I love to people watch. I enjoy meeting friends after work for a drink, but the part that usually sways me from just inviting them to my house and having them there instead is the promise of people watching. We are a fascinating species, and I’m not sure I’ll ever get tired of watching people interact, picking up on the cues from body language and expressions.
Because I try to be observant, and feel like I read people well – I get frustrated when the people in my life don’t seem to be accurately reading me.
And for a long time, I held out, wishing that someone in my family and close circle would know me well enough to know what I needed without me having to actually ask for it. And sometimes they did. But more often than not, they assumed that I needed something, I know how to ask for it.
I hate that.
It’s not an unfair expectation. I am rather self-assured as a general rule, and don’t have an issue having hard conversations or adapting to change if it means that something gets done well and more efficiently than the alternative. I try to be conscientious of others – but I’m also unnervingly stubborn when it comes to accomplishing whatever it is I’ve decided upon.
Except that somewhere in the 20-plus years I’ve been alive, I’ve managed to divorce asking for what I need to accomplish my to-do list, and asking for what I need to feel wanted and worthy.
I told myself for a long time that if these people really loved me, if they really knew me, they would get it. They’d do it, because who would willingly deny someone something they considered vital to being loved and valued? And if they didn’t, I probably didn’t actually need that thing or that conversation after all. And so I spent a lot of time secretly resenting the people I loved because I felt like they were wronging me. Like they didn’t know the real me. Like they couldn’t possibly like the real me because she was going to ask things of them that they weren’t willing to voluntarily give.
Friends, please hear me when I say this:
Ask the people you love for what you need.
Ask them.
That conversation may be awkward and painful and filled with frustration, but it is the only way you can reasonably expect to feel like your needs and wants are being converted to the other people. Even then, they may not fully get it. But like anything in life, the more you practice – having hard conversations, setting boundaries, being specific and explicit in what you need from people – the better you get at it.
It doesn’t meant that they will actually act on any or what you have expressed to them. They may not respond in a healthy or helpful way to you and the amount of bravery and work it took for you to put into words what you need from them. They may hear you, and get you, and still continue doing what they’ve always done. That puts you in an entirely different situation, filled with entirely different hard conversations, but you have done what you can to be transparent.
Deep down, no matter what people seem on the surface, we all want to be known by those we love. But it is unfair of us to assume that being fully known requires no effort on our part. It does require effort, and finding tactful ways to speak the truth in love, and coming back with equal parts forgiveness and apology when it’s not been done right. If it ever gets easy to have those conversations, that’s surprising and welcome news to me…but if my gut is right, it won’t. It may get easier – because we know that they end result is worth the discomfort. or because we learn to trust the process so the whole thing isn’t as anxiety inducing as it once was.
I look forward to that day in my own life, because my heart still pounds and my stomach still pools with dread whenever I have to have those conversations. And honestly – sometimes I avoid them for far longer than I should, because the whole situation wants to send me spiraling into a mess of my own anxiety triggers. When I’m spiraling, I feel like they are terrible, horrible experiences that freak me out…but I know that good things require work, effort and the tenacity to get up again and face those things that leave me shaking in my boots.
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