Pushers and Leechers

A friend of mine found it quite simple to categorize men. She would say that they are either fun or boring. The fun ones are less than responsible; the boring ones are very responsible, but don't ask them to be fun. I thought it was funny, but I don't usually subscribe to such a generalization. However, I am going to contradict myself with the following post.

Today, I want to talk about two types of people I have frequently come across in my life: the pushers and the leechers. I don't really have any leechers left in my life (let me check...nope, I think I got rid of all of them). But, there are many pushers still left in my close circle of family and friends.

If you're wondering what I mean by these names, let me explain. A leecher is a person (friend or not) who just sucks the life right out of you. The darkness and self pity they live in is so strong that it just takes all the happy energy from everyone around them. In my early 20s I had a friend like that. Even when I think of her now, all I see is this type of gray veil surrounding her. Now, I don't mean to say that she is a bad person. She is not. But, she was a toxic person...at least for my type of personality.

The pusher is a person (friend or not) that pushes their way into your life. They are bossy, strong-willed and try to get you to do what they want, see life through their eyes and basically live your life the way they think is right. Balls to those people! They really irritate me. I have a friend who is that way. She's a great person (I can attest to that), but her behavior is very invasive. That also means that she is a toxic person...again, at least for my type of personality.

Now, what I have learned is that you have to hold onto your "self" when your dealing with a leechers. Their "vacuum cleaner" personality is already turned on. You just have to hold on to something and wait for them to leave. In my case, I've never really had a problem with this type of personality. I just stuck around for a while, listened to them, and went on my way.

My problem has always been the pusher. With pushers, you HAVE to have strong, almost immovable boundaries. It's like you're the goalie, and they are going to try to score anyway they can...even if it's with a cheap shot (hope you're all following my metaphor). Boundaries are one of my weak spots. I never know if setting limits is a good thing or if I'm just being mean and unreasonable. (Seriously, I am working on it!) Unfortunately, I have this nagging certainty that once I truly learn to set boundaries, these types of people will just vanish from my life (or in the worst of cases, I will learn how to deal with them in a healthy way).

How about you guys? Have you met a leecher or pusher you just can't shake? Any other type of people who frequently show up in life (good or bad)? I'd really like to know, so feel free to comment. :)

Re-vamping

After much thought, I have decided to change the direction of my blog. As you can see in the blog description (in the header), I no longer subscribe to "a blog about crafts & life". Don't get me wrong, I still love crafts. I do consider myself to be, for the most part, a craftsman. I like making things with my hands, I love cooking, baking, etc. But, I realized that that's not what this blog was "supposed" to be about.

Without knowing it (or rather, failing to admit it to myself), the main purpose of this blog was to talk about myself and how I've managed to build my life even if (especially because) it's not quite how I imagined it would be when I was kid.

Lately, I've been reminded about something my high school director said to me. I used to compete in extemporaneous speech, and I wasn't great at it. But, I did manage to do some damage especially when I got a topic that I was passionate about. Once he told me that he knew exactly what rounds I would do well in when he got a chance to look at the topics. "The environment? Oh, yeah, Pini's going to knock this one out of the park." And (as much as I hated to admit it) he was right.

The greatest lesson I think that I learned from that is that life is easy, pleasurable and satisfying when you follow your heart. Well, lately I haven't been following my heart, and that has been a bummer. So, that's one of the reasons (maybe the only one or at least the most important one) that motivated my changing the course of this blog.

I hope that those of you following me and those of you who stumble upon this blog are not taken aback by this change. Trust me when I say: it was a change that needed to be made :) and I'm quite certain that it will actually make me want to blog more frequently. So, until next time!