How to lose your best friend in 1 hour

[Andy Black]

I almost lost my best lifetime friend once over business. At the end of the day, I decided the friendship was worth more to me than the business.

Agreed.

It's the silent treatment that winds me up.

 

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[ZCP]

Offer him a royalty IF it takes off. In return, he gets the first shirt and agrees to help sell them by being your best friend spokesman and telling everyone he knows. Ask him if he has any other ideas for shirts. Creative licensing for him, keep your best friend for you.

 

[Vigilante]

Offer him a royalty IF it takes off. In return, he gets the first shirt and agrees to help sell them by being your best friend spokesman and telling everyone he knows. Ask him if he has any other ideas for shirts. Creative licensing for him, keep your best friend for you.

Agreed, but offer him a royalty REGARDLESS. Even if it doesn't take off. If it doesn't, you offered a royalty and did the right thing.

 

[Fox]

@Vigilante How can I send you a PM?

 

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[ZCP]

Agreed, but offer him a royalty REGARDLESS. Even if it doesn't take off. If it doesn't, you offered a royalty and did the right thing.

Worded wrong ..... definitely offer him a royalty. Just tell him it is payable IF it takes off as an incentive for him to get in and help you sell them!

 

[Vigilante]

@Vigilante How can I send you a PM?

You can't.

 

[Vigilante]

How did you resolve it?

I had to be the bigger person (that time).

I had to be the one to bridge the gap, right or wrong.

I had to decide to keep first things first.

 

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[JAJT]

You've known him for a decade.

Pick up the phone and call him.
If he doesn't answer or return your calls - go find him.
To hell with texting.

Texting is great when you are asking someone to pick up milk on the way home or if you are still on for beers after work. If a major life event is happening in front of you - put down the keyboard and go address it.

If you both attack this problem with a friendship-first attitude you will almost certainly solve the problem pretty quickly and easily.

 

[Ronak]

It's easy to when you're posting on a forum to say, "screw him! move on.." but this is real life involving real people and a real relationship.

Yes, sometimes people are unreasonable, that's just human nature. If its a true friend, I would say work it out. Patience is a virtue, and a true friend will come around sooner or later.

Good luck.

 

[Vigilante]

If I were you, my very NEXT POST on this forum would be about how you fixed this.

I only have a handful of REAL friends, a few of which are on this forum.

They're not dispensable.

Go F*cking fix this, and come back, and teach us all how to be THAT guy.

 

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[Vigilante]

Go.

 

[458]

Friends and business never ever mix.

 

[luniac]

Damn vigilante you gave up a business for your friendship?

This is affecting my perception of the kind of dude i thought u might be.

I don't know if i could do something like that, unless it's not my first business.

 

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[Hong King Kong]

I had a similar experience, and I ultimately had to cut him out of my life.

Because when we met and talked about the issue, it was obvious he didn't want the same level of success I desired. And him seeing me work my a$$ off made him feel insecure, so he was doing stupid little things to sabotage my efforts.

Similar to your friend, he's sabotaging your efforts to succeed by leaving these stupid negative comments, not picking up your calls, all which do nothing but take slightly take away your drive, as if he's injecting small doses of poison into you. So in my opinion just cut him off, in the long run unempowering friendships will take more than it gives.

 

[Tomekmeister]

I might have a solution.

Don't talk about business with your family / friends (unless they have a similar mindset). I noticed that the more I talk about it, the less action I take (it applies to most areas in life). You probably won't be able to convince them to change their way of thinking, you will just lose your valuable time and energy. They will probably play on your nerves too.

So my advice is:
Work your a$$ off in silence and let results do the talking.

Now go get your friend back, good luck!

 

[E-Sharp]

I suppose it depends on the quality of the friendship, but overall I agree with Vigilante.

A friend gave me a really unique handmade gift last Christmas. This item was very cool, and she was thinking about mass producing and selling these items herself. For the usual reasons people don't take any action, she hasn't moved on it yet. I would take this idea right now and run with it if she wasn't my friend.

Maybe it's because I'm middle aged. For me a long friendship isn't worth tossing for one potentially profitable idea.

 

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[deepestblue]

There is massive irony in the tee shirt name and the situation described in this thread.

Because you're on this forum, you don't want mediocre.

Align yourself with like-minded people.

 

[mayana]

I almost lost my best lifetime friend once over business. At the end of the day, I decided the friendship was worth more to me than the business.

I sort of did lose my best friend. We are still friends, but the failed partnership and business will always be a cloud over us.

We initially were partners in a small business, and then I cut her out of it because I felt like she wasn't holding up her end of it, and I was the one on the line for the business loan. I ended up having to close the business anyway, and I really wish that I would have just gone through it with her. I don't think it would have changed the eventual outcome, but at least I would have had good company on the way down.

How did you resolve it?

We didn't talk for almost a year, but finally I reached out to her. I stopped by her house, and I think she was really glad to see me. But in all of the 15 years since then, we've only chatted on the phone some, and never regularly. I think we've only gotten lunch once, and it used to be a thing that we did all the time. I really do miss her a lot, but it will NEVER be the same

So I don't know, if it is someone who is truly really important to us, and if it isn't the business idea of the century, maybe the friend is more important.

 

[IrishSpring600]

Damn vigilante you gave up a business for your friendship?

This is affecting my perception of the kind of dude i thought u might be.

I don't know if i could do something like that, unless it's not my first business.

[HASHTAG]#landfill[/HASHTAG]

 

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[Shades]

I mean yea...the guy is acting like a baby. And its possible you end up not being friends in the future anyway...

But do you want to lose a important person in your life over a dumb T-shirt? A real business maybe I can see. But this is a tshirt thats not going anywhere in the first place. Just take it down.

Truly good friends do not come around often in your entire life. If he is one then Id work this out over over something that generates tens of dollars.

 

[evanthebarbarian]

But do you want to lose a important person in your life over a dumb T-shirt? A real business maybe I can see. But this is a tshirt thats not going anywhere in the first place. Just take it down..

I really don't. I don't think it's worth losing a friend over a stupid t-shirt, but given his reaction it seems like that was his first instinct. The t-shirt's been taken down. Took me about a minute after his remarks to do it, and I didn't think twice about it cause...it's not worth it. But that hasn't made a difference. I plan on taking @Vigilante's advice, but I don't have high hopes.

 

[Vigilante]

I really don't. I don't think it's worth losing a friend over a stupid t-shirt, but given his reaction it seems like that was his first instinct. The t-shirt's been taken down. Took me about a minute after his remarks to do it, and I didn't think twice about it cause...it's not worth it. But that hasn't made a difference. I plan on taking @Vigilante's advice, but I don't have high hopes.

Change your expectations. Go humble. See both sides (even though you think you are right.) Make amends. It sucks. It's not fun. But it's an hour.

And then... if you fail in your mission, you can spend the rest of your life knowing you did everything you could to make it right. If he stays an a$$, you find freedom.

But walk into it expecting to fix it. Walk in with an expectation.

The only other thing I would tell you is a lot of suns have set already. Do it swiftly. Time has a tendency to steel, not soften, resolve.

 

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[Soulrize]

This stuff happens all the time. I even had a run in where taking action just made them insult my effort. I have for a fact found better friends and those that are still my friends even after that, the friendship doesn't grow after that. They are what they were and will not move forward. I am thankful I put myself out there and met a new friend whos always wanting to move forward ,change, and grow. It was that moment in the un-comfort of the relationship that I went out and explored. I never regretted it and have been moving forward since . I don't miss my old friendships because they are where they are, static.

 

[Mattie]

Hey folks. Name's Evan. New here. Just had a fight with a friend the other day that I'm still trying to wrap my head around. Hope you can shed some light and reassure me and/or point me in the right direction.

Few weeks ago, a long-time friend posted a joke on Facebook, said it might make a good bumper sticker. Thought: "Wish I had come up with that." A couple days later, we're out hiking and he mentions it again. "That's pretty good," I said. "Mind if I put that on a t-shirt?" Sure, he says. Go for it.

So over the last week I'd been boning up on print-on-demand sites like Teespring and PrintAura, cramming on Facebook Ads and targeting niches. I tell him what I've been doing, and why. I setup the Facebook page, and show him. I get the design back from the guy on Fiverr, I tell him. A day or so later I launch it all, start the ad campaign rolling, and tag him on the post.

"Shitty," he says. "Are you really trying to make money off my idea? It's not funny anymore."

I text him and ask if he's serious, he gave me permission, I've been transparent the whole way, etc. Says he doesn't "have the time" to talk to me right then.

I try to brush it off at first, thinking we'll talk later, but as the hour passes I just get more upset. He was my best friend, I've known him for a decade, I loved him like a brother and he legit broke my heart. Who does he think I am? What does he think I am? Somebody out to screw him? If he had a problem with what I was doing why didn't he just f***ing say something? Did he think I would risk our friendship over a stupid t-shirt? I text him all this, get no reply. And later I think: Yes. Yes, he actually does think all those things about me. And maybe about everyone.

It's been a few days and I'm still in my head rehearsing the tongue-lashing I'd give him if I ever saw him again. And I'm still heartbroken that a guy that I respected, valued, and looked up to, saw as a mirror image of myself in some ways, didn't see me in the same light. And I'm angry. Almost as angry as I was ten years ago when I found out my ex-girlfriend had been cheating on me. It's that same quality of righteous and incredulous anger, y'know?

What I think? I think he never actually expected me to do anything with the idea. Because he never actually planned to do anything with the idea. So when he saw how easy it would've been to just execute and not dream on it, it pissed him off. But it doesn't help.

Anyway, total rant. Bad introduction to the forum I guess. Hope it can help someone, in some way. But mainly I just needed to get it off my chest.

Sounds like he was joking around with you, and didn't take it literally that you would use it to sell. Perhaps you should have been more clear up front with him. It sounds like he misunderstood completely. So, I'm not sure it really was about you, but his perception of things.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

I think this situation is similar to the old "do I go to college?" question.

Some relationships are worth fighting for. Some aren't. Every scenario and proper course of action is different.

If your friend doesn't have similar goals and aspirations, it makes the relationship difficult. If you want to talk entrepreneurship and marketing, and he wants to talk about Kylie Jenner's Instagram, at some point you will have a disconnect.

 

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[evanthebarbarian]

I think this situation is similar to the old "do I go to college?" question.

Some relationships are worth fighting for. Some aren't. Every scenario and proper course of action is different.

If your friend doesn't have similar goals and aspirations, it makes the relationship difficult. If you want to talk entrepreneurship and marketing, and he wants to talk about Kylie Jenner's Instagram, at some point you will have a disconnect.

@MJ DeMarco , this is a lesson I've been learning very slowly over the last several years, while struggling with my own psychological problems, is cutting people out of my life that just aren't good for my mental health. It's always been painful, but it's always left me in a better place afterward.

 

[minirich]

Wasn't it MJ. DeMarco who said "Ideas are nothing but neurological flatulence."
You get ideas a dozen a dime but to execute is the thing.
So your friend got a mirror presented that showed him that he is lazy sitting on his butt and life goes by.