Trouble Making Friends/Relationship Concerns
Trouble Making Friends
Human beings are social and benefit greatly from being in relationships. Although some students find the process of meeting new people exciting, others experience trouble making friends and view the process as downright frightening. Building relationships in college takes time and effort; therefore, it is often important for students to try and establish friendships early in their college experience. A central factor in building and maintaining friendships is trusting another person, which often takes the shape of feeling relaxed and comfortable in that person’s presence. Relationship trust also includes letting others see you for who you really are, including your strengths and limitations. Being real with others can be very scary for those of us who have had experiences of being hurt in relationships, judged by a group, or rejected by a specific person. While our past experiences often color our way of looking at relationships it is also important to keep moving forward in trying to build relationships with others as we know that possessing a support system in college helps with school and our overall satisfaction.
If you have trouble making friends during college it might be helpful to talk with someone at The Counseling & Testing Center to explore the specific barriers to reaching out and building friendships. Often the barriers to forming relationships are within your capacity to change and can be addressed during the course of a semester. Other times the barriers to forming relationships deserve a little more attention and include addressing feelings of anxiety and self-confidence when in the presence of others, including those of a different gender. Talking about one’s fears or concerns regarding friendships can provide you with new understandings about some historical patterns you might get yourself into when it comes to friendships and trusting others. Finally, when we communicate and address our fears regarding relationships we gain skills and a sense of empowerment to take steps toward building more satisfying and long lasting friendships.
Relationship Concerns
Although trust is essential to relationships, it is also important to work toward mutually satisfying interactions and nonviolent communication when forming relationships. What does this mean? Mutually satisfying interactions include all individuals in a relationship sharing the role of speaker and listener, or said differently, supporter and recipient of the support. One way to build satisfying interactions with others is to practice assertive communication, which includes respecting both your rights and the rights of others. Engaging in aggressive communication, in comparison, encompasses exerting power over others and prioritizing your rights over others. Passive communication, which is another form of interacting, includes being quite at times when it might be important to communicate your needs and desires with others. When we engage in passive communication we ultimately give those around us permission to make decisions about our life and time for us.
Something to consider in building satisfying and nonviolent relationships is that even when trust is established there are times when interactions over the course of a relationship can become less satisfying, aggressive, passive, or even passive aggressive, which is a combination of these earlier terms. During these periods it is often very useful to consider reaching out and talking with others about what might be going on in your relationships. This process of shining the light on your concerns in your interactions with others allows you to gain the skills and ability to make changes and maintain such changes in all of your relationship. The Counseling & Testing Center is a great office to talk about relationship concerns as our staff possess advanced skills in working on relationship barriers such as:
- Experiencing interpersonal, physical, or sexual violence
- Experiencing nonconsensual or unsatisfying sexual relations
- Feelings of being invisible or minimized by others
- Feelings that others take advantage or manipulate you into doing things
- Feelings that your worth is associated with another’s attention/love
Nonviolent communication and behavior is a final aspect worth addressing in relationships to building friendships with others. Nonviolence includes extending respect and appreciation for others attitudes, feelings, body image, and choices. Nonviolent communication should be considered in terms of verbal as well as nonverbal interactions. Verbal communication was addressed earlier with respect to assertive vs. passive or aggressive communication. When considering nonverbal language it is important to address one’s body language and actions around others. Body language such as posturing, pointing your finger, raising your fist, punching a wall while someone is present, blocking someone’s ability to exit a room or use a cell phone are all forms of violent behavior insofar as they restrict another person’s freedom to act and overall feelings of safety. If you are someone who engages in violent forms of communication it is also important that you consider getting help to learn way to be more respectful and not violate the rights of others.
The University of North Carolina at Greensboro
Anna M. Gove Student Health Center, 107 Gray Drive 27412
Greensboro, NC 27402-6170
VOICE 336.334.5340
FAX 336.334.5343