Gal pal's got the blues?
Speaking of joy – what do you do when you’ve a gal-pal who’s a little less than joyous? She calls you up for drinks, and halfway through the night (and her sad-story, which you’ve heard more than a few times!) you want to crawl under the table and hide! The problem might be that girl doesn’t know how to fix her situation, and inevitably is stuck in this same rut, over and over. Sometimes the problem is not that girl doesn’t want to fix her life, but maybe she doesn’t realize she’s in a funk, or maybe doesn’t know how to break free. Step one – recognition. Maybe something as simple as saying, “That seems like it really bothers you” will help her realize she’s kind of a drag.
If this doesn’t break her out of her funk, my second gal-pal aid effort is to find out the underlying reason for her blues and ask her how she could beat the funk. If she keeps making excuses to stay unhappy, though, I’m not above telling a girl “Listen, you seem down and as your friend I want to see you try to solve your problem, instead of continually complaining about something you’re not fixing.” My method may be a little abrupt, right there, but if you can’t tell one of your homegirls how you really feel (with tact, s’il vous plait!), what CAN you tell her? Lucky for me, my friends and I are ULTRA honest and open with each other.
It stinks when your girl friend’s got the blues. Sometimes, to help them realize or solve their dilemma, I’ll come up with a personal example of their problem to show them how silly that problem is, or a practical solution that I’ve used, to show how easy it is to solve.
For example-
Girl: Yeah, since boy and I split, I feel like I don’t get dolled up to do anything anymore…
Me: Well you should slap on some face, and exit your abode!
Girl: Well, I hate having to drive somewhere to hang out, and parking is aggravating…
Me: I used to feel the same way – I realized I was using parking/cash/driving as an excuse to stay home and feel sad about the breakup. It’s totally okay to mourn a breakup for a bit, but I felt better once I started getting out of the house.
Girl: Good point. Maybe I will go out! What are you doing after class?
Me: Grabbing drinks with you!
Some of that dialogue may have been slightly elaborated (so that you’d understand the situation) but the premise holds true. Sometimes people don’t see their own rut, because they’re the person in it! Sometimes it helps to suggest personal experience.. sometimes it helps to just get them out of the house, and doing something – like silly photo(booth) sessions, checking out vintage fashion books at the library, or hanging out at the park and whistling at cute boys who pass by!
If all else fails and your friend’s blues are getting YOU down, it may be time to step back from the situation and re-evaluate. Gala Darling wrote an article on dealing with negative people and when all else fails, maybe that’s an article you should check out.
The one person you can make happy with any guarantee is yourself… and happiness is contagious.
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Yup. But sometimes those so-called friends are not worth the effort when you put in all the time and energy and they are lumps of coal.
I’m going to do (that above) to my sister in March
We’re going to pig out in front of her TV