I'm cleaning out my Facebook "friendships" and it feels good.

Yesterday I went out with my mom, sister, and aunt. Later, Stephen and my aunt's boyfriend joined us. At some point we got to talking about Facebook and my aunt said that she finds Facebook is just like high school all over again--people trying to be popular again by forming "faux" friendships, as she called them. In my generation, Facebook doesn't seem nearly that drama-infused, although I did agree with her about faux friendships.

I had my own reasons for adding high school classmates that I probably wouldn't really become friends with. I was trying to make up for who I was in high school. I was extremely withdrawn in high school, terrified of anybody who wasn't a Christian, terrified of making friends with anybody I didn't know was a Christian. I'd heard way, way, way, way, way too much about peer pressure to smoke, cuss, drink, do drugs and have sex, things I had vowed to myself never, ever, ever to do, and I figured the only surefire way to never give into the pressure to do any of those things was to avoid the pressure to do them, which meant avoiding people who would pressure me, which meant avoiding people altogether because I was never sure who would try and who wouldn't.

You could say I had some self-esteem problems. :T

Anyway. After I graduated from high school, grew up a little and realized how ridiculous all that avoiding people was, I was just pummeled with regret. I started adding high school classmates right and left, hoping that somehow I could get up the courage to explain to EVERYBODY I attended school with why I had never tried to be friends with them. But the courage to do so never comes, because those people never, ever knew what was going on in my head, and they would probably think I was really strange for all of a sudden coming out and saying, "I'm sorry I never attempted to be friends with you in high school. I was afraid you'd talk me into stuff I didn't want to do." Right. That'll fly real well.

Anyway, on the drive back from dinner and shopping with everybody, I was listening to the John Tesh radio show, and he started talking about how we, as a society, strive to "keep our options open" by never closing doors, "just in case." (Man, the way I put that wouldn't translate at ALL across languages...) I'm not sure exactly what he said, but what I heard was, By keeping all these "faux friendships" on Facebook open, I'm not committing to the real friendships that ARE in my life. I'm wasting time regretting my past, browsing Facebook pages, and hoping that one day I'll get up enough courage to explain myself to every single one of those people. I should end some of those faux friendships and bring closure and resolution to my past.

It was so cool, because the instant the idea hit me, I felt myself starting to let go. It fit so perfectly that I knew that was exactly what I needed to do. So I'm cleaning out my Facebook friendships that are "dead end doors," which is a phrase John Tesh used. I'm also writing very short explanatory notes (that I will not send) to the people I'm ending Facebook friendships with. I'm writing them on a separate D-land journal I've kept, which I will also be deleting when this is over. It holds a part of my past in it that I need to close the door on as well.

Here is the link to the article on John Tesh's website:

Do You Have A Hard Time Making Choices?

I'm not ending Facebook friendships with any of my faithful D-land readers. Love you all. :)

-Stephanie

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