Sometimes, you want to be kind to other people, and you (or me anyways) end up allowing them to chip away little pieces of you over time. They are small and cumulative, so you hardly notice. OR you respect or love someone so much that even though the pieces are BIG, you don’t notice the loss of yourself. Something else is distracting you: your love for them is front and center, and the loss of yourself is not. (And to be perfectly clear, when I say, “you,” I technically refer to my own lived experience. I just suspect this may be more of a universally human thing, not just me. Hence the collective “we.”)

I’ve let this happen more than once in the past. The example that most stands out to me is the ex I lived with in Austria. I had a tiny apartment I loved; he lived in a large one with a friend. Because I didn’t have housemates and he did, it was only logical that we’d spend time at my place rather than his. Gradually (but really pretty quickly), he’d bring over stuff and then leave it around. One day when he was at work, I happened to open a closet door, and I realized most of the stuff in the closet was his. Board games. Laundry. Random shit.

He had moved in with me! And I hadn’t even noticed. He may not have noticed either. I didn’t want to say anything because I didn’t want to embarrass him. At the same time, I very strongly believed that before living together with someone who is something other than a platonic friend, a (or many) conversation(s) need(s) to happen. At least back then: I had lived with plenty of people, including good friends, but not with someone who fell into the social category of “partner.” I was self-aware enough to know I didn’t want to live with a “partner” at that point in my life … not because of them, but because of me. I still needed time for just myself, in my own space. I wasn’t done having a “I’m renting my own apartment” experience.

Add to that, I would not have lived with ANYONE in this particular tiny apartment on a long-term basis. I worked from home, I had two large dogs, I loved my space and my alone time, and this apartment was way too small for an additional person. Especially someone who also occasionally works from home and wanted to get a dog too. Especially someone I hadn’t dated very long, and whose life rhythms were different than mine. If this was going to be a permanent living-together conversation, I’d want at the very least to make a plan, have both of us think of what obstacles we might run into, and talk them through before deciding whether we wanted to do this or not. I felt like our unawareness that the moving in had happened robbed me of the opportunity to have that thoughtful conversation. I didn’t speak up because back then, in my early 20ies, I still didn’t question the cultural myth that we MUST let the feelings of others matter the most to the extent I do today. Remember, I grew up in a tiny European country, in a small town, and the values this country, especially its small towns, are steeped in are community-oriented. I lived in the country’s capital and largest city, but those values were still with me—even though I didn’t believe in them

Eventually, I could not bear the constant proximity in the tiny space any more. We needed to either move apart and keep dating (that’s what I would have preferred) or move to a larger space together. Or I’d break up with him; it was only a question of time until I’d explode over a small thing and he wouldn’t know what had hit him. I still don’t know if I was just very good at keeping the peace and suffering silently, or he was really bad at recognizing all the things that annoyed me. Maybe a bit of both. On top of all that, I had a therapist who very much pushed me to stay sith him. I liked the therapist. I liked her sense of humor, the strength she projected and the way she put things into perspective. I learned a whole lot from her, but in this respect, she held me back. She framed me making myself small and not speaking up when I disagreed with him as self-growth. I believed her for a long time. I wanted to self-grow. When I shared things about his constant presence I struggled with, she recognized our fundamental differences, and painted it as a most excellent learning and growth opportunity for me to (I rephrase) squeeze my own mind into acceptance.

When we were at the choice point of moving apart and continuing dating or moving to a bigger space together, I knew beyond a doubt that I wanted to do the first thing: move apart. Just undo the mistake that had happened by accident. But I loved the guy and didn’t want to hurt him. The therapist thought we should live together. I wasn’t convinced. I asked a trusted friend for advice rather than just doing what I wanted. I shared the two options I had come up with and that I strongly preferred the living-apart one because I felt like we had not had enough time just dating. I asked my friend, did they think he could take it if I explained both options and then said, I’d really like for us to just live apart again?

My friend shut me down. They said he would take it as a rejection; it would destroy my relationship; if I really felt the need to, I should bring up moving apart, but I should definitely not say that I preferred it.

I was sure he’d pick the other option if I simply presented both: living together in a bigger space. Which I felt like I could manage because I liked him a lot and did want to keep dating. But living together really was not what I wanted at this point in my life. At all. I trusted that the therapist knew better than I did, and I trusted that friend even though I disliked their advice. I presented both options objectively an let him choose.

It went the way I foresaw: he picked living together in a larger place (probably didn’t even take the other suggestion seriously), and that’s what we did.

I ended the relationship a year and a half after we had moved to the bigger place. I realized: what my friend had said back in the day? It was TERRIBLE advice. Not only was it terrible for me (never advise your friends to do something they genuinely don’t want to do! It makes you a misguided friend at best and a terrible one at worst.) It was also insulting to my partner in that it rested on the assumption that his ego wouldn’t be able to take me kindly explaining that I loved him and wanted to keep being with him, but didn’t want to live together. It robbed him of the opportunity to show me that he was an emotionally mature, self-confident adult who could handle a genuine conversation.

I don’t know what he would have done. If the relationship had ended then and there, it would have spared us 1.5 years of intermittent misery. And if it didn’t end, we probably would have broken up either way eventually, but without the need to deal with a home neither of us could afford the rent for on our own. My hard boundary would have caused us to live apart and slow way down … maybe even making room for possibilities other than breaking up. Any break-up would have been a lot less stressful because our lives would have been less entangled. We could have supported each other through it rather than getting sidetracked by how we could get rid of the place we were renting together and where we’d each go to live now (me: Thailand. He: stayed in the same place and was married to someone else 2 months later.)

It took me a few more rodeos to learn to say stop. (Single-event learning? Not me! I need to touch the stove a couple times until I believe it’s really hot.) Even now, I still get carried away … of course I do. It’sfundamentally human to get carried away by emotions sometimes if we allow ourselves to feel. I hope I’ll always be able to allow myself to feel. But when I realize I do get carried away, I will now (a decade later) stop, I will think of the kindest way I am able to communicate my own flaws of being a human who gets carried away, and I will not let things get to the point of living-together-hell. (Literally or metaphorically.) It’s about me, not about you. I appreciate you; I don’t want to live with you. It’s not about being flexible. It’s about being true to what I need. I know what I need better and better every year of my life, and it sure as hell is not living with someone I don’t want to live with. I may never want to live with anyone. Having my own space, and friends who come and hang or stay for a while now and then, is perfect for me. The bar of actually wanting to share a space with a partner (who by definition expects more than just cohabitation) is EXTREMELY high because it would have to feel net better than living by myself.

Recently, I was faced with a different kind of conundrum that brought up all this reminiscing you’ve been reading about. I’m new in a place I’m moving to. It’s a different culture. I want to live here. I’m an anarchist; I believe the idea of nation states and nuclear families is deeply flawed, and I strongly want everyone to be able to live wherever they want and however they want. At the same time, I recognize the reality we live in, and I recognize the place I ended up picking for myself happens to be inside a community that shares a certain culture. My preference would be it being in the middle of nowhere … but it’s not. I didn’t find a truly middle-of-nowhere place I could afford that had the kind of climate I like.

I’m still a guest, a newcomer, to the community. I don’t share the values of the community, but I appreciate and respect them. I don’t want to poleaxe them. The people around me have been extremely nice and helpful. That has been wonderful! I’m a helpful person too. I believe community (my definition of it is different than that of most people, but for the sake of simplicity, let’s just call it all community) is important. I’m someone you can call if your house is on fire, and I’ll run into the building to help you get your grandma out, burns to my skin or no burns. I’ll lend you my couch if you lose your home. I’ll cook you eggs if you’re out of gas. I’ll buy you food if you can’t afford it and give you money if you need some. OF COURSE. I’ll cancel other appointments and help you find your dog, your kid or your horse if they are lost; I’ll help you look all day and all night. I won’t charge you for help with your dog if you can’t afford it. All of these things are OF COURSE things to me; matter of fact; no questions asked.

I’d like my neighbors to know this because one or more of these things are bound to happen sometime, and I want them to know they can count on me. Because it DOES make a difference, and because I love this kind of human connection.

Now, there are also many things I very much am not, and that at the same time happen to be part of the community culture around here: I can’t stand smalltalk in my own space unless I’m extremely relaxed and haven’t talked to another human being in days. While I’m happy engaging in smalltalk in public as I’m waiting for my orange juice, I don’t like spending my free time drinking gaseosas, beer or tinto with my neighbors, or simply standing around and talking and joking for minutes at a time. Minutes I could use for other things, like lying under a tree in peace. I don’t appreciate people stopping and honking anytime they drive past to encourage me to come down and chat. I downright hate people coming over uninvited and without calling first. I don’t like people calling me to ask me to come have a drink with them. I don’t like getting cold calls at all, even from my friends. There’s a reason doG invented texting. It allows us to schedule calls rather than get surprised by them. In a sentence: I dislike most things my neighbors do all the time.

I’m picky when it comes to my friends. I’m not going to be your friend just because you live next to me … I’m going to be your friend because we have a connection that is meaningful to both of us, no matter where in the world you are. I’ll help you if you need me to because you live next to me. That doesn’t make us friends. I’ll also help you (if I can) if I don’t know you and I’ll never see you again. I believe we, qua humans, should all help each other out anytime we can, and I see this as completely independent from friendship or smalltalk.

Now here’s my conundrum: I’m a newcomer. Everyone wants to make smalltalk with me (and set me up with someone Colombian because dude, the societal expectation is that everyone wants a mate. That, too, isn’t true for me at this point in my life, but I’ll let that one slide for now.) What I don’t want to establish is a pattern of stopping by and talking. Especially when I’ve been busy and finally have time off, and I’m home, the LAST thing I want is to talk to a neighbor. I want to lie in the grass with my dogs and talk to no one. That’s how I recharge. That’s how I am able to show up fully and genuinely when I am needed, and that’s how I’m able to stop and help out a stranger I’ll never see again: because I recharge. And I recharge alone, or with my closest friends. I don’t recharge with my neighbors, and I certainly don’t recharge going places to have a drink, being honked at or smalltalking.

My instinct is to just explain to folks who approach me:

“I super appreciate your friendliness and welcoming-ness. It shows me that you want me here and see me as one of you! Thank you!

I also want you to know that you can count on me. If you need me—this is my number; you know where I live. Just ask; I’ll help where I can, no questions asked!

Also also, here’s a little bit about me. I recognize I’m new and you’re curious about me. I’m a loner and happy that way. Feel free to chuck it up to my background culture causing me to be weird. My dream space to live would be in the middle of nowhere, no neighbors. I strongly dislike smalltalk. I want to spend my free time by myself, with my dogs or with my closest friends. I don’t enjoy fence-talking.

That part? Not personal at all. It’s entirely about me. It’s a boundary that matters to me and that I’d like to be respected. Please let me know if there’s any boundary you’d like me to respect, too! I appreciate frank, direct conversation. Over and out.”

So this is my instinct. I trust my gut instinct for the most part: when I don’t listen to it, things tend to blow up in my face. See also: that ex in Austria. But I’m in a new country, so I ran it by a close European friend (note: not the one who had given me bad advice about my ex) and a Colombian friend who is familiar with both European and Colombian culture. Both of them were like, we totally get it, but it may be a bit much for the people living in rural Colombia. They might think you’re a jerk. Take a golden middle type approach. Be pragmatic! Meet them occasionally. Use the “different culture” or “busy” excuse at other times.

I hear it. I can logically follow the arguments. They don’t sit right with me thought. I don’t want to use excuses. I want to live in a world where people are capable of understanding individual differences (be they cultural or idiosyncratic) and go with them. I want to live in a world where I get to be a loner who absolutely will always be reliable when it matters. I don’t know if we actually do live in this world. But hearing the feedback, thinking back on past experiences of letting little pieces of what makes me me get chipped away … I’m not comfortable doing this anymore. I want to be authentically me, not hide behind excuses. If people are offended at first, so be it, but I truly believe people, unless they have a fragile ego, are able to understand that me being me is not about them.

I’m not going to squeeze myself into little boxes that are convenient or what people are used to. I find the local community lovely. And I don’t want to participate in it. These are not contradictions. I won’t disrupt local customs, and I’ll still be me, doing life my own way.

I’ll write down my thoughts, and put that piece of paper with my bullet points in my pocket, and anytime the invitation for a drink or the honking or the wanting to visit comes up … I’ll take out my list, smile and explain.

Assimilation is the chipping away of pieces I’m not willing to let go of. I won’t do it. I’m going to be respectful, kind and helpful. I’ll make my boundaries known and respected, and I will enforce them.

I won’t be like my parents who kept accepting giant chocolate Easter bunnies out of politeness, even though no one would eat them, and saying thank you so much that the next year, the chocolate Easter bunnies would be even larger and more plentiful, and now they have a house full of expired chocolate Easter bunnies. I don’t want a house full of expired chocolate Easter bunnies. Considering my friends’ opinions helped me see that.

~~~

When I started writing this post, I hadn’t yet had to explain myself to a neighbor. Now that I’m finishing it, I have. And it went well. The person—someone who had been very insistent on spending time together—understood and wasn’t insulted. We can all be adults here. We can live in a world where many worlds fit. And that’s the only world I’m interested in living in.

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In other news,

since I forgot to mention these news to you last time:

My online content has a new home now! My first course, Calling All Dogs (an updated version of what used to be on FDSA) just made it on Tyler Muto’s Consider The Dog platform! It’s available as part of the membership as well as an individual purchase. One thing I like about this platform: CTD doesn’t create artificial scarcity. Everything is ALWAYS available, not creating the “need” to purchase something “right now.” Check it out! I’m still finding my way around there myself, and getting to know my fellow trainers via their huge course library. More content of mine? Coming soon!