Dealing with someone that shares your same interest.

[Marcus]

I don't know how well this thread will be received, quite frankly I don't really care, I just needed to get this out of my brain.

In the past I met this person that loved Star Wars just like I do, at first the idea of that was all fine and dandy, that is until I learned that he favored the "good" side or "light side" if you want to get technical.

I'm a strict Dark Side only person and I could go into detail as to why, but I shouldn't have to justify why I align myself a certain way.

Anyway, I kept my dislikes about his alignment to myself for awhile, just trying to embrace the fact that we both love Star Wars, and then out of nowhere one day he just blows up and rams all this jedi propaganda down my throat and everything else, and of course I fired back my Sith knowledge, and there were some things about the jedi that I brought up that he never knew, and eventually all because of that sudden outburst, our friendship ended.

I guess what the point of this thread is, is that it seems that sharing the same interest with someone else always turns out to be a "who knows more" competition.

In the future, if I encounter someone else that likes Star Wars again, I'll try my best to get along with them, but it does put a wall up in my mind if the person likes the opposite alignment, it's almost as if that similar interest doesn't even exist.

 

[LogicalMind]

Many lightside dudes use the lightside to destroy bad dudes...many darkside dudes use their powers to help the lightside...what is important is the balance...

A chord of three strands is not easily broken...
Imagine Darth Maul with Force Speed?
Imagine Kylo Ren as good...or Luke as bad...

They complement each other...

 

[Suzanne]

There is this lady who does cross stitching as I do and when I saw her pieces, I really, really liked them and admired them and complimented with complete sincerity.

She comes to my place and sees mine and actually picked one up and was studying it and I knew exactly what she was doing and she confirmed with: ah, for a minute, I thought it was perfect, but yeah, found a mistake. It honestly took all my courage to not throw her out my door.

Another time, she was here with some others and they were openly complimenting me on my cross stitch work, but the look on that woman's face was with utter jealousy and spite. Now, I am not the sort to revel in that and so, said: you should see "so and so's" stitching, she is really good. No look of thanks; just simpering.

I am not a competitive person, but others who are, makes me feel that way and I resent that very much.

 

[OkRad]

I fear people too much to get close enough to feel all that

 

[Nervous Rex]

From both stories from @Marcus Chorn and @Suzanne, beware of people who invest their entire identity in one job, cause, hobby, etc. To challenge anything in their “Identity Topic” is to challenge their entire existence.

 

[Tom]

Sad that it was over a fictional subject too.

 

[Progster]

I can kind of understand, because I have a drive towards perfection, so I do tend to want to know everything, but whatever hobby or interest I have, there are always going to be people who know more and people who know less. The thing is to not take it personally when someone has a different opinion or ideology - it´s just an opinion, it´s not personal.

 

[WildCat]

If it has to be a competition, chances are the friendship wasn't likely to work out to begin with. Move on from this, let it go and try not to get emotionally over-invested next time. I was going to use "trivial" in this post, but I forget sometimes just how big of a deal things can be to some people...

Personally, I think your former friend's reaction to that was pretty ridiculous, but there are plenty more people out there who really do think like that. Not worth the trouble or effort to me, so I try to avoid them or skirt around it when it comes up in conversation.

 

[Slackjaw]

This is a complicated topic. I find myself loving the competition with friends when it comes to knowledge on our shared interested. Trivia upon trivia keeps the conversation going a'plenty. You best believe I know my Clint Eastwood facts!

Things get difficult when it is something like filming or acting -- active hobbies. Let's say your friend has more resources than you, they have the opportunity to overshadow you.
Unfortunately this happened to me during the filming of a western, similar to the John Wayne classic "Stagecoach". My mate had been allowed use of the camera and lighting equipment from the university, and unfortunately that went to his head. This man became director and star in a single stroke. My scenes and lines were all but cut from the (short) film! Get it together, mate!

 

[flawedplan]

My aspie partner and I do real battle over this on a regular basis. I don't want to hijack your thread, and probably need to take this to couple's counseling, but it just jumped out at me so hard.

He and I are bohemian types with, for lack of a better term, pronounced *alternative* values, which I am constantly doubting his commitment to. Yesterday, while riffing on the subject of empathy in action, I was furious with him to discover he hadn't watched Patti Smith flub her rendition of the Bob Dylan song A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall at the Nobel Prize ceremony.

I hollered and berated, called him a poseur, dishonest, inauthentic, intellectually lazy, and asked him if we would be watching sitcoms and reading Wal Mart potboilers if he had his druthers.

He said I was being unfair. That when it comes to his sharing his musical sub-genre with me I take the attitude that he's overdoing it, but I'm expecting him to be well-versed in my special interest.

I was impressed that he stood up to me. I apologized many times, because I've seen my volcanic eruptions shut him down. So I was conciliatory, and we kept talking. My whole body was shaking.

It's the betrayal. Feeling like he will never trust me enough to tell me the truth about himself.

We both know this isn't my obscure special interest.

And if he wants to claim alternative credibility, then yes, he does have to take an interest in the renowned Patti Smith Bob Dylan Nobel Prize Stumble of 2016, as noted in full page write-ups in The Times, New Yorker, Washington Post, Vanity Fair, Guardian, etc. This is not on par with his special interests, charming though they may be. This is a thing that people like us know about. Full stop.

This is one of our major areas of discord, and I pray it will work itself out, as my aspie learns he is ok just as he is, and infuriating when he tries to be something he is not.