Dear Victor:

You wrote: “A few months back I had a very bad experience with friendship and made me lose my trust in friendships”- you had a bad experience (and I read about it in your June thread) with one person, a friendship with that particular person. A friendship is as good or bad as the two people involved in it.

My input to you back in June was to get to know a person before you get emotionally involved, learn who that person is, what he values, what motivates him.

You wrote in June: “If a person does something nice for me a few times I start thinking he is a very loving and caring person and I trust them blindly”- better correct his tendency. Don’t trust a person blindly because he did something nice for you. Instead, get to know that person well, over a long time.

I understand that you are alone in the U.S and you need friends very much. You need friends so to feel better, to function better. This is why it is important to have good people as friends. Evaluate people before trusting them, before caring so much.

Regarding frequency of getting together, there is your need, everyday, and his need, maybe less- this is one of the things you get to learn over time about him.

In other words, don’t operate impulsively, driven by your need to have a close friend. Operate thoughtfully, mindfully, pay attention, learn about the person over time, pace yourself.

anita

Dear Victor:

You are welcome.

On the long run we can’t be alone, not for long. We are social beings. We need people.

You wrote: “I do not know how do I control my habit of not trusting new friendships”- I don’t think you need to control or eliminate this habit. I think you need to add a habit, that that is the habit of getting to know a person before you establish a friendship, learn who a person is before you call him a friend.

anita

You are welcome, Victor. Post again anytime you’d like.

anita