, but we are together? Its silly. I understand that everyone feels like they are the only person thats been through this etc. Thats not what I am here for. I wont go into details about the situation, but in summary, she feels that she needs some time to sort herself out. There is no definite timeline or outcome. She just needs some space.
I've been pretty pathetic with not calling/texting her. I think out of the month maybe a total of 5 days have passed that we havent talked. We keep running into each other at the pub or in the street and talking about the same stuff. Its one giant loop and its not helping either of us.
Now, two nights ago I caught up with an old friend who happened to be going through the same thing. Shes not a huge talker though, so I ended up holding up the conversation. We talked over a few cups of coffee pretty much strictly about her current relationship situation.
Why is it that I was capable of giving her advice for certain scenarios and felt totally confident in doing it, but when I am confronted with these problems, I cant follow my own advice?
If I cant follow my own advice and help myself, should I be attempting to help others? I feel Im a bad person. Shed some light.
is it as simple as things are easier said than done?
lolwuthalp on
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I personally think this is just normal human behavior. It is sometimes easier to identify and judge other's situations than our own, especially when strong emotions are involved.
Don't look bad.
It's all about perspective and the effect of emotions on the brain. Your friend's problems have no impact on your life, therefore nothing is clouding your brain/perspective in that regard.
But thinking clearly is harder when the choices affect you directly. You have fears, doubts and a history with the other person all combining to make it more difficult. Cast any fears away if you can. Know what you want to achieve, put her feelings into that plan (to see if they arne't hurt) and see if it still seems like it could work, then go for it.
Your advice to your friend would be the same for yourself, but you hold your own experiences as though it's unique. It isn't. Maybe also try imagining that this was a story being told to you from someone else?
Sometimes people need time alone to assess their situations. You're being a little extreme here. This isn't a game where someone wins...
Yeah, basically it's really easy to say assertively what the right thing to do is when you know you won't be the one to live with the consequences and ramifications of actually doing said right thing. It's messier when you're the one left holding the bag when good advice might yield a less-than-desirable outcome. In this case, I gather that you're afraid that if you were to follow your own advice, give her space, stop calling/texting etc., a possible consequence might be that she won't ever come back even if she does sort out whatever it is she says she needs to work on. Even though you know that the alternative behavior is not any better for your relationship and may actually be worse, you feel emotionally safer by continuing this behavior because you believe it makes it harder for her to leave you.
Upon reflection, would you say that's about the size of it?
If so, consider the following questions:
1. Does it *actually* make it easier for your relationship to fall apart? Or is it just as likely to end if you call her every day? Has it fallen apart already?
2. If your relationship were to end, what would you do next? Do you think it would be the end of the world for you, or would you both eventually move on to a more-fulfilling relationship?
Relationships are tough, but if she wants space you've gotta just give it to her. Maybe find a new pub for a while? You might find some new friends to connect with and piece your life back together without constantly being reminded of what used to be. Then if it does work out you've still got new friends so good for you, and if it doesn't you've started to move on and your world doesn't fall apart when it's officially over and all of your routines are now filled with your ex.
As many here will tell you, the fact of the matter is that it is much, much easier to give advice than it is to take it.
Yeah, it's pretty human to not be able to follow what you know is best to the letter. Don't let that stop you from helping others. As for the possibility of people rejecting/resenting your advice, feel free to to own up to the fact that you're not perfect if they're aware of your difficulties ("Considering X, I'm sorta not one to talk, but..."). A bit of humility can be appreciated sometimes, though you probably don't want to bring up the situation with your girlfriend to people who are not close enough to you to be aware of it.
Hell, I'm saying this and I often chastise about not being able to follow my better judgment and feel I shouldn't contribute :rotate:
Introspection is a lot harder than extrospection, to put it in a very very brief way.
This. A thousand times this. I am the same. Giving advice is easy. But following my own advice or even worse, accepting advice from others is very, very hard, if not impossible for me.
Of course you can give others advice, even if you don't follow it yourself. Just because you don't follow it yourself doesn't necessarily make it bad advice.
You might wanna think about if the advice you are giving is applicable to your own situation and than actually apply it to your situation. But you don't have to feel bad for giving advice you are not following yourself at the moment.
When you analyze a situation for someone else, you can be objective. You aren't having to deal with the emotional baggage that comes with the conflict.
Its not really hypocritical per-say, its the entire REASON we seek out advice to begin with. If we could all be totally objective in every relationship scenario, then advice wouldn't exist.
If everyone was already living the objective based view...there'd be no reason to need advice. Does that make sense?