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LifeQuake™
Ask the LifeQuake™ Doctor
Dr. Toni Galardi
Dear Dr. Toni:
I just moved to a new city and feel completely lost. Although I am still in close contact with a few of my old friends, I am having trouble making new friends here. The strange thing is people are very friendly in San Diego, which is why I moved here. However, when I meet people and follow up with emails or phone calls, often they don’t call back. I have never had a problem making new friends before and I have started over three times.Do you have any suggestions as to what to do to develop a community?
City Transplant in the Harbor
Dear City Transplant:
I know it is a huge adjustment when you move to a new city. You don’t say how long ago you moved but I would say that sometimes our bodies and psyche need time to integrate this big transition. Often things we want, like new friends, don’t appear right away. I suggest giving yourself time alone to experience San Diego. Call the Chamber of Commerce. They can provide some suggestions for activities or places of interest to visit.
Further, there is an umbrella organization called Meetup.com that has about seven hundred different organizations that gather in the San Diego area. There will most probably be groups with similar interests to your own. Just as one may have to kiss a lot of frogs before finding a prince, you may have to go to a lot of meetings before you find kindred souls, but you will if you persevere and do not give up. You may also consider starting your own group if there is a particular thing you have an interest in that is not listed on Meetup.com. They will add your group to their list free of charge. One more suggestion: don’t follow up with someone you have just met via email. I have personally discovered that often my emails have gone into the spam filter of new contacts and my messages were never received. Be bold; call people twice if you have to. If they still don’t call you back, you don’t want them as friends anyway. Good luck!
Dear Dr. Toni:
My husband left me for another woman and moved in with her immediately. I am having difficulty getting over my anger because it has been a costly divorce. He is paying a fraction of what I am paying for rent now. We don’t have any children but I still can’t seem to move on even though I know it is the answer to my peace. I have continued to be in communication with him because I have wanted our separation to be amicable but at times he says something that infuriates me and I just lose it. I was in the middle of editing a book I’ve been writing and have been unable to go back to it. The creative juice is gone. Please, Dr. Toni, I want to move on but I seem unable to, despite my best intentions. Can you help?
Torched in Maui
Dear Torched:
Remember, the opposite of love is not hate; it is indifference and at the bottom of rage is hurt. You still love him and are infuriated with yourself that in spite of how much he betrayed you, you still have feelings for him. Continuing to have contact with him is not allowing the wound in your heart to heal. I suggest you cut off all contact with him for six months, and then if you still want to be his friend, test the water. See if he makes you angry; if he doesn’t, then you are ready to be his friend. If not, then give it a year and do the same thing until you reach a place of detachment.
In the meantime, go back over the entire relationship and evaluate what you learned from it. What would you do differently and what about it made you grow as a person? Then do a ceremony of releasing him and all expectations you have of him and when you think of him, turn the thoughts of anger into gratitude. Send him thoughts of love and gratitude and eventually the fire of rage will become the fire of transformation. Hold this thought for yourself every day, “ I am a stronger, more loving person for having known (fill in the blank with his name).”