relationship – The Life and Times of Ben Weinberg

A lot of times in life, things won’t be handed to you, opportunities won’t just present themselves to you, and relationships or friendships don’t just form out of thin air. You must be making the effort more often than not to take the initiative to do all those things I just mentioned. It is not easy and can cause you rejection, stress, and even heartache, but if you just expect your life to just progress on its own without putting in the work, you will be sorely mistaken.

Making that initial effort will make the difference as you devote 80-90 or even 100% to get the return you were looking for. You may expect others at work, at school, or in your personal life to meet your half-way or 50/50 after a while but you may find that it’s a running theme in that instead of finding it as being equal or meeting them halfway, it’s likely to be more 60-40 or 70-30 in terms of your effort versus theirs. Now, that does not mean you should be taking the initiative all the time to ask for that promotion, or be open to developing a friendship, or seeking a new relationship but you’ll be better off from driving the effort rather than by taking a backseat.

Having more of the effort initially won’t just make an impression on the person but it will also develop your abilities, your relationships, and your professional / educational future more so than if you had made less of the effort. You should be conscious that the initiative you are taking is worth it and that the time you are putting in gets the result(s) that you are looking for. Your hard work, effort, and perseverance should lead to the other party putting in some conscious effort after a while. If it is just a one-way street in terms of that effort months or years later, I think that relationship, job, or friendship is likely to be doomed to fail.

It would not be fair or just for you to be constantly taking the initiative especially when that person isn’t reciprocal at all or even 30-40% of the way in a friendship or relationship. If you are giving all of the effort and feel like you’re not getting anything back from it, you may be dealing with an ‘emotional vampire’, who you may enjoy their company and like them but the fact that you are putting in all the work to keep things going and them not doing anything to reciprocate is not only a form of manipulation but it is also a sign of someone who only wants to take advantage of you.

They may lack certain qualities including introspection or self-awareness so they may not think they are at fault but if you believe that nothing is going to change, your time and efforts aren’t being valued adequately, and you are not getting as much in return from them, you may need to cut them off or just take a break from being with them or working for them. I encourage proactivity, being extroverted, sociable, and wanting to take on new goals, but if it is draining you and the results professionally or the relations personally you get as a result are not satisfying from that 60-40 or 70-30 set up, it may be best to move on to another person or opportunity.

To cite some examples, if you are good at reaching out to friends or acquaintances and just checking in to see how they are doing or even making the effort to see them and spend time together, that’s a positive initiative to take and shows you care about keeping that relationship going even if it had fizzled out a bit. However, if you feel like you are constantly the one making the calls, setting up the plans, or checking in on them, and they are not doing the same to you on that 30-70 or 40-60 balance that I mentioned, then it may be best to cut back on making the initiative there. If they truly cared about you, they would seek to make plans to see you by their own initiative or they would call to check in every now and then to see how you have been doing. Again, you should not be doing that all the time and if you find that it is becoming a pattern with that person, it may be best to stop seeing them so much since it looks like more of a one-sided friendship or relationship rather than a balanced one.

Another example professionally would be if you’re looking to boost your career and would like to learn new skills, then you should take that initiative with a training or a workshop or a conference that can make you more valuable to your employer. Similarly, if you take it upon yourself at work to learn a new skill by taking courses or attending seminars or providing trainings to others, it should be recognized not only to develop your career but to also further yourself in your role with better compensation or to be promoted to a new role because of the skills / abilities you acquired. If you take the time to volunteer, to be trained, to train, and to become a better worker, your employer or company should realize that it is also not a one-way street so there should be a proper recognition of your having taken the initiative to be more valuable to the firm in question.

However, if you find that after multiple trainings, skills developed, or competencies improved upon, that you are not getting the desired career promotion or compensatory boost, it may be that your initiative, while recognized, is not being formally appreciated. You made the most of the opportunities given but the other party involved doesn’t seem to recognize the new value or abilities you can provide. In this kind of situation, it may be best to start looking elsewhere professionally with those new proficiencies in your work to find a firm, company, or organization who will do their best to meet you halfway or maybe 40-60 so that you know that they care about you staying with them into the future and that your presence is both valued and appreciated, which is actually shown in different ways, a promotion, a raise, or otherwise.

Personally or professionally, you should consistently be looking to take action or initiative to improve your life in either way. However, it should not give the other party free reign to not give anything back in return or to provide their own initiatives or actions for you to take part in after they start it up. If you invite your friend to a barbecue, hopefully they’ll reciprocate in the future by having you over for a birthday party. If you do a skills workshop for a week to improve your competency at work, maybe your company or firm can reward you with a promotion to apply those new skills you picked up. It’s not always 50-50 in life and you may have to do most of the work, especially at the beginning of a new job or friendship. However, if it is you who is giving 100% and them putting in 0% in return on a consistent basis without the other party realizing it, it’s a toxic kind of relationship and you should be cutting ties with that person or entity as soon as possible.

Anger is an emotion that we all experience at one point or another in our lives. While it’s inevitable to experience this emotion, but what is especially important is how we use that emotion and how we deal with it. Instead of letting it stir within us or to lash out to that person who angered us or for those close to us who we vent to, I believe it’s best to take that anger and channel it into something positive. Instead of spreading that anger and letting it spread elsewhere, the anger you feel should instead be reversed to acting out in happiness and caring to keep that specific ‘ripple effect’ of anger from spreading.

Instead of taking that anger you receive as a reflection of who you are as a person and letting it bring you down, try to let it reflect not on you but on the person doling it out to make you angry. The anger that they give out is more likely than not about you but about how they are feeling or what’s happened to them before. Anger is not often personal but often about how that person is being treated and instead of breaking the cycle, they continue to take their anger they received and spreading it to other people.

Perhaps in other cases, that person’s anger at you is justified if you did something wrong or erred in some way but their anger is not likely to change your behavior and may backfire if you take offense at their tone. When receiving someone’s anger, it’s important to respond rationally that you understand their frustrations at see what their criticism is about but that you don’t appreciate the way they are going about airing their grievances with you in that manner. It is important to explain that if they are angry about you, they can voice it in a measured tone without yelling or being contemptuous as that will prevent you from taking their anger seriously.

When receiving someone’s anger, do your best to hear them out and to apologize if you were in the wrong but don’t get angry if you can and don’t redirect that anger back or to hold it in you that it affects your mood for days, weeks, or months. As you go through life, you are going to be likely on both ends of anger as an emotion but it’s best to realize that anger is not a good emotion to experience and it’s best to avoid even if you’re frustrated or disappointed or annoyed with someone or something. It’s likely that you will experience anger on your own but to not let that anger grow or linger or eat you up inside. On top of that, if you receive anger whether you feel you deserve it or not, you cannot take that anger from someone else and let it stay with you for very long.

As one of my favorite sayings in English goes, you should not ‘look back in anger’ and to let it consume you. Any anger you’ve had or received needs to fade away and you must let go of it or else it will worsen your life on top of your present and future relationships with other people. Letting go of grudges, not dwelling on past blowups, or forgiving people from wrongful words or actions is a key part of maintaining a healthy attitude towards anger. Part of that attitude towards anger is forgiving yourself for past transgressions related to your anger and then forgiving others as much as possible for their anger towards you, deserved or otherwise. Often, you will have to give people the benefit of the doubt and realize that some people don’t control their anger well or lash out at you or others because they don’t have a healthy attitude towards that emotion.

However, instead of letting others have their anger spiral out of control or to let yourself get angry in response, it’s best to not be angry in response or to just breathe, take time to think it through, and respond in a way that does not let your emotions take control of your words. You should try to prevent yourself from letting your anger get the best of you and to say something to somebody that you cannot take back and ruin your relationship or friendship with them. Noticing that you’re angry with them is enough to at least have a conversation with the person in a mature and measured way without letting that anger boil to the surface.

Quite simply, the anger needs to dissipate, or it will infect other parts of your life and cause you to lash out at other people who don’t deserve your anger or are unrelated to what caused that anger in the first place. You would be better off when you stop holding on to that anger or looking back on it. If you can let it go, let it go completely but if you can’t, try not to think about it and remember that all emotions come and go and that is the way it should be. Anger can be channeled into more productive uses of your life like going to the gym to release the tension, writing your thoughts down and working through your emotions and reflecting why and how your anger came to be, or just talking through your anger with a trusted friend or a family member who you feel comfortable sharing that emotion with.

Being able to channel your anger into something positive or something worthwhile is a key test of being a mature individual. Anger is a negative emotion but that doesn’t mean it has to go on forever or cause you to be a negative person. Knowing how to deal with it at first, react to it in a measured manner, and then eventually letting it go to leave it in the past where it should remain will help you to not look back on anger and to keep it from reaching the surface of your emotions again. As the famous Oasis song goes for which this blog article was inconspicuously titled regarding how to deal with anger at someone close to you whom you’ve grown apart from, “Don’t look back in anger, I heard you say…, at least not today.”