What ghosting really means

Welcome back to another episode of how to twenty-something where today i’m going to be talking about ghosting

And no I’m not referring to Casper the friendly ghost, but rather when you never hear from a person ever again.. Or worse, if you’re the person that is committing the act of ghosting

I mean I get it, it’s really tempting to just never respond or reach out to someone and assume they get the message of you’re not interested, but when the tables are turned it sucks

I’m not going to hold your hand when I say this, ghosting is a sign of immaturity, where you haven’t learned adequate communication skills yet nor do you really care how you treat others/make them feel

It’s extremely selfish to ghost

And yet, we do it

And even more so we hate when it’s done to us

And the most fucked up thing, is it continues to happen – you continue to ghost because it’s convenient for you and you also get ghosted and feel no sense of closure

To which I want to remind you of the golden rule: treat others the way you want to be treated

I love this topic because I used to think of ghosting only in regards to dating, but as I’ve moved through my twenties I’ve realized ghosting takes all forms

It’s a versatile little bastard

You can get ghosted from companies, clients, friends, and romantic interests – so fun, I love it here

No but seriously, this episode is to help you 1. Reframe your own thoughts when you’re getting ghosted and 2. Help you to end your part in ghosting once and for all

As I already mentioned, ghosting is a sign of your maturity level and it’s extremely disrespectful to the other person and vice versa

I mean yes, we are all guilty of ghosting at some point in our life, but i’m here to tell you to cut it out because it only makes you look worse as you selfishly took the easier way out than confronting someone with where you stand on your relationship with them

I don’t blame you for ghosting because it’s part of being in your twenties. 

We are all still very much learning boundaries, communication skills, and confrontation

Heck, I have encountered people in their thirties who have yet to learn these skills and it’s beyond frustrating

And when you’re on the receiving end of someone vanishing it stings

It’s a silent rejection of you as a person and you’re left with no answers as to how you can improve or why this person disappeared

Instead of simply sending a text of ‘i’m not feeling this’ or ‘I don’t think this will work out’ or ‘it’s not a good fit’ 

I know it’s not fun to send or receive that kind of message but it does give closure and it’s a sign of respect for that other person

How the other person responds to such message is a reflection on their character to which you have no control over

On the other hand, how you respond to such a message is a reflection on your character, and that you have all of the control over

When I was in the thick of dating last year, I had to constantly remind myself that I need to communicate in the way I want to be communicated to and that was meant for all current and future interests

And when I met my now boyfriend, he loved how communicative I was right at the start and I said I was extremely attracted to his communication skills

So for you to end your ghosting habit once and for all, it means doing what’s within your control and practicing your ability to communicate

If it’s in terms of dating someone, it’s saying (even via text) that you had a nice time but don’t see anything romantic with them

If it’s in person and your date asks you for a second but you know you definitely do not want to go on one, then do not say you’ll let them know or you need to check your calendar and get back to them, or even worse say yes to a second date because you’re just prolonging the awkward message you’re going to have to send regardless or give the lame ass excuse of ‘sorry i’m just really busy’

Because the reality is, we all know people have enough time for what’s important to them regardless of how busy they are

So thank them for spending that time with you, but that you are not interested in seeing where things go

It’s going to feel awkward and uncomfortable regardless but think about how shitty it feels when you’re on the receiving end and you’re waiting for that text from the other person who told you they just need to check their calendar first

Ugh oh my god, I had a huge crush on someone last year and we finally went on a date, and it was a great date, but at the end I initiated a second and he said he needed to check his calendar

The guy has a 9-5 what calendar are we checking.. I can say I need to check my calendar because I truly mean I need to check my calendar since I have a very odd schedule that varies from week to week

And low and behold, after a very anxious day of waiting (when in my heart I knew he didn’t want to go on another date), i received the text of he’s not looking for anything romantic

I’ll give him the credit that he didn’t ghost me, but he did prolong the inevitable 

So don’t bullshit the end if you know for a fact you will be going on a second date or third or fourth, basically when you know you’re not planning on intentionally seeing this person again, do NOT lead them on

If it’s in terms of denying a job offer because you got a different one that you’ve decided to take, it means sending a thank you email for their offer and politely decline

If you wanted to hire someone or inquired about hiring someone, like for example stepping into a coaching partnership with me, and say you changed your mind or what I see happen is you get scared about your ability to follow through on the changes you say you want to make, then you need to communicate that

Basically, you have the ability to stop ghosting and bring something to a complete close

And like I said a few moments ago, how the other party responds to your communication, which is rejection, you are rejecting that party for whatever reason and there’s nothing wrong with that, but how the other person responds is no longer in your control or your problem

It’s a reflection on their character

To which we can loop in mel robbins’ let them theory

Let them be upset with you, let them tell their stories about you, let them throw a fit – as long as you know you communicated in a way that represented you well, then don’t worry about how they receive it because it’s not your responsibility to console them further

You did what you needed to do

Now on the flip side of ghosting, is getting ghosted

Getting ghosted is tougher than getting rejected because for the same reason you should communicate to the person you don’t want to see again, not being communicated to out front leaves you with a sense of hope, expecting to hear back, being led on

Only, unbeknownst to you, you’re being led to a dead end

And that dead end road could take a few hours, a few days, and even yes, even a few weeks depending on the relationship at hand

Meaning, the deeper the relationship, the longer the road to nothing will be and the worse it’s going to feel

A short term situationship, a few dates in, a newer friendship, a company you had one interview for – those are easy ghosts to move through and bounce back from because a relationship was barely being developed

One of my favorite memories from college was, sorry mom close your ears, but I was hooking up with a guy for probably a month and then he fully disappeared, like we’re talking off of the face of the earth

I finally ran into him again right before halloween and I went up to him, because I apparently have zero filter and a whole lot of balls but I said hey allen, what are you going to be for halloween this year, a ghost?

It was hilarious, my friend Kylie was right next to me when i said it and she loves re-telling this story too.. Probably one of my best one liners to this date

But it was light hearted because we were nothing serious, it was a month long situationship thing

And it turns out he was actually dealing with a lot of family stress during that disappearance

Which brings me to my main point if you’re getting ghosted, and it’s similar to when i spoke on rejection, which is it’s usually not about you

I mean yeah you could argue that that person doesn’t care for you or you specifically aren’t what they’re looking for, which is true, but a lot of times it’s their own issues they are dealing with

Whether it’s family stress, school, work, commitment issues, you name it, they are ghosting you either because they have poor communication skills, are unsure of what they’re looking for, are emotionally unavailable, or because you are low on their priority list of other fires going on in their life

And I will say, technology and social media makes all of this so much worse

Like when you’re waiting on a response from someone but see that they are active on instagram your mind starts to spiral

The silence is  very loud in those situations especially for my anxious attachment peeps

And i hate to tell you this but no response is a response, you’re just in denial and giving that person the benefit of the doubt

And I love that you want to see the good in people, I do it too, but it lets you create stories about what’s going on with the other person, or worse, what’s wrong with you, to justify their disappearance

When in reality, they are showing you their true colors and you are choosing to put sunglasses on and look the other way

But you’re the one that’s going to get hurt

Ghosting is everywhere in your twenties because you are constantly connecting with people and a majority of the time it’s not going to work out

You’re applying to jobs, making friends, going on dates, and throughout it all you’re going to find that your priorities will change to fit the life you’re working towards in that moment

It’s the perfect recipe for ghosting to be given and received

And what I’m here to tell you is to knock it off

The higher the stakes, or the more pressure you put on an outcome with a person or the longer you’ve known one another – again knowing that person can be a job, a romantic interest, or a friendship – the worse getting ghosted is going to feel

I’ve been ghosted by everything under the sun

When i was approaching graduation in college, I had 4 interviews lined up in Atlanta – ask me how many of those four I heard back from

Well this is a podcast so you can’t answer that question, but it’s zero

Zero firms had the decency to tell me I didn’t get the job

What’s worse, is that two of the four led me on and told me they are still deciding

And I know that companies are busy and probably get a lot of applicants that they don’t have the time to individually say no to

But at the same time, that’s part of the hiring process and they should know better

You see, I put a lot of pressure on those jobs so when i was waiting for their response, I didn’t apply anywhere else I just want to wait to hear back 

And was devastated when i came to my senses after 2 months of crickets and knew I wasn’t going to be moving to atlanta after graduation

Another example is if you’ve been listening since pretty much the start of this podcast, then you are familiar with me getting ghosted by my best friend of 8 years

That one really fucked up my head, because it was 8 years of knowing one another

We had a little tiff and finally talked things out in person, hugged it out, was left with him telling me he’d let me know what he was doing for his birthday that upcoming weekend, he left the parking lot we were in and that was the last I ever heard from him 

And for me that is unforgivable, you don’t treat another person like that, especially after 8 years 

Ghosting is taking the easy way out, but you are burning so many bridges in the process

Even if you’ve had encounters where the person doesn’t take rejection well, I can almost guarantee that down the line they are looking back and feeling grateful for your communication

People ghost because they don’t know how to exit and it feels easier to say nothing than to say they’re not for you

And what I want to tell you is that yes it’s going to feel uncomfortable to communicate, every fiber in your entire being is going to want to just disappear 

But bringing it back to the start of this episode i want to remind you to treat others in the way you want to be treated

My friend christine would constantly remind me of this when I was dating and tell me that I’m sending the signals to the universe to treat me the ways I’m treating other people

So after a few awkward moments of saying no to guys, I met my boyfriend who has been up front in his communication skills from day 1

What goes around comes around, so swallow your discomfort, communicate where you’re at, and reward yourself for acting like an adult

But what I really want to leave you with in regards to what ghosting really means is that ghosting says more about the ghoster than the ghosted

Communicating builds your character, your reputation, and your relationships

And know that closure doesn’t always come with an explanation

Sometimes things end, people disappear, and you’ll never have the rhyme or reason for them doing so

So if you take anything away from this episode, please stop ghosting, put on your big girl pants or your big boy pants and communicate

Be the example for others and one by one we’ll be able to eradicate ghosting once and for all

But on that note, this does conclude another episode of how to twenty-something

So if you liked what you heard, if you felt called out, if your bestie is notorious for ghosting then please share this episode – post it on social media, send it to a friend in need, but help me help others ghost ghosting 

And as always I can’t wait to be in your headphones again next week with another brand new episode