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In my immediate circle of friends, there is one person that has a tendency to invite herself to whatever events/happenings we have planned. In a group of friends as big as mine, there is a natural tendency for factions of the group to plan smaller things (dinner, shopping, etc) for those who they are closest with in the group rather than for all the friends. Everyone knows that the bigger the group is the more difficult it is to plan something that everyone wants to do, so we hang out in our smaller “factions” for the most part. This person, however, just doesn’t quite get that and tends to show up at any given time unannounced, unexpected, and sometimes unwanted.

In terms of family, I have an extended family member who has a habit of inviting himself to outings my immediate family plans, such as going out to the movies or dinner. It doesn’t even have to be a formally planned outing; he’s often come over just to hang out and watch TV or eat a home-cooked meal (my mother is a great cook). I know he’s family, but I still find it a little weird that he’ll just invite himself to come over, particularly if there’s nothing planned. It’s not like my family is an exciting host as more often than not each of us are preoccupied with our own agendas and can’t afford to divert attention to guests!

I’ve always been particularly cautious of inviting myself to events/places because I know I’m not always happy to see others who have invited themselves. It places everyone in an awkward situation: the people who didn’t invite the person, and the person who might not be welcome but still showed up anyway. And even though I’ve had somewhat uncomfortable encounters with people who just show up and assume I will be flattered with their presence, I still have yet to find a strategy to handle that type of situation. I’ve no issue on calling out people on misjudgments, but I know the people I am with do have problems with doing that so a much subtler, more low-key way of handling it is needed.

Question of the Week: How do you handle people that have invited themselves to an event? Do you think that it is appropriate for one to do so, or does it make you feel uncomfortable?

In the two months of 2010 that have passed, I think I’ve learned more about how to detoxify my life than I did in the last eighteen years.

Gone are traitorous best friends. Gone are dirty lying ex-boyfriends that waffle between wanting to transition into becoming friends after the breakup and getting back together. Gone are all the relationships in my life that I have been hanging onto for far too long without practical reason.

I am a strong and independent woman who deserves care, respect, and honesty. If the people in my life can’t give me those things, then I don’t see why I should keep them around.

I know who I am, I know what I want, and I know how I want to live my life. If I hang onto all of these relationships that cause me nothing but pain and hurt and hold me back from achieving my full potential, I am not going to get anywhere in life.

I can’t let that happen. I won’t let that happen.

It’s time for me to finally free myself from the boundaries my ex-friends and ex-boyfriends have managed to set for me post-friendship/relationship breakup and cut them out of my life. I need to detoxify from the poisonous effects of maintaining relationships with these people. I refuse deal with other people’s crap anymore for the sake of sentimental reasons; it’s time to be practical and move on.

While many of the guesses as to what happened were very creative, none of them were actually close to the mark. But a common theme was the language ability of myself and the three boys, so I should say that I, as well as the boys, all have an intermediate working knowledge of Mandarin.

I’m not sure how well I will tell this story seeing as there’s a bit of a backstory to explain, but I’ll do my best. It’s also quite convoluted and bizarre!

Next year, I want to study abroad in Beijing on a year-long program. I have three guy friends that, as of now, are also planning on participating in the program. Two of the three (Boy 1 and Boy 2) will only be studying abroad in Beijing in the fall, while the other (Boy 3) is also going to be there for a year. Boy 1 and Boy 2 are friends and I have known them since the first day of Chinese class freshman year. Boy 3 does not know the other boys and I have only known him since the beginning of this semester.

In the Beijing study abroad program, there are two options for study: a regular track or a language immersion track. In the regular track, you take classes taught in English about Chinese history, politics, economics, etc. In addition, you can take a Chinese language course on top of the English-taught classes. In the language immersion track, you only study Chinese. It’s an intensive program that really focuses on learning and using the language; students in the program usually are housed together and pledge to speak only Chinese during the course of the immersion. This pledge might interfere with how social immersion students are with the regular students as it has the potential to create a language barrier depending on the individuals’ level of spoken Chinese.

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