Hi Kumo,

I responded to you on your other thread. I hope you find my advice helpful.

As I said in your other thread, Facebook, texts and emails are a relatively new technology and people respond to them differently.

I have to be a little blunt here. I have no intention of distressing you, what I am about to say I do with good intentions and the hope of helping you. Now please understand that my opinion, is just my opinion and we all know that opinions are like arseholes. Everyone has one. I am not a professional therapist or a professional anything. I am a flawed human being with my own prejudices and ignorance – so if you think I am wrong just ignore what I have said and don’t take it to heart.

From what you told us here, in this particular situation, I actually think you might be the one who is being a little unreasonable.

When you discussed your feelings about text messages etc in the past with this women, she explained why she didn’t always respond straight away or at all. She explained that it wasn’t to do with you personally.

I think that is a perfectly reasonable explanation. I also think her time frame has been reasonable too. You say you only sent the email yesterday, I don’t think it is fair to upset about not getting a response by now. I know people who take weeks to respond to emails, myself included. She possibly sees the situation the same way.

When I was working in the professional world it was common to wait days for responses to emails, particularly from higher up people. You are setting yourself up for a lifetime of frustration if you get upset over people not responding quickly.

I would let this go and wait for her to respond to you. If you haven’t heard from her regarding the issue about the club in a couple of weeks, you could send her a quick, very polite and non resentful email asking her if she has had chance to take any action on the issue you wrote to her about.

I worry that you are being too demanding of her and that you will drive her away if you keep this up.

You maybe have to decide if you want to pursue a relationship with this women, because it seems that issue is muddying the waters of what is going on between the two of you.

I hope you take this post in the gentle spirit in which it was intended, and I wish you health and happiness.

Kumo,

There is a quote from Thich Nhat Hanh who says that when you are having trouble attaching a certain emotion to a certain object to simply “remove the object”. There is the resentment, there is the fear – and then there is the object of that resentment and fear. These are two COMPLETELY separate things but your mind links them. I would suggest, for your own sake, to completely let go of this particular someone in order to go back to yourself and find out what this resentment means – without her being a part of the equation – without the “object”. There is nothing unreasonable about her time frame. She is establishing boundaries, and everyone’s boundaries are going to be different and even if they are not the same as your boundaries the boundaries of others must be respected in order for healthy relationships to proceed. Please, for your own sake, recognize your own obsession on this situation and with kindness release yourself from it. You do not need to rely on a particular response from someone to bring you peace of mind – to do so would be to control something that is COMPLETELY outside of your control. It is madness. But you can control how you respond to it – with work. And it may be a lot of work. It requires you to honestly look at yourself and take stock of what it is that you are looking to get from this relationship and to ask yourself if these are reasonable things to expect getting from someone. People need space and freedom in order to feel safe in a relationship and if you do not give this to them then it is you they will begin to resent. I have been on both sides of this situation many times – as I think most people have. And what I have found is that it is better, always better, to recognize obsession (that is, strong attachment to an outcome) and to relieve yourself the stress and burden of having to hang onto it. Let go, friend. Detach from this and experience your own freedom and give her the space and freedom. If you don’t – she will pull away – as she should – in order to give herself the space and freedom to exist within her own boundaries. I hear your own suffering in this situation. You are suffering because you are attached to a particular outcome. Let go, friend! Let go for your own sake and be a friend to yourself. You deserve it.

Be well – and be wary of excessive thinking. Inject some space into your mind – “breathing in, I know I am resentful – breathing out, I let go of the need to feel resentful” To continue this thread of thinking and attachment is to only cause yourself to suffer – and her possibly, more.

-J.D.