Quote from John Freeman on December 14, 2020, 5:19 am

I think that there is an imbalance in your relationships and everything unfolds from this. I think you respect him more than he respects you. You say he plays games so that means he has manipulative tendencies or manipulates as a default behavior. That means that you will feel frustration and irritation when interacting with him as he will step on your boundaries as he did there. So that's the context.

Personally, I would not keep such an individual as my friend as he took value from you. You were better off before interacting with him. I know you did not asked me about this but this is what I think is the bottom thing. It's a hard realization though.

On the communication, he one-upped you twice: first by correcting you without explanation then implying he's superior because he changed country. What I would not have done is go sarcastic as it is passive-aggression. I would have realized he's a dick and used humor to uncover his tactics:

"Well, that's very nice of you! A long time friend wishes you a happy birthday and that's all you come up with? Time zone?"

These individuals are nasty. Uncover them as you did and say what is really happening then they lose all the time. But you have to stay calm. You also stayed in his frame so you lost two fold: he controlled the frame "it's a time zone problem" and he pushed you in a passive-aggressive stance. Also, recognize that you might have the first one to wish him happy birthday and maybe one of the few who did. So it means you are a high-value individual to him and he cannot accept that as it comes with a reciprocity that he's not willing or has not been giving you. Short answer: drop him.

Summary:

1. Stay calm
2. Don't fall in his frame (see my post always reject a negative frame about yourself)
3. Say what is really happening.
4. Choose higher-quality individuals as friends

Quote from Matthew Whitewood on December 14, 2020, 8:39 am

Thanks a lot for the feedback, John!

I have lots to learn from this incident indeed.
I'm not sure why this incident affects me emotionally in particular so much.
But I believe that I had a subconscious expectation of him to respond with warmth.
The harsh reality of his response challenged a lot of my beliefs, and it was emotionally painful.

I have been making better friends in recent years.
But occasionally I reach out to my friends that I made when growing up.
Sometimes it is a mistake because these were not intentional friends that I made during my adult years.
It was more like we gained familiarity due to a common place like school or other social circle.

Learning Points for Myself

1. Don't build your self-esteem from the validation of others.
   In this way, I would not get angry if someone takes advantage of my sincerity.
   But, at the same time, I still have the courage and assertiveness to stand up to any value-taking behaviour.
   Expecting someone to treat me with warmth is not anti-fragile because it is out of my control.
2. Hot Buttons
   Tied to the first point.
   My hot button is whenever I approach someone with warmth and sincerity, and someone takes advantage of it.
   The underlying cause is my fragile ego built upon the external validation of others.
   Changing the first point would help alleviate this hot button greatly.
3. Frame control
   I fell within the frame.
   Sometimes assertion is not the best course of action for manipulative individuals.
   Use covert/passive aggression back to re-gain my power and stand up to the person.
4. My friendship with this person.
   Is it worth to stay in touch with this person?
   Maybe it was a mistake to reach out to him after distancing from him for a while.
   My calendar reminded me that it was his birthday, so I thought it was natural to wish a happy birthday message to my friend.
   But I was too impulsive and did not think about my friendship with this person beforehand.

I acknowledge that this moment was painful for me.
I will adjust what my self-esteem is built upon.
I will build my self-esteem upon how much I add value to my life and other people's life.
And also whether I stand up for myself effectively when my boundaries are crossed.
Now my self-esteem is built upon more controllable factors.

The shaky portion of my self-esteem was that I did not spend enough time developing the portion of how I dealt with others.
My thinking was that "People do not have the right to cross my boundaries."

My belief will be from now on

"I will stand up to people who cross my boundaries to the best of my abilities.
If I fail to do so, I have done my best, and am proud of it.
It was the person's choice to not respect my boundaries.
Harsh reality but I did my best.
Now I will move forward from here with my newly obtained information about this person."

I have found this incident surprisingly painful and that's okay.
It has been an opportunity to reflect and learn.

This is the quote from Lucio's book, Ultimate Power that I am internalising:

For example, I care what people think and what they think of me. I care a lot. It’s extremely important feedback. But it does not define me. It doesn’t hurt me, or at least not too badly, when people criticize me, and I don’t base many of my life’s most important decisions on what other people think. And, most importantly, external validation feels good, but I don’t need it for my happiness and self-esteem.

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on December 14, 2020, 12:58 pm

Me: Happy Birthday! *Toasts*
Him: You too!

That was already off.
Do you guys have birthdays on the same day, or near the same day?

If not, he outright rejected the wishes.

It's power-scalping.
Congratulating someone, being nice, saying "hi" first, in a way, these all give away power.
When people answer warmly back, then it's win-win.
But when someone uses that nice opening to one-up others, they're power scalping.

After that, I would have replied with a:

Me: Happy Birthday! *Toasts*
Him: You too!
Me: ?

Purposefully super low investment, meeting game with game.

Or standard uncovering against all types of covert/micro/daily nastiness power moves, as you did in your next example:

Me: Happy Birthday! *Toasts*
Him: You too!
Me: What do you mean

The conversation then escalated as you wanted to be made whole again for the power-scalping and to come out of the one-down position -a very fair request-, while he wanted to hold on to his "power" and avoid taking a step back.

Him taking screenshots to "prove" he was right was all smart-aleckey games that focused more on achieving "victory" and petty power, and quite low-value.

If you wanted to assertively address it rather than dropping it, then going meta here could have bene a good choice.

I like this a lot:

"Well, that's very nice of you! A long time friend wishes you a happy birthday and that's all you come up with? Time zone?"

It goes meta with humor, and does so quickly, directly, and effectively.
It also uses shaming to push him into apologizing and stepping back.

If you wanted to be more direct, then you'd only have to take out the humor and turn it more matter-of-factly. Something like "I wished you happy birthday, which is a kind gesture, and while it might be a few hours early, it feels demeaning when one denies the wishes".

Quote from Matthew Whitewood on December 14, 2020, 1:49 pm

Lucio, thank you for helping me to understand what is going on better!

Do you guys have birthdays on the same day, or near the same day?

Our birthdays are not close at all.

Now it all makes sense.
It's power scalping.

The question mark is genius. I would have never thought about that.
Low investment, meeting game with game.
Like how to deal with street hustlers.

"Well, that's very nice of you! A long time friend wishes you a happy birthday and that's all you come up with? Time zone?"

Thanks for this phrase John, and, to Lucio, in explaining the dynamics of this comeback.
John, I will join you in the journey to counter value-taking games and learn more assertive comebacks.

If you wanted to be more direct, then you'd only have to take out the humor and turn it more matter-of-factly. Something like

Lucio's Statement: I wished you happy birthday, which is a kind gesture, and while it might be a few hours early, it feels demeaning when one denies the wishes

My Original Statement: Yes but you are messing with me. When you play with time zones and I wish you happy birthday, it occurs to me that you do not appreciate my gesture.

Looks like my assertion was a bit off as it did not explain the dynamics precisely.
I should have stated what he was doing exactly with his time-zone games by focusing on "a few hours":
"while it might be a few hours early, it feels demeaning when one denies the wishes."

Rather than saying "you play with time zones"
"When you play with time zones and I wish you happy birthday, it occurs to me that you do not appreciate my gesture."

Because he is being smart-aleckey, he will find ways to nitpick on my words.
So, by being direct, assertive and precise, he will not be able to manoeuvre around my words.

I can also make this statement after he says "I'm not playing with zones. I am in a different time zone."

Me: Yes but you are messing with me. When you play with time zones and I wish you happy birthday, it occurs to me that you do not appreciate my gesture.

Him: I'm not playing with zones

Him: I am in a different time zone

Me: I wished you happy birthday, which is a kind gesture, and while it might be a few hours early, it feels demeaning when one denies the wishes.

This would reaffirm my assertion once more.

I agree with John.
I'm thinking of letting this person fade away from my life.
He does not add much value.

Or use him to practise power dynamics from time to time.

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on December 14, 2020, 3:28 pm

Yeah, exacvtly, from a power dynamics point of view you can interpret his reply as if to say:

Ah, got ya, you invested in coming to me and gave away power being kind, and now (instead of being kind back), I reject you and your effort, which makes me higher power (rejecting people is inherently higher power)

Your original assertive response was already going in the right direction, the bits that could have been improved were making it less accusatory and more descriptive / objective, and stating it earlier.

And yes, if he often deals with others (or with you) in that tone, fading away seems like a good option.
Keeping in touch requires effort, and that effort is best spent on those who deserve it.

Quote from John Freeman on December 14, 2020, 6:10 pm

Hello Matthew, I recommend you do again the lesson “Law of social exchange” in PU. It’s the first one. I did it again yesterday and it’s very good I think.

Quote from Matthew Whitewood on December 15, 2020, 3:07 am

Ah, got ya, you invested in coming to me and gave away power being kind, and now (instead of being kind back), I reject you and your effort, which makes me higher power (rejecting people is inherently higher power)

Clears it up even further.
Especially this rejection is not stemmed from any difference in interests.
Rather it stems from a "power hungry" attitude.
Not sure if that is an accurate phrase because power players usually don't play these games.

Your original assertive response was already going in the right direction, the bits that could have been improved were making it less accusatory and more descriptive / objective, and stating it earlier.

Too many "you"s in my original statement. It does sound accusatory.
Mixed up the techniques when dealing with aggression where you keep the comment on the other person.
If going for assertive statements, I will focus on how it affects me in a descriptive/objective manner.

This is what I mean by keeping the comment on the other person to avoid being pushed onto the defensive.

Boss: *Shouts At You*
Me: You seem really angry. ...

But this doesn't sound accusatory.
More like labelling the emotion openly.

I will review the techniques and open another thread to clarify this point if necessary.

Hello Matthew, I recommend you do again the lesson “Law of social exchange” in PU. It’s the first one. I did it again yesterday and it’s very good I think.

That module is golden indeed.
Reviewing that together with the assertiveness module.
Putting this as a priority till the year ends.

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on December 15, 2020, 9:57 pm

Matthew: Rather it stems from a "power hungry" attitude.
Not sure if that is an accurate phrase because power players usually don't play these games.

Yeah, exactly.
The lower level, social-climbing ones do.
And a few ones at the top who still carry that poor, social climber mindset, but it's far less common, and not something high quality people would ever do.

Matthew: Too many "you"s in my original statement. It does sound accusatory. (...)

Yes, exactly again, both the quoted part, and the whole rest of the message.

Quote from Matthew Whitewood on December 16, 2020, 2:44 am

Thank you for the further elaboration.
Makes the concept very clear now.