Has anyone encountered a situation where you had to stop being friends with someone due to that person’s poor character?
I have a bi-polar friend (in his late forties) who’s okay as a person, but then sometimes acts as if he has the mind of a 12-year-old kid.
Just recently he bought a cell phone that might have been stolen. Instead of turning it in to the police, he keeps it regardless of the fact that the person who owned the smart phone turned off the phone’s service.
I told my “friend” that the smart phone has a tracking device and if the guy who owns it turns it on and finds out where he lives, he could be seen as having stolen the phone. And my friend gets mad at me and says what is he going to do call the phone police? Technically my “friend” could get arrested for buying stolen property.
What would you do in this situation? I’m under the impression my bi-polar friend has to be thrown in jail before he wises up and takes responsibility for his life.
I have a friend with bad character and it’s not for me to say what she does with her life, but it’s hard for me to be around her, because it messes with my mind and I get psychotic. I feel healthiest when I’m around people with good character. So, once in a while we text briefly on the phone, but I never see her in person anymore. I had my phone stolen and tracked it, but the police were too busy with larger crimes to care, so I don’t think he will go to jail over it, but he isn’t conscientious…and that’s what bothers me so much about this friend I have. I feel like her bad character literally seeps into my mind, so I have to keep a distance.
I don’t know, while I’ve never dealt in stolen property and never would, I suspect that you’d find the majority of my past and current friends to be of this “poor character”. While I’ve had a few friends of good moral character I tend not to develop friendships with people who are let’s say too goody goody for my shoes, just doesn’t seem to work.
Hope you can find some like minded people though, that’s what I would do if I were you, find like minded people to hangout with.
Poor character? Does he do this all the time? Is that the only incident or is it a pattern of bad judgement? You’re right, he’s wrong. He makes choices and has to live with the consequences. I don’t usually break off relationships, I let them run their course. If his actions start effecting you directly than I would consider breaking it off if I was you. But in this case he is only harming himself.
I try to help people before I leave their life. But if they aren’t going to listen, then they aren’t going to listen. I had one friend who just always had a caper going, or a scam or one thing and another… life was always chaotic with this guy.
Eventually I had to give up because I just didn’t have the energy to keep up. I will always wish him well, but life is a lot less complicated without him around. When he left, it opened some space in my life to welcome a returning friend who is a lot less stressful to be around.
I’ve never said people can’t come back into your life… but taking a break from people if they want to be chaotic… it’s perfectly OK.
I would keep a distance. My best friend said one day to me on Whatsapp that my husband was infected with evil and I got mad at her and ignored her messages. But after forgiveness comes reconciliation - eventually. I also had a friend, whose lifestyle I didn’t approve of, so although I accepted her, I didn’t get close.