The Role You Didn't Know You Were Playing In Your Friendship Group

Friendships in your twenties is a whole different beast than it was in school. We’re growing, healing, working, moving, dating and so much more. And our friendships either stretch with us… or snap.

We’re talking about those invisible roles we all end up playing in our friendships, the ones we didn’t exactly sign up for. Are you the therapist friend? The one who plans everything? The friend who always brings the vibe but never gets checked on? 

In today's episode, were talking about how you can identify what role you play in your friendship group and why, how to spot the signs when your friend needs help, and how to reset your role in your friendship group.

Enjoy!

Transcript

Introduction to Friendship Roles

Speaker 1 0:17

Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of the 20 survival guide. This is your host, emily Askley. In today's episode we're going to talk about something I find super interesting and that is the role that we play in our friendship groups. You might be someone who doesn't know their role yet, or you might have just fallen into this role, like you could be the therapist, you could be the class clown, you could be the moderator, you could be the one that everyone comes to for advice. Class clown, you could be the moderator, you could be the one that everyone comes to for advice, and most of the time you just fall into that role because people just naturally gravitate towards you for that one thing, and you might not have signed up for it, but you're just good at it. But what happens when these roles get exhausting? Maybe they're not the role that you want to be playing in your friendship group.

Speaker 1 0:59

Sometimes friendships can, sometimes friendships just aren't like they used to be when we were younger, and a lot of us play these like roles unconsciously, just to keep the harmony in the friendship. For example, you might be the person that always brushes things under the rug, doesn't want any drama, but then you might unintentionally be hurting yourself there and you might be putting in more than your friend is giving back to you. And we're going to talk about what happens when these friendships start to break or you don't really want to be playing these roles that you are playing in your friendship group. Or even if you don't know what role you're playing, we're going to go through them today and you can figure out which one is you. So, without further ado, let's get into the episode. So if you're thinking, which role am I, you might be the kind of person that ends up always organising the group chat holidays. You might be the one that books the flights, gets the dates together. You're just relied on to be the organised one. There's so many, and we're going to talk about the traits, what that might look like if you are that person and how it affects you.

Speaker 1 2:10

So we're going to start with number one, and this is the therapist friend. The therapist friend is always listening. They're a great listener. That's why you come to them for their therapy. But at the same time, they rarely feel comfortable venting because they tend to take on other people's problems and they're not the one who is like the loudest in the room all the time. You could probably guess that if they're dealing with everyone's trauma, everyone's therapy, they're probably going to feel quite worn out. So a lot of the time they're worn out emotionally. The annoying thing about this, if you are the therapist friend, is that you're just so good at giving advice that people come to you for everything the tough love or the person who. You just listen to their problems and it's a blessing and a curse because sometimes you don't really want to listen to someone and let them rant all the time. Sometimes you just want to do your own thing, but people come to you because they need you and you just feel obligated to help them. So it is a blessing and a curse because you know it's great that they see you as that person and they trust you, but sometimes you just want a break.

Speaker 1 3:12

Number two the planner and the coordinator. So this is the kind of person I was talking about earlier. This person organizes the parties, they organize the events, they organize the holidays, they organize the hangouts, they organize the pub trips, they organize everything and in a way they kind of hold the group together socially and you rely on them that they're going to make the plans, get the group together and it's always going to be a good time. But here's like a really deep analogy of this person and this might not always be right, so take this with a pinch of salt. But this person either just loves to be organized or they might feel the need to be in control because they know that the friendship group won't do it and will always expect them to do it, so it always falls on them and that's kind of exhausting.

The Entertainer Friend

Speaker 1 3:57

Number three the entertainer. Now, you probably guessed that I pretty much identify myself with this person in the friendship group just because I have my own podcast and I tend to talk for ages. This is really tooting my own horn here, but the entertainer is the funny one. Everyone in your friendship group is probably hilarious, but they're kind of known for being funny. They tend to bring light to the room. They're the kind of person that you invite to the event, to the pub, and you just know You're probably not going to have to show up and give loads of effort to the conversation, because you know that you can just let them take the conversation wherever it's meant to go and they can just handle it all for you. So you don't really have to be super high with your social battery, and that can be really nice.

Speaker 1 4:43

But at the same time, this person will usually cover their sadness or whatever they're going through with humour. They'll make sarcastic comments. They'll tend to mask up their moments of downness with humour. No surprise there. This person can also feel pressure to perform, and when I say perform, I mean like, be on all the time, be that bubbly person, be that funny person that brings light to the room even when they don't want to. I like to put it in this way, where if this person is struggling, they tend to not express it the same way as other people do through crying, because they just tend to mask it much better. As a result, the friends might not give the same sympathy or attention to that person, because they might think that they're more okay than they actually are. But that's just not the case because, as we know, not everyone handles sad things in the same way. Some people handle them without looking sad, but they're just doing a great job at masking it. That doesn't mean they're okay, because it's not always visible, but it just means that they handle things differently. So if you do have a friend like that who is the entertainer, maybe check up on them. Just because they are making jokes and keeping things light doesn't actually mean that they are okay.

The Mediator and Yes Friend

Speaker 1 5:51

Number four we have the mediator. So this is the person that keeps the peace, smooths over the drama, just puts it under the rug and a lot of the time they carry the emotional weight of the group and if you're a big group of girls, gosh, there is a lot of emotional weight and I'm speaking from experience. But the mediator is the kind of person that you'll come to and complain about a situation with someone and they'll likely give the response of oh, I'm sure she didn't mean it or it's okay, and just brush it under the rug, like they don't wanna be the person that might be giving you the advice in the same way as the therapist would, but they just don't want the drama and at the same time, it makes sense for them to then sacrifice their own opinions just because they wanna keep the peace. So they're the kind of person who's probably gonna say yes to something when they don't really want to go to it, even if someone's in the wrong. They would just prefer to smooth things over rather than get any conflict in the group. Also, this is a slight tangent, but with some people and not all of the people who are mediators. But sometimes if you're thinking this person might be a mediator, they can tend to have a bit of a god complex sometimes, if you don't know what that means. It means like this sort of aura which makes them feel like they're fixing everyone's problems and it's their duty. But they do it a bit too much and they rub it in your face and it's like people will come to you with their problems. You try and sort it and become known for that, but you're not the kind of person who's going to give the advice. You're just going to be the person that they come to to sort it.

Speaker 1 7:18

Number five is the yes friend. We all know the yes friend and we are the yes friend sometimes and they just go along with everything. Every plan you make, they're going to say yes to you. Whether they absolutely hate the thought of it and don't want to go, they'll probably still turn up and say yes. They probably won't be the person who brings the ideas to the table or makes the plans themselves, and they also avoid conflict and they're afraid to take up space in that way. And the sad thing about this person when you know that they're kind of struggling. They'll slowly drift away from their own identity. Because if you're always saying yes to stuff when you don't actually want to say yes to stuff, it's basically people policing and you're not really sticking to your own boundaries. So you might not even be sure. If you like the plans but you don't want to say no because you don't want to be left out of the group, you're going to get FOMO. You feel like you're not going to be invited again. You just will never really make the decisions. Like I mentioned, you just prefer to say yes because you don't want to disagree. If you disagree with people, you're fearing of being judged by them.

The Ghost and Role Formation

Speaker 1 8:21

Number six the ghost. This is the person who tends to be flaky, they tend to be distant and they tend to be misunderstood a lot of the time. I'm not going to sit here and slate the ghoster of the group because actually, if they're ghosting a lot of the time, if they're distant a lot of the time, there might actually be a reason for that and it's super easy to be the person that's like why are they behaving like this? It's really irritating for everyone else and it might be, but it also might be something deeper and they might not be okay, and it's important to pay attention to that in your friend. So they might be struggling with burnout, with anxiety or just life stuff in general, and a clear sign that your friend is a ghost is that they just are unreliable. You can't really count on them to come to the event, to come to the plans that you made, and they tend to usually need support. They'll cancel, they'll be really apologetic and then there'll be a whole reason that you need to end up supporting them. For if this is you, if you are the ghost of the friendship group, you're not a bad friend. I'm here to tell you you are not a bad friend, contrary to what you might feel. You might actually just be in survival mode. Sometimes your friends might not notice being unreliable as a sign of help that you might need and they'll tend to just see it as like you don't care or you'd rather just not go to that thing and just misunderstand you. Those were the six main types of characters in your friendship group and obviously there are a couple more, but those were the main ones. Let me know what you think if you identify with any of them and which one you identify with and it kind of just gives you a good indication of if you know one of those friends is fitting into those characters that I've just mentioned. If they do need help, you can sort of spot the signs easier when they might not be as visible.

Speaker 1 10:13

Now we're going to talk about how these roles are formed. Like, how did you get this role? You didn't sign up for it, you just got this role in the friendship group and you've just had it for years. None of these roles are bad, by the way. I just want to clarify that none of them are bad. They're just what you ended up gravitating towards. So one of the reasons why you might have this role is through your childhood dynamics. So maybe you're the oldest child and that could be meaning that you're the person that feels like they need to organise everything, be in control of everything or be like the therapist. That tends to be the role that you end up playing.

Evaluating and Reclaiming Your Friendships

Speaker 1 10:46

If you are the older sibling and, as much as you might think, your role isn't actually random. But if you're sitting here thinking, I guess I am that person, I guess I am that character, but I don't really like being that character and it doesn't serve me anymore. What can I do about it? How can I adjust myself in my friendship group? That is what we're just about to get into. So, in order to identify your role, if you don't know which role you play yet, you can ask yourself what do my friends actually expect from me? What happens if I stop doing that, doing that thing, doing the therapy, being the light, funny person in the room? And the most important question is what do I actually want from this friendship? So if you pull back from a friendship where you feel like you're putting in all the effort and you're overcompensating for their lack of effort, you'll be able to see if they respond and put in more effort or if they just stay the same. And that is purely the way that you know if the friendship is worth keeping or not, if they're willing to put in their side of the bargain. So here are some ways that you can actually figure out if you are the kind of person in that friendship group, which person you identify with and how you can figure out if the friendship is worth it.

Speaker 1 11:52

Number one keep a journal for one week about your interactions with your friends. I mean, that's kind of asking for a lot, but it is a good point. It could even be a mental journal or just a little page in your notes app on your phone. Observe who checks in first when you've got a lot of baggage. Observe which friend out of your group checks in with you first to make sure you're okay. That is huge. It's a big sign.

Speaker 1 12:14

Number three note how you feel after big group events. Are you drained by hanging out with these people, or do you feel recharged, like they bring the energy out of you that you love to see? Or do you feel exhausted and you were like I never wanted to go to that in the first place? And once you spot those things, you can start tweaking it and you can start seeing which friends you want to keep in your life and which friends you feel like are draining you. So now I've also got some tips to help us reclaim our space in our friendships. So when I say this, I mean how we can bond and meld the friendships that are suffering at the moment or, if you don't like your role in a specific friendship group, how you can fix this.

Speaker 1 12:52

And number one is you need to start small. This could be saying no to a plan that you feel like you always say yes to and you never really wanted to go. Start saying no, start setting your boundaries. Number two communicate. So if you feel like you're in an emotionally safe group and when I mean that, I mean you feel like you can be vulnerable with these people and they're not going to go and tell the world about your problems and your issues then speak up and talk to them in the safe environment. Number three test the waters. So this is a really good one, and it's when your friendship is in a dire situation and you feel like you're putting in more effort than they are. So what you do is you pull back slightly and you start to see if anything shifts. You start to see if the other person notices and if they put in more effort or if they don't, and if they don't, you know. That's a pretty clear sign.

Speaker 1 13:42

Number four build mutual friendships. So this is something that you should have with all of your friends, and that is just a friendship that goes both ways. You give and they give back, and you're there for them when they're going through problems, and likewise, you just have a very mutual friendship and everything feels really in balance. Number five let go of the friendship if it needs to be let go of and I know that might be sad when you've been friends with this person for so long but if the friendship isn't serving you, if it's actively draining you, and every time you hang out with this person it's just because you feel like it's a check off of your to-do list or that you need to hang out with this person because otherwise it'd be really sad to go through a friendship breakup that's not a good enough reason to stay friends with this person. If they're not there for you when you need them, if they're not giving you a good time, if they're not listening to you when you're venting. It's just not really a friendship that you need in your life right now.

Speaker 1 14:46

So I hope you guys enjoyed this episode. This was just a little quick reminder of how we should be acting in our friendships in our 20s and it's okay if some friendships are sort of breaking up. If you don't keep all your friendships and you're sort of going through those friendship breakups right now, it doesn't mean that you're someone who can't necessarily hold on to friendships. It just means that they might not be serving you anymore or that you're growing apart and you're drifting and it's really important to monitor that, because when you're going through enough changes and life is kind of really chaotic at the moment you just want people around you who you know are going to be there for you. Without a doubt they're going to be there for you, and you don't need 50 friends, you only need a couple good quality ones. They mean way more than like a massive group.

Speaker 1 15:35

So I'm gonna set you guys a challenge for the week. I want you guys to write down two things this week the role that you think you're playing in your friendship group and the role that you wanna play. And then I want you to ask yourself what is one thing I can do to move closer to that version of me that I wanna be in my friendship group. And honestly, if you are happy with who you are in your friendship group and you feel like you show up as your true self, then you're good to go. But if you aren't and this episode has made you think and question things then that's a really good challenge. So let me know how you get on. If you like this episode, send me a message in the show notes or dm me on instagram. You know the drill and I shall see you guys next Wednesday. Bye.