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The Art of Showing Up
Dec. 5th, 2022 04:03 pmLast year I read "The Art of Showing Up: On Friendship in the Age of Flakiness" with hopes that it would teach me good things to say to friends who are going through hard times. I never know what to say. I wasn't sure if I liked the book or not. HALF of it was about showing up for one's self, setting boundaries etc and I didn't think I needed help with that. There's one later chapter that really breaks down a bunch of situations, along with how to respond for each, and it was great. Loss of a loved one got two pages. I'd hoped it would have a chapter.
Anyway after the week I've had I skimmed it again and I'm really not sure I agree with some of the advice.
The book says
1) Send something besides flowers - disagree, flowers were lovely
2) Do send a card - agree. I'm not normally a card person but I appreciated cards last week.
2) Ask "how can I support you?" I disagree, questions were stressful, especially in text messages. Even "how are you doing" made me want to just say "fine" and get on with it because the answer was too complicated to text, and it frustrated me because it's like... they're doing no work and I'm doing work. I didn't want to think up some creative thing for them to do. I felt like they were just asking to ask. I was tired.
3) Don't ask how they died - but I was fine with these questions.
4) Don't share your own experiences - disagree, sharing helped. It says to avoid the "I understand what you're going through" and that part I agree with because every experience is different, but hearing "I had a relative in the ICU" or "I sat with a friend in hospice" got us talking and it was really good. The best day I had was one where I went into the office and went to an in-person meeting and a couple guys just hung out with me and we chatted until we lost the conference room. They'd dealt with people in hospitals and all the emotional/logistical terribleness it brings.
5) Go to the funeral - eh
I might be weird because I am REALLY used to talking on the phone, I work in customer service. So the most helpful thing for me was for people to talk, send a text like "hey I'm not doing a damn thing until 2pm today want to talk on the phone?"
I realize everybody is different, and there's some buzz about how neurodivergent types are more likely to embrace "experience sharing" than others, or is that an everybody thing? I do not consider myself neurodivergent but the theme comes up in my world sometimes. I'm sure there's no one right answer. But as someone who'd like advice navigating these situations, I was hoping the book would have SOME right answers. It had a few.
Anyway after the week I've had I skimmed it again and I'm really not sure I agree with some of the advice.
The book says
1) Send something besides flowers - disagree, flowers were lovely
2) Do send a card - agree. I'm not normally a card person but I appreciated cards last week.
2) Ask "how can I support you?" I disagree, questions were stressful, especially in text messages. Even "how are you doing" made me want to just say "fine" and get on with it because the answer was too complicated to text, and it frustrated me because it's like... they're doing no work and I'm doing work. I didn't want to think up some creative thing for them to do. I felt like they were just asking to ask. I was tired.
3) Don't ask how they died - but I was fine with these questions.
4) Don't share your own experiences - disagree, sharing helped. It says to avoid the "I understand what you're going through" and that part I agree with because every experience is different, but hearing "I had a relative in the ICU" or "I sat with a friend in hospice" got us talking and it was really good. The best day I had was one where I went into the office and went to an in-person meeting and a couple guys just hung out with me and we chatted until we lost the conference room. They'd dealt with people in hospitals and all the emotional/logistical terribleness it brings.
5) Go to the funeral - eh
I might be weird because I am REALLY used to talking on the phone, I work in customer service. So the most helpful thing for me was for people to talk, send a text like "hey I'm not doing a damn thing until 2pm today want to talk on the phone?"
I realize everybody is different, and there's some buzz about how neurodivergent types are more likely to embrace "experience sharing" than others, or is that an everybody thing? I do not consider myself neurodivergent but the theme comes up in my world sometimes. I'm sure there's no one right answer. But as someone who'd like advice navigating these situations, I was hoping the book would have SOME right answers. It had a few.