S7E6 - Ghosting as a Breaking Strategy?

Damn, breakups are hard, and we don't mean just with romantic relationships.

If we consider the deep influence couples in relationships, 'situationships', talking stages and so on exert on each other, it is not too surprising that ending relationships can be one of the most emotional, distressing, painful events adults can experience.

One thing that contributes to the distress we experience during breakups is how we communicate the breakup message or experience.

In general, how people break up tends to vary in the level of directness or in the amount of care or concern they express towards the other person.

Some breakups happen directly, with open expressions of the desire to break up. Others involve indirect communication, typically by avoiding the partner.

With our increasing reliance on online communication, people now have new indirect ways of terminating connections, one of which is Ghosting.

Ghosting is unique. It is not like every other breakup strategy because when we do it, it happens in the absence of the ghosted partner immediately knowing that it has occurred.

The immediate impact on them - the ghosted partner, then becomes ambiguity, uncertainty, pain, and hurt.

Now, we aren’t suggesting that ghosting just began in recent times. We can imagine that ghosting has been around since the times of Romeo and Juliet.

But we argue that the ‘ease’ and ‘normalcy’ of ghosting is more prominent today than it has ever been. And that shift is because of the current norm and proliferation of online communication.

Since many of us initiate, develop, and maintain our relationships through texting and social media mostly, terminating our connections with people by ghosting then becomes a way of avoiding these communication channels with a particular person.

But should ghosting be normal? And should it be considered an appropriate way to end relationships? Can any motivations for ghosting be justified? How can we deal with the inevitable uncertainty, pain, and hurt that ghosting brings?

In this episode, we brought back one of our day one guests to tackle this wicked problem of ghosting.

Have you been a 'ghoster' or a 'ghostee'? How was the experience? Let us know!

 

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