I usually like to keep things to myself. Especially if I think it will make someone upset, but I keep hearing this same thing over and over in different settings, and I think this is a lesson that we should have basically learned by now. I do want to say that sure, there are probably some people who are 'exclusive' and don't really want to be friendly with others. However, in my experience, people are nice to people who are nice.
I know. It's a revelation.
Let me term this in the ways I have been hearing it recently. If you are in a group of people, and they aren't really talking to you, you need to step out and say something. Like comment on the weather, or clothes, or shoes, or hair, or any of the millions of things that women talk about. I would be willing to bet that 99.999999% of the time, people weren't talking to you because...wait for it...you weren't talking either.
I am a fairly introverted person. I could spend a whole day, alone, at home, and not talk to anyone or be around people and be beyond happy. I don't naturally start conversations. I am not super loud and aggressive in making friends. I had a really hard time in school because I am not that person. That super funny, outgoing, cutesy person. And I didn't really like those super outgoing, loud, funny people.
I have learned, however, through many years of feeling left out and not wanted, that if you want to have a lot of friends, or feel included in all the friend 'groups' that naturally happen, you have to be friendly. That's right. Pull up your big girl panties here. If you want to have friends, you have to be a friend.
Don't hate me, ok?
But all the people that I see complaining about 'cliques' or about how certain women are just friends with each other, and they are never part of the group, have excluded themselves. Literally. I have yet to actually met a group of women, that aren't willing to add another to their crowd. And believe me, I am more often than not, on the outside of the crowd. And I can let myself get my feelings hurt, and think how mean and awful those women are, OR I can walk into the group and join the conversation.
Is it comfortable? NO! It's awful for a few minutes. What if no one talks to me, or if they just keep talking to each other?!
But that hasn't happened yet. Sure, I have to try, I have to go beyond what is comfortable for me. I have to make the effort to join the conversation. I think more often, women just expect to be included, and when that may not happen, they get their big girl panties all twisted up, and start labeling groups of women.
And that makes me a little nuts. Because, as someone who is a part of all these different groups, I hear it from all sides. I hear that certain women just aren't talking to anyone anymore, and then I hear the same woman complain that everything is awful, people are terrible, and how she hates cliques.
Or, I see a group of women who 'hates cliques' become the most exclusive set I have ever seen. And you want to know the part that is a little funny to me? I am some how able to be parts of all these groups...
Because I...again, wait for...go out on a limb and talk to people. If you wait for everyone to come to you, you will be lonely for a long time. And sure, some people are way more shallow than others, and maybe you don't want to be best pals with them, but don't start labeling everyone before you make the effort. And if you have made the effort, do it again. And again.
Or you could just resign yourself to the fact that maybe you won't be friends with everyone, and that it doesn't really matter.
But please stop complaining about these groups that naturally happen. No one is being purposefully exclusive. No one is out to get you. Stop being so self-involved and go make a friend. Everyone is just as self-conscious as you, and feels just as awkward. Or maybe they don't. Some of my closest friends are the loud, funny, annoying-er-endearing people that I would NEVER have been friends with before. I have learned lots from them.
So chill. The sky's not falling. People aren't purposefully being excluded. If you want to be involved in the conversation, go join it.
