As usual, did you respond to your best friend’s text message two weeks later? If this behavior is relatively banal, strong guilt can result. Pascal Anger, clinical psychologist, deciphers this phenomenon for True Medical.
Not responding can cause a form of anxiety
In the age of constant notifications, response time has become an implicit indicator of interest, attention, even affection. Simply seeing an unanswered “read” message can trigger a cascade of interpretations: “Did I say something wrong? Are I being ignored on purpose?”
In this context, not responding quickly can be seen as a form of social transgression. “We are so immersed in the emergency that the lack of an immediate response destabilizes us”, admits the psychologist. This implicit pressure then feeds diffuse anxiety, both in those who wait and in those who are slow to respond.
“This difficulty in responding to messages can indeed generate anxiety, because it exposes us. Sometimes, moreover, the other “reactivates” us, via a second SMS. But one person’s time is not another’s time. We can like to take the time to respond; we must accept that we do not all live at the same pace”, admits Pascal Anger.
Certainly, being in the immediacy can be rewarding, but some people need to wait, to have empty time: their brain does not always know how to react instantly. We must accept this form of non-performance and manage to say to ourselves “that no, you are not a bad employee or a bad friend because you do not respond immediately”specifies the expert.
Saying your difficulties remains the key
To get out of this anxiety, the idea here is to learn to accept not responding quickly… and to make the other person accept this period of time.
“It’s important to be able to tell him: ‘I wasn’t very responsive.’ We can apologize for his lack of responsiveness,”
advises the practitioner. You can also say “I prefer calls or emails.”
Indeed, if this expectation has become a deviation from the norm, and the anxiety of others often overwhelms us (we are not sufficiently available in their eyes), we must learn to be confident with ourselves.
“Remember that you do not have to be constantly present at every request and that you are too often trapped in this mechanism because you do not dare to say these things,”
confides the practitioner. In other words: learn to express your difficulties, and to impose your own pace to free yourself.
People who love and respect you will only be able to (better) understand your expectations and needs!