(M)ending a relationship.

When I first read this on the list of requirements I immediately thought of a friendship that has fallen apart over the last two and half years and a family member I have been struggling with longer than I can remember. Those were the most obvious choices to consider however my brain jumped rather quickly to the conclusion that I had already tried everything I could to fix this friendship and the other one well it's been a lifetime of wishing it was different, so how much can be done about that.

Knowing this is a requirement has helped me to dig deeper. 

When it comes to this friendship I want to first mention, the falling out hit me pretty hard and it had a massive impact on my life as we used to share a lot of interests, friends, and adventures together. To this day I have not understood what had happened but I have learned to move on. For the first year and half I tried everything I could to mend this or so I thought. A few weeks ago in one of our classes we were talking about acts of kindness. One point stood out to me, that sometimes even though the intention is well-meant it can not be received as a kind act if the other party is not in the frame of mind. For example, if I insist on giving a hug but the other person does not want to be hugged at that time is it still an act of kindness? 

It kind of hit me that maybe while I was thinking I'm fixing a relationship I really might have been sanding off the wrong end. I mean it's hard to fix something when you don't know where it cracked. I had sent lots of messages of apologies, suggestions to talk, and countless well meant invitations to various events. Nothing helped and indeed it seemed to get worse. At the end of last year some time I finally decided to let it go and I even considered leaving Junior Forest Wardens as we both played a leader role in our little Stony Plain club. 

Long story short I did not end up leaving the organisation because after all I am doing this for my kids. I decided to get over myself and be an adult as I sometimes need to remind myself. I don't know if this requirement helped me to consider a different approach or if my letting go last year trickered finally an improvement. But I'm happy to say today that, while we are no longer friends like we used to be we have become respectful team members, that work very well together and even support each other's missions in this youth organization and I'm truly thankful for it.  

I came to the conclusion that the issue when trying to mend a relationship is that we have a very specific idea of how this relationship is supposed to look and feel. Maybe if I'm willing to accept that our time of shared adventures as much fun as it was has come to an end but there is still value in many other ways and if I meet her where she is willing to be met, than maybe I'm still mending my relationship after all.