I have mixed feelings about this one. Hearing about people's problems and helping them tends to make me feel better about some of my own issues and not so alone. It's easy for me to get wrapped up in my own problems and think I'm the only one facing particular situations. It can be a good reminder to know that I'm not. It's probably why I was drawn to working in social services, honestly.
It's when people blow their problems out of proportion or become really self-absorbed that I get annoyed, though. Does your friend ever listen to your ish or is it really one-sided, OP? If he doesn't listen to you, maybe you should be direct about how that makes you feel. Subtle suggestions about how he should consider seeing a therapist might not do the trick here. My guess is he'll need to know how his behavior makes you feel before it'll click with him and he'll consider changing it. To get through to an emotional person, you'll probably have to deal in his currency, even if you tend to be more cerebral by nature.
Toy_Soldier wrote:
May I ask kouzoku, if there may not be some cultural element here as well ? It has been expressed to me by people from Asia that emotions are not as on display there. Even within the West there are differences. For example Americans and Italians (and Latin cultures in general) are known for being very open or emotional. Germans and perhaps some Nordic cultures are more reserved. I know we are dealing with stereotypes, but if you travel and live among these places you see the basis for them has validity. You just cannot assume any one person has them. They are simply cultural tendencies you may commonly find. If the culture changes, so will the tendencies.
There could be some truth to this, I think. (My two longest relationships have been with a guy whose family is from Sicily and a guy whose family immigrated from South America and they were far more demonstrative than me, despite any sterotypes about which gender is supposed to be more emotional). I would really take it down to the micro level, though, and say it's not so much the culture of a country as the culture of someone's immediate family and the home in which they grew up.
25 May 2013, 5:30 am
