Among your group of girl friends, do you have someone who always tries to compare her life to yours, shows off her accomplishments when you talk about yours or feels jealous when you are praised in front of her?
If yes, you might be hanging out with a competitive friend.
While it is best to stay away from such a person, if you’ve known her for long and want to keep your friendship intact, here are ways you can deal with a competitive friend.
1. Understand: For most people, the need to be competitive stems from a certain sense of insecurity. The fear of not being good enough leads them to bad behaviour, which includes bragging to make themselves feel more valuable. Try and get to know from your peers if she is feeling insecure about something.
2. Praise your friend: If the need to be competitive stems from her insecurity, let your friend know that she is deeply valued and that you love her. Shower praises on her, even if it means complimenting a dress she is wearing or showing interest in her new haircut.
3. Ignore her behaviour: If you get upset by your friend’s competitive nature, try and ignore it. Just because your friend sees herself as better than you doesn’t make it true. Though this isn’t easy, you have to commit to not caring about what she says and loving her with all her flaws.
4. Avoid trigger situations: To keep a healthy friendship intact, you know you shouldn’t play the game. Competing with your own friends will only create problems. Don’t go for information that can start a competition or create jealousy like how much you weigh or what your pay package is. Be careful of these trigger topics and if you feel your conversation is moving in that direction, change the subject.
5. Have a heart-to-heart talk: Honest communication is the best way to sort out problems. Tell your friend that her competitive nature is doing more harm than good. However, make sure you don’t get into a fight as that would only make matters worse. Make a point to reassure your friend that she has great qualities and that’s why you love her. You could say this: “I know you care about me, but when I tell you about something good in my life, I feel like you’re not listening, because you jump in with something about you. It would be nice if we could both be happy with each other’s accomplishments.”
6. Diversify your friend circle: Establishing non-competitive friendships is important. While interacting with some overly competitive people is difficult, it is possible to make friends who are competitive yet supportive. You need to be friends with people who are in a similar place in life so they don’t feel the need to compete, but who you can also relate to.
