Chapter 13 - Relationships with Friends

Relationships with Friends

Friendship - "A voluntary relationship characterized by intimacy and liking." (Ch. 13, Pg. 335)

Friendship Rules - "General principles for appropriate communication and behavior within friendships."  (Ch. 13, Pg. 366)

I consider myself to have amazing friendships, so much so that even though my friend group has for the most part moved from each other. I tend to find enough out of these relationships I don't need new friendships, but I'm still always open to new friends.

My friends are all a part of a group, we all met in Caroline County, grew up together, and consider each other family. My friend's names are Kentrell, Aiden, Rahim, Josh, Jay, RJ, Cadell, Brendon, Devonne, Isiah, Hayden, Jack, Nick, Chris B, Chris W, Kennedy, Mandy, Justin, and Hassanatou. 

I never knew about the 10 friendship rules until this class. We all follow those rules effortlessly and share common interests, and humor.

 I would say Rule #1, Show Support, is the rule we use the most. We all grew up together, so we all know each other's families and know what everyone is going through. Naturally, we all show support to the best of our abilities. 

Having such a big but close group of friends is amazing, we all get together and do things. There's nothing but love between us, of course, we fight and argue, but doesn't every friendship reach that point sooner or later. 

We may have differences but we look past them and it allows all of us to become better for ourselves and each other. 

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Chapter 12 - Relationships with Family Members

Relationships with Family Members

Family - "A network of people who share their lives over long periods of time and are bound by marriage, blood, or commitment" (Ch. 12, Pg. 327)

Laissez-Fair Families - "Families characterized by low levels of conformity and conversation orientation," (Ch. 12, Pg. 336)

I would describe my family as a laissez-fair family. We really don't communicate or conform with each other.

I live in a household where we all do our own things and only come together occasionally. It's like having co-tenets, you all live under the same roof but you all have your own lives. We all, for the most part, have good relationships with each other individually.

My family life could be summed up like this. I wake up get ready, go to school, come home, do homework, and make food. while I'm making food is really the only time I communicate with my family, my mom is usually on the couch, and my dads sitting at his desk. They ask me how my day is, I ask the same and then I go back to my room. I communicate with my sister infrequently too, it just depends if either one of us has something they want to tell the other. We even have a roommate, my mom's best friend's daughter. Her best friend moved to Florida, so she pays rent to live with us. I end up talking to her more than my family most days.

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Chapter 11 - Relationships with Romantic Partners

 Relationships with Romantic Partners

Romantic Relationship - "An interpersonal involvement two people choose to enter into that is perceived as romantic by both" (Ch. 11, Pg. 291) 

Loving - "An intense emotional commitment based on intimacy, caring, and attachment" (Ch. 11, Pg. 289)

I've been in a couple of romantic relationships, although they've never worked out for one reason or the other. I would describe them as loving at first, but they've all ended the same way. I've been ghosted more than I can count at this point, so I really haven't tried too much to begin another one.  

My last serious romantic relationship was really interesting, to say the least. I'm going to refer to this person as C. Me and C started off amazing, we were getting along great. Met each other's parents, talked every day, and even hung out really frequently. 

Around the 4-month mark, C started to act somewhat differently. She began to start responding slower, responding less, calling less, and even making up excuses to not hang out. I thought I was doing something wrong or maybe I was the one acting differently, I was not! 

Me, C, a couple of her and I friends were hanging out one day. I noticed she was hanging out with one of my friends, whom I'm going to refer to as K. I'm very observant when it comes to others' feelings and actions, so when I saw it I knew something was off. While I was there, C decided to ride in Ks' car. So when my best friend Kentrell, not to be confused with K, got in my car I talked to him about it. He said something was definitely up, later that night I talked to Cs' best friend who I was already really close with. She said not to worry about it.

Sadly, Kentrell and I were not crazy and Cs' best friend didn't even know. Turns out K and C had been hanging out behind my back. The craziest thing about it though was I got told about this 4 days before prom and 6 days before my birthday, so it was a great week. So not only was I going through a breakup on my birthday, I was kind of forced to bring this girl to prom.

I believe in love, but I really don't think I'm going to give it a chance for a while. Not to say if It comes around I will just avoid it.

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Chapter 14 - Relationships in the Workplace

Relationships in the Workplace

Workplace Relationships - "Any affiliation you have with a professional peer, supervisor, subordinate, or mentor in a professional setting." 

When in a workplace, relationships are bound to happen. What type of relationship really determines how it influences your workspace and productivity. Work acquaintances should add a nice social aspect, but not obstruct your work detrimentally. Work Friends will make you want to go to work, and make working more plateable, but they could start causing obstructions and distractions which make you less productive. Finally, Romantic work relationships can be manageable but cause serious pitfalls for the individuals involved. If the relationship becomes tainted, toxic, and/or fails, both parties can and/or will experience major obstructions and distractions in the workplace; along with a reluctance to work or stay at the workplace. 

I understand and have experienced why relationships are formed within the workplace. Being placed within a certain set of tasks, a certain number of days a week, and for a certain time period with peers, causes us to communicate and form bonds.

At my current job, platonic relationships are encouraged and rewarded. When a new hire is introduced, we can get free meals, rewards, and paid breaks if we make them feel accepted in the workplace.

I find myself connecting and appreciating the people I work with more because making or having friends in my workplace is not shunned. Surprisingly, this minuscule and rare aspect of my employers improves my motivation to go to work.  I find myself not contemplating ways to depart abruptly or neglecting to work altogether. We're part of what feels like a huge friend group, not just around acquaintances at work. 

Workplace relationships inject qualitative elements into the work environment that can increase engagement, motivation, productivity, and satisfaction; with a balanced platonic relationship.

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Chapter 10 - Managing Conflict and Power

Managing Conflict and Power 

Conflict - "The process that occurs when people perceive that they have incomplete goals or that someone is interfering in their ability to achieve their objectives." (Ch. 10, Pg. 259)

Power - "The ability to influence or control events and people." (Ch. 10, Pg. 240)

Collaboration - " A way of handling conflict by treating it as a mutual problem-solving challenge."                                                                                                                                      (Ch. 10, Pg. 269)

Accommodation - "A way of handling conflict in which one person abandons his or her goals for the goals of another." (Ch.10, Pg. 267) 

When communicating interpersonally, whether verbally and/or nonverbally, encountering conflict is destined. Individually we think, perceive, react, and respond to certain actions, subjects, and emotions differently. Depending on multiple elements and causes of interference, varying degrees of conflict might arise.   

Collaboration is one of the main effective forms of conflict management, allowing depression and resolving said conflict. When collaborating each party comes to an agreement that is suitable for each side, allowing for a cease in conflict. 

I find I have a collaborative and/or accommodating mindset when it comes to conflict; I tend to be very passive in most situations. 

During the summer, my friends Kentrell, Aiden, Brendon, Rahim, and I would hang out nearly daily. The only issue with this was the distance we live from each other due to moving. Kentrell and Aiden live 40 minutes from Caroline, while Brendon, Rahim, and I live in Caroline. 

So Aiden and Kentrell were upset that they had to drive 40 minutes to and back from Caroline nearly every day. This caused conflict on why they had to use so much gas and we didn't. 

So we all collaborated on a solution to their issue, and we picked a dedicated car to use for that day and/or event. Along with cooperative donations of gas money for said person's car.

Because we collaborated we solved the conflict smoothly and quickly and avoid any further issues involving gas.

 

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