As our lives recalibrate, and we reconnect with people we first knew decades ago, we realise that we have all gone through some difficult years. Some people are difficult to recognize at first, physically. There have been divorces, financial stress, disasters, bereavements, addictions to alcohol and other substances, betrayals and unfortunate involvements with narcissists. They all take a toll, on our optimism and our positive momentum.
Because so many of our sources of security have been profoundly disrupted in the past two years, we naturally wish some things to stay the same. Old friendships from our late teens and twenties are among these sources of reference. Often they seem to involve a complex karmic connection of some sort, and - looked at in that way - they have definitely brought with them some illumination which has been unique, in our formative years.
When we are just starting out, we are young and energetic, but also quite anxious: worried about the choices we make in haste, and whether what looks good on the surface will actually make us happy. As we get older, getting wiser is not actually a given - unless we have made the effort to confront a great deal of the truths we all must face at some stage in our lives, and have benefitted from the fruits of that sustained effort.
If we ride the shock waves of change, we may find our current lives to be unrecognizable in comparison to the one we inhabited in the past. And our choices are far better: both personal and professional life choices, and our choices of friends. Our history matters, because it has shaped us.
As we become less superficial, we don’t judge everyone by external values or in hierarchical terms - inferiority or superiority - by their appearances, or by worldly or material standards. We assess their energy. And even people who have suffered continually in their lives, but have refrained from involving us in their sufferings, or blaming us for them, remain part of our friendship group.
If we want to inhabit a world which perpetuates a narrative of dead-end negativity centered on outmoded perceptions, those choices are now shown to be unsustainable. As the dead wood disintegrates, vivid new life is given space to flourish.
People do learn, and grow. That has been my lived experience. And the truth is that some people prefer not to grow, and prefer that the people they want to dislike, for whatever reason, conscious, or unconscious, do not. That the people they stereotype and label - often unjustly and inaccurately - remain stuck or unhappy or troubled or ‘problematic’ or ‘difficult’ forever.
When we were younger, our capacity to absorb other people’s chaos that was higher. Now we find that we need to keep that to a minimum. Especially living in these chaotic times, and in a country with no safety nets, or buffers at all, we may find our emotional band width has diminished.
Some people attract and perpetuate drama. And while it was interesting in our twenties, and an opportunity to develop compassion and empathy, it has become a spectator sport in later life, as we extricate ourselves from the inner circles of those draining, attention-getting members of our social circles. They caused discomfort, by always going through something intense, which meant the conversations they engaged in were one-sided, and their friends didn’t feel heard. Looking back, the perpetual drama we were subjected to seems like a sort of narcissism, and we realize we felt - without admitting it directly - that the friendship had become an ordeal. A lot of the interactions were heavy, and were about processing big issues.
Sometimes unhappy and chaotic people want what their friends are having, are offended or irritated by their friends’ happiness, and so compulsively downgrade the joy or success their friends seem to have discovered.
As we increasingly value ourselves, we become selective, and discerning: we align ourselves with less troubled people, and people who do not wish us well. It’s not that some people are free of suffering, but that they have grown and learned how to be able to handle our own griefs and stresses, and manage them more effectively. As we do an honest audit of our lives, we confront the fact that we may be ashamed of some of the choices we have made. I think understanding our choices and accepting ourselves leads to self compassion and forgiveness, that leads to our lives becoming clearer and the burden of the past lighter.
The joy of growing is that you find people who respect the very qualities which you yourself possess. They do in fact exist! And understanding, respect, and inter-assurance of the mind do exist, good communication and empathy do exist, and mirrors can be held up lovingly by people who trust and care about each other, and genuinely wish each other well.
We can find ourselves refreshed: completely glad to be alive, and to be walking on a path we find meaningful and joyous, productive and fulfilling.
If this is the case, we want people in our life who feel the same way, about themselves and about us, whatever backgrounds they come from, or whatever lives they are living. They may be troubled by their own issues in their life, and be struggling in all kinds of ways. But they see us as an ally, and a companion in the adventure of their life. We do not burden each other.
So now, as the houses all over the world have so recently been cleaned for the first auspicious New Moon of the year, and salt and blessings have been scattered over the thresholds to protect all those who go in and out of these households, we can really say goodbye - not only to the old year, but to all the old years before, and all the tired old connections that grew in them, and whose cycles of life and relevance have now ceased.
We can wholeheartedly wish each other Happy New Year, because the seeds of our current happiness were planted by our own good decisions in the previous year. We do not have to predict or foretell the future in mystical ways. We can make choices today which create it.
