Your friends might ignore you for reasons that are not in your control, and you have done nothing wrong. However, this is the first thing we want to believe after blaming them for various reasons, but the truth is that in many situations, it is our fault as well, and it will be helpful to find out the real reason.
I discussed in previous articles that we tend to lose friends starting in our 20s, and it gets harder and harder to make friends as we get older, so a natural process happens for all of us. Also, having a relationship or being married might influence how many friends you need.
I don’t want to discourage you or say that it is ok not to have friends as we get older, but it is important to know that you have to put extra effort into keeping your friendships compared to when we were teenagers and hanging out with friends is all we did besides school.
In this article, I want to talk about what are the possible reasons your friends are ignoring you so you can do your best to avoid them.
As I said, it might not be your fault, but I would highly recommend starting by thinking about what you can do better since it is the only thing you can control. You can not control how busy your friends are, but you can control how annoying you are when you hang out with them.
7 Reasons your friends are ignoring you
1. Lack of empathy
In my opinion, a lack of empathy is the number one reason for low-quality friendships, which leads to friends ignoring each other.
Understanding that it is not always about you, how you would do things, what you like, and so on is crucial when it comes to a healthy friendship. Understanding the person in front of you, knowing their needs, and putting yourself in their shoes will lower the chances of you getting ignored since they will feel appreciated and understood.
We all have that kind of friend that always come up with a solution to our problems to show us how they would deal with the situation without asking us for more details to better understand the context and our point of view. The intention behind that might be good, or it might just be to impress us with how smart they are, but in both cases, the lack of empathy destroys what they want to accomplish.
Read Also: Is Playing Video Games A Hobby?
2. Not opening-up
Not opening up with your friends and always having superficial discussions and small talk will make them ignore you because there is nothing that they can not get from someone else and it ends up being a surface-level friendship or just casual friends, but there are no chances of you becoming best friends or really close ones.
The friends I don’t know much about their personal life and preferences, who always talk about superficial things like the weather, food, and work, are the ones that I ignore most of the time. Why would I bother to invite them to hang out when all I get from that is a boring discussion that we pretend to be interesting?
Trying not to be vulnerable and not open up is one of the traps most people fall into regarding friendships. That happens because most people think there is no downside to not opening up, while in reality is one of the worst things you can do if you want real and healthy friendships.
3. Needy
Do you get more than you give from that friendship? You need to ask yourself this question and be honest when you answer it.
I wrote an entire article about five signs you might be needy, go check it out if you want to see what a needy friend means since I will not get into that much detail here.
If you always need help with different things, you don’t value your friends’ time, and you think they need to be there for you whenever you need them and so on, you might be needy, and that is a sure way to get ignored.
3. Overwhelming and annoying
If you talk too much, especially about yourself, and monopolize any discussion, you might give your friends no choice but to ignore you.
Many times friends don’t bother to tell you that you are annoying, but they will slowly start to ignore you, it is not their fault necessarily. A person who talks too much and it is annoying is rarely a person that will be willing to take feedback and work on improving themselves, so why bother?
Don’t go in the opposite direction, and be too quiet. In that case, they will have no reason to hang out with you. Here is an article about being talkative vs. being quiet that will show you the pros and cons of both.
It’s important to know that you don’t have to be in the middle of the attention all the time, it is ok to be a listener, this way you will understand your friends better, and you will know what they like and don’t like.
4. You know everything
Unfortunately, we have this perception that we have to know everything, and it is not cool to say”I don’t know” or ask for more details. This is why many people are the type that knows everything, and they are quite annoying, to be honest. Talking to someone who always says “I know” makes you ignore them since you can’t surprise them with anything, and what you say feels useless.
It is ok not to know everything, in fact, it is helpful since you will encourage the person in front of you to go into more details, and this feels nice, especially when they talk about their passion, hobbies, and things like that and only this way you can learn more in-depth things.
5. You are always better(one-upper)
The most annoying people are the ones that always have a better story(one-uppers) than you and make you feel insignificant. I know a few people that, no matter what I would say, will always come up with a better, more impressive story about the same thing.
Those people always brag about themselves, or if they don’t have a personal story, they will talk about someone they know that did something impressive, of course, they tend to lie or exaggerate since life is not as impressive all the time.
Those people feel like people around them are impressed, but the inevitable result is that they will get ignored sooner or later since they are insufferable after all.
So always impressing your friends and having better stories than them is a sure way to get ignored.
Read Also: How To Stop One-Upping Everyone?
6. Lack of initiative
If you never call them, they might not bother to call you, in fact, people lose their initiative when it comes to hanging out with friends when other priorities come into their life.
I know many friends that say things like, “If they don’t call me, why would I call them?” which seems correct, but someone has to be the first to do it.
7. Negative energy
Some people always complain, have low energy, and bring the discussion into negative territory, those are very annoying people to spend time with.
Being negative all the time and having negative energy will make your friends ignore you because no one wants to hang out with you just to go home depressed and with negative thoughts.
That doesn’t mean you have to be always positive but stick to the facts and try to be realistic, it can’t be all that bad.
Also, being funny from time to time is a great thing since it will brings good energy. You can even be funny about some not-so-positive news if you are careful not to end up looking like a clown that is never serious.
What can you do when your friends are ignoring you?
You can try to talk with them to see why they are ignoring you, but if you are already in this situation, there are little chances to fix it, but you should do your best anyway.
They might not be open and tell you immediately, so you have to make them understand that you are aware that it might be your fault and want to work on that.
To lower your chances of getting ignored, you must do your part as well as possible before ending up in this situation. Open up to your friends, this will encourage them to open up as well, try to be more emphatic, put yourself in their shoes, and stop trying to impress your friends, they are your friends you don’t want them to be your fans.
Knowing that you are not perfect and you might have to work on a few things to be a more likable person that people will enjoy spending time with is ok.
“My friends have to accept me as I am, or they are not my friends” is BS. A friendship is not only about you, paying attention to your friends, seeing how you might annoy them to avoid that, or talking about their interests is necessary for a healthy long-term friendship.
Many people don’t understand that you have to make a conscious effort and also some sacrifices to keep your friends, if you take them for granted, you might be surprised that you remain without friends pretty fast.
Read Also: Do Friendships Last Forever?
Conclusion
Those are the most important reasons why your friends ignore you regarding what you have done. As I said, it is not always your fault, it might be their fault or just the fact that the circumstances have changed and they don’t have time anymore, or they don’t prioritize friendships as much as before.
So don’t blame yourself too much but don’t try to avoid responsibility and blame them without thinking about the situation.
