The most intuitive reason is that ambivalent relationships are unpredictable. With a clear enemy, you put up a shield when you cross paths. With a frenemy, you never know whether Dr. Jekyll or Mr. Hyde is going to show up. Ambivalence short-circuits the parasympathetic nervous system and activates a fight-or-flight response. It’s unnerving to hope for a hug while bracing yourself for a brawl.
Another factor is that unpleasant interactions are more painful in an ambivalent relationship. It’s more upsetting to be let down by people you like sometimes than by people you dislike all the time. When someone stabs you in the back, it stings more if he’s been friendly to your face.
Finally, ambivalence is an invitation for rumination. We agonize about ambiguous comments, unsure what to make of them and whether to trust the people who make them. We dwell on our mixed feelings, torn between avoiding our frenemies and holding out hope that they’ll change.
Although frenemies are the people who hurt us the most, we’re much slower to drop them than enemies. In our lives, we have about as many ambivalent relationships as supportive connections. And we don’t seem to get better with age at handling them. (Of course, although no relationship is purely positive, any relationship that crosses the line into being abusive should be jettisoned.)
Early in my career, I invested a great deal of energy in mentoring a student. I thought it was a positive relationship, but she chose a different adviser. When I asked for feedback, I learned that the relationship had looked different from where she stood. On the one hand, she appreciated my rapid responses and clear guidance. On the other hand, my answers were too directive: I was silencing her voice and crowding out her ideas. What I thought was being supportive was actually undermining her autonomy. As Anne Lamott puts it, “Help is the sunny side of control.”
It’s all too rare for us to exchange this kind of feedback. Sometimes we end up avoiding or ghosting the people who stress us out in this way. It isn’t always a deliberate decision; we procrastinate on replies and put off lunches until the relationship fizzles. Other times, we just grit our teeth and tolerate ambivalent relationships as they are.
A relationship in which you can’t be candid isn’t a relationship at all; it’s a charade. Research shows that we tend to underestimate how open people are to constructive suggestions. Feedback doesn’t always lead to change, but change doesn’t happen without feedback. The goal is to be as candid as possible in what you say and as caring as possible in how you say it. As Brené Brown emphasizes, “Clear is kind.”