I have a very poor relationship with social media. Despite being intellectually gifted, there are things I have never been able to comprehend, such as forex trading, cryptocurrency and, well, social media.

When I was in high school, I distinctly remember telling my best friend that I was afraid I’d never adapt to it. And maybe because I had a preconceived notion about it, I wound up rejecting the ability to stay too involved with it (that’s an honest truth to admit out loud).

However, there are posts and creators who stand out to me, whose content I find myself closely relating with.

Sarah Akinterinwa is one of them. Her animated slides stir conversations on and amplify messages of emotional awareness, maturity and growth. And to hit home as closely as possible, she draws from deeply personal experiences.

Last week, she portrayed a young woman’s train of thought as she’s undergoing a distressful internal conflict about no longer enjoying the company she’s with.

One of the thought statements that resounded with me was, “Do I force myself into the version of me they met years ago?” Which felt eerily familiar to a feeling that burdened me for a couple of years.

GROWING PAINS

There are a few things about adulting that I was not prepared for: How to support your parents when they grieve their parents; financial literacy and prudence; and how to healthily move on from relationships (primarily friendships) that have reached their expiry date.

Moving on from friendships that I no longer feel aligned with has never come easy to me, and I partially attribute that to my sentimental nature. As a sensitive person who remains attuned to the energies of others and the world around me, any kind of loss causes me a physical reaction.

There came a time when I was finally ready to accept the change that I had been stuck in a stalemate with for many seasons (being stubborn is a double-edged sword).

In quick succession, I also started to feel, somewhere within my gut, that I was growing distant from the tribe I had grown to cherish for the better part of my late teenage years and early to mid-twenties.

Hearing “I miss when you used to…” started to get stale and made me feel as though I was being restricted to a version of myself whom I was blossoming beyond.

I understand what it feels like to miss how someone was and how they made you feel, and I miss older versions of myself. But nostalgia shouldn’t be a reason to regress.

One morning, after a weekend of being in their company, I woke up with a literal heavy heart, my chest felt tight and sadness enveloped me and embraced me wholly, making me believe that heartache exists.

The body has a funny way of jerking you to attention when you are playing avoidant with your intrinsic self.

This irrational pain was my body demanding that I submit myself to be totally carried along by the winds of change, whose wispy rewards I was already enjoying. I was being asked to be honest with myself about how I felt about my friendships.

SENSE OF GRATITUDE

We stay in relationships primarily because they feel familiar, and your lives are so intricately intertwined, and that quickly becomes analogous with ‘safety’.

And in spite of growing apart, in beliefs and interests, we settle into that comfort of familiarity and unconsciously rob ourselves of the opportunity to branch out and discover new places and faces.

As individuals, we are set on a course of constant metamorphosis and consistent evolution, and that includes shedding our skin multiple times and fitting into the next form. We are malleable as human beings.

During seasons of growth, the people around you might either grow with you or silently fall away to make room for new energy or more of ‘you’, and that is part and parcel of learning social dynamics in our 20s.

However, it doesn’t mean that you totally discard those you no longer feel close to. 

It is okay to love them from a distance and wish them well. You can acknowledge that the party is over and as the sun is steadily climbing into view over the horizon, you bid them goodbye, attaching the warmth from the rays that you feel on your back to how you feel for them. 

This is not about cutting people off and being proud of it, like those New Year’s posts. This is about learning to accept the reality of outgrowing people, and the grace you should extend to yourself for it.