My Non-Buddhist Friends

GentleJanet

My girlfriends and I love to chit-chat. We 'vent' to one another about negativity in our life which includes relationships, the general public, fellow-drivers, TV personalities, among others. I am ashamed to admit that, but its all true. It actually makes us feel better to vent and not be judged. Now that I have decided to embrace Buddhism, how can I still connect with my girlfriends when they call me up for 'therapy', since I want to practice right thoughts and right speech?

karasti

You can listen to them without contributing your own words. Also, evaluate whether something is actually important enough in your life to warrant the time and energy that goes into speaking negatively about it. As the saying goes, if you can do something, then do it. If you can't, then why dwell on it? It's actually very liberating to give up on some of those habitual practices I still hang out with friends who vent about similar topics. Sometimes, I can turn it around in a more positive manner, or add my more positive viewpoint (depends on the topic of course) and sometimes I just ignore it and let them do what they feel they need to do. Sometimes topics are just that difficult where you can't help but vent, because maybe you are doing what you can to fix it but that doesn't make it not difficult in the mean time. But just stopping enough to realize what you are doing, and why, is a huge step in deciding to continue or not. Chances are, you'll find you and your friends have plenty to talk about without having to focus on negativity. More interesting topics come up when I started to look past what it added to my life to criticize Matt Lauer or the person who just cut me off (who knows, maybe they are in that much of a hurry, maybe they didn't see me...I know I've done it by mistake and when I do I hope the person realizes it was an accident).

GentleJanet

Thanks for the helpful comment. I appreciate you giving me some ideas in how to deal with these situations. I will keep them in mind.

fivebells

Learn the basics of Rogerian psychotherapy. Most crisis hotlines teach it to their volunteers. It is essentially a compassion practice.

It's probably also worth noting that you don't have to give everything up at once. Once you see the damage those conversations are doing to your state of mind (perhaps you already do) they will be easier to give up, and the social consequences will be easier to face.