You sound deeply frustrated, and understandably so. You’re feeling pulled between a very important friendship and your educational/professional goals. That is a very tough spot to be in.
I’m curious to know if you have tried to talk to your friend about this. It seems to me that maybe you have not, since you indicated that you “don’t want to mean and tell her to knock it off.” If you haven’t yet spoken to her, I would encourage you to think about doing so. It isn’t “mean” to let a friend know what you need. Consider what you might want if the roles were reversed. If your behavior was making it difficult, or even impossible, for your friend to achieve something that was important to her, wouldn’t you want to know? You wouldn’t want to hinder the pursuit of her goals, would you? And if she was courageous enough to be honest with you, I imagine you would adjust your behavior and support her efforts.
Let her know how much you value her friendship and explain that, because you value it so much, you need to be honest about something that has been troubling you. Your assurance that she is important and valued might mitigate any rejection she feels after being asked to back off a little. Hopefully, she will respond by hearing you out and adjusting her behavior to be more supportive of your goals. Your requests are reasonable and appropriate. The worst-case scenario is that she doesn’t understand where you are coming from, takes your request very personally, and chooses to end the friendship. If your very reasonable request evokes such an unreasonable response, it might be time to question the quality of the friendship. If you can’t ask your best friend for support in achieving your goals, then how strong is the friendship? You probably know her well enough to predict how likely this worst-case scenario is.
You might also want to ask yourself why her needs seem to be more important than yours. Is this something that comes up often in your relationships? Do you have a tendency to put the needs, desires, and feelings of others over your own? Is this behavior detrimental to you? If you answered yes to those questions, it might be a good idea to work with a therapist on these issues. It’s possible that an underestimation of your self-worth might be impacting many areas of your life, and a therapist could be invaluable in helping you sort these things out.
Gathering the courage to talk to your friend and/or find your own therapist might take some time, and it seems like you might need some tangible solutions right now. From your brief note, I’m not clear on whether your work is academic or professional, or whether you work in an office or elsewhere. Either way, it might be useful to find some other location to do your work. For example, if this is happening in a college dorm room, try going to the library or a study lounge to do most of your work, and make plans to meet up with your friend after you finish working. If this is happening in a work setting, try working in a conference room or putting some headphones on at your desk to discourage chit-chat. You can still plan to have lunch together or spend some time together after work.
Finding a balance between work and relationships is a challenging task, but it is one that most of us have to deal with at various points in our lives. While this situation may be a bit overwhelming at the moment, it is also an opportunity for you to figure out what strategies work best for you in attaining this balance. You can add what works to your toolbox for the future and toss strategies that don’t work.
All the best,
Sarah
The preceding article was solely written by the author named above. Any views and opinions expressed are not necessarily shared by GoodTherapy.org.