You wanna know the truth? My best friend just dropped me for no discernable reason in December when I was going through an unrelated mental breakdown (started in October) that required new treatment. To this day I have no clue what happened.

This has, without a doubt, been the most traumatic event that has ever happened to me. I had felt that maybe there was distance there, but I was trying to take care of myself. He reassured me he loved me just 1 week prior. Then, he said he was going to quit working with me.
He had been my business partner and literally helped me co-own my business. He requested his name be dropped from the company completely and that he needed to "put my family first" and find a different job. I don't know what that family first comment meant at all...
Then, he stopped communicating with me as frequently. This lasted a few days. He started acting extremely squirrelly and dodging direct questions. Very innocent questions like, "are you doing okay?" Again, this whole time I'm dealing with a genuine mental breakdown.
Last, he sent me a bizarre vague message, telling me that he didn't want to talk to me "in the foreseeable future" and cited some of the - honestly - most paranoid reasons for this. We live literally across the globe from one another. One of the things he accused me of was ...
video and audio surveillance of his home. He said he believed that I could murder him or maybe his family. He accused me of wanting to break up him and his wife. He told me I gaslighted him, that I "made him sick", that I was stalking him online, etc ...
Another thing he accused me of was sending him emails from my partner's email account. I have no idea where any of this came from. I was not being hostile with him in any way and I was dealing with a crippling mental breakdown that made it literally impossible for me ...
to carry out the sorts of tasks that he said I was doing. Remember, as he quit, the business, he also left me doing double work on top of the mental breakdown. I didn't know what to do, so I filed a police report to leave a paper trail if he tried to move against my business.
I don't think I could overstate enough that I genuinely loved this man. I wanted to be nothing but a positive force in his life. He was the closest person in my life aside from my partner and family. I was in a brain fog when this happened and I didn't know how to cope.
A few days ago, I made the mistake of reaching out to him. Just basically saying that I shouldn't have taken the action I did and that I was open to hearing from him. Honestly, I was lonely. I'm afraid I'll never make another friend again after this.
Thankfully, he didn't respond. That wouldn't have been healthy. I got spooked and cried about making such a huge mistake. I'm left feeling like I'm completely broken, like there's something very very wrong with me. I wonder, how could a person who was so close misread me?
How could someone who should have known better misread me to the extent that he did? His words have left me feeling terrified of human connection. I'm afraid that if I find something out about someone - say through their profile - then I'm some sort of horrible stalker.
I'm afraid that maybe I did the things he said I did but I don't remember or that I'm so messed up in the head that I literally repel people from me. I feel that I have to protect people from getting to know me. But see, there's this part of me that *knows* that is wrong.
I'm fighting REALLY hard through this mental breakdown with a team of professionals. I'm working on my health which has completely tanked. I'm trying to put one foot in front of the other each day. But I don't know how to reclaim my power.

I thought telling my story might help.
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More from Life

THREAD: 12 Things Everyone Should Know About IQ

1. IQ is one of the most heritable psychological traits – that is, individual differences in IQ are strongly associated with individual differences in genes (at least in fairly typical modern environments). https://t.co/3XxzW9bxLE


2. The heritability of IQ *increases* from childhood to adulthood. Meanwhile, the effect of the shared environment largely fades away. In other words, when it comes to IQ, nature becomes more important as we get older, nurture less.
https://t.co/UqtS1lpw3n


3. IQ scores have been increasing for the last century or so, a phenomenon known as the Flynn effect. https://t.co/sCZvCst3hw (N ≈ 4 million)

(Note that the Flynn effect shows that IQ isn't 100% genetic; it doesn't show that it's 100% environmental.)


4. IQ predicts many important real world outcomes.

For example, though far from perfect, IQ is the single-best predictor of job performance we have – much better than Emotional Intelligence, the Big Five, Grit, etc. https://t.co/rKUgKDAAVx https://t.co/DWbVI8QSU3


5. Higher IQ is associated with a lower risk of death from most causes, including cardiovascular disease, respiratory disease, most forms of cancer, homicide, suicide, and accident. https://t.co/PJjGNyeQRA (N = 728,160)
1/ Here’s a list of conversational frameworks I’ve picked up that have been helpful.

Please add your own.

2/ The Magic Question: "What would need to be true for you


3/ On evaluating where someone’s head is at regarding a topic they are being wishy-washy about or delaying.

“Gun to the head—what would you decide now?”

“Fast forward 6 months after your sabbatical--how would you decide: what criteria is most important to you?”

4/ Other Q’s re: decisions:

“Putting aside a list of pros/cons, what’s the *one* reason you’re doing this?” “Why is that the most important reason?”

“What’s end-game here?”

“What does success look like in a world where you pick that path?”

5/ When listening, after empathizing, and wanting to help them make their own decisions without imposing your world view:

“What would the best version of yourself do”?

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"I really want to break into Product Management"

make products.

"If only someone would tell me how I can get a startup to notice me."

Make Products.

"I guess it's impossible and I'll never break into the industry."

MAKE PRODUCTS.

Courtesy of @edbrisson's wonderful thread on breaking into comics –
https://t.co/TgNblNSCBj – here is why the same applies to Product Management, too.


There is no better way of learning the craft of product, or proving your potential to employers, than just doing it.

You do not need anybody's permission. We don't have diplomas, nor doctorates. We can barely agree on a single standard of what a Product Manager is supposed to do.

But – there is at least one blindingly obvious industry consensus – a Product Manager makes Products.

And they don't need to be kept at the exact right temperature, given endless resource, or carefully protected in order to do this.

They find their own way.