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Culture

How to Not be a Flaky Friend: Rules for Inviting and Accepting Invitations

Melody Valberg
The opinions expressed in this article are the writer’s own and do not reflect the views of Her Campus.
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Tampa chapter.

Trying to make plans with people can be a real hassle. This is because many people are so unreliable. Like seriously, reliability is such an underrated quality. Flakiness is a pet peeve of mine. When you’re being flaky, you are disrespecting the other person’s time. They’ve blocked out time from their busy schedule to hang out with you. If you cancel at the last minute or commit a no-show, your friend will no longer have plans. They could’ve used that blocked time to hang out with a more trustworthy friend. When you cancel without a good reason or don’t show up, you’re telling the world that you’re not reliable. Because of this, you’ll be brought down to a lower tier of friendship, which is not something you’d want if this friendship is important to you. Here are some rules that the invitation sender and receiver should follow in order to eliminate wasted time and resentment. 

For the Receiver: 

1. Do not automatically say yes to an invitation just because you’re excited or you want to be polite.

Michaela: “Hey Britney, do you want to see Doja Cat with me next weekend?”

Britney: “Oh my god yesssss!!!! That sounds like so much fun!”

*Fast forward to two nights before the concert, no messages from Britney*

Michaela: “Britney I’m so excited to see Doja with you!”

Britney: “I’m not sure if I can go with you anymore. I have a lot of exams to study for.”

*Fast forward to the morning of the concert, still no messages from Britney*

Michela: “Hey, do you know if you’re coming to the concert?”

Britney: “Sorry, I can’t come.”

See how annoying this is? Michela assumed that Britney would be able to come to the concert with her because she initially said yes. Then, when Britney wasn’t sure if she’d be able to come, she never told Michaela. Michaela practically had to pry an answer out of her. If Britney had been transparent with Michaela about her indecisiveness from the beginning, Michaela could’ve found someone else to go to the concert with her. If you’re not sure if you’ll be able to attend certain plans, just say so at the beginning. If you can’t go, or you don’t want to go, tell the other person ASAP. This will eliminate uncertainty for both parties.

2. Let the invitation giver know as soon as possible whether or not you will accept the invite. 

3. Be aware that if you can’t accept the invitation, another possibility is to offer an alternative plan. 

Michaela: “Hey Britney, do you wanna grab dinner with me tomorrow night?”

Britney: “Sorry, I can’t. I have to study for an exam that I have tomorrow. Would you wanna grab dinner Saturday night instead?” 

Britney is unavailable, but she still wants to hang out with Michaela, so she makes an effort to reschedule. 

4. If you know you need to cancel plans, cancel them ASAP. Do not be the friend who cancels at the last minute with a weak excuse. It’s even worse if you say nothing and don’t show up. 

For the Giver:

1. If you invite someone to do something and they say maybe, just assume it means no. Find other people to hang with, and if the initial person you asked ends up coming, great! If not, you still have people with you to do the things you enjoy.

2. If someone declines your invitations multiple times and doesn’t offer alternative plans, it would be wise to remove that person from your friend list. 

Melody Valberg is a writer for the Tampa Her Campus chapter. Her articles cover the topics of emotional intelligence, college life and life advice. Outside of Her Campus, Melody is pursuing a degree in graphic design with a minor in marketing. She's currently professionally illustrating her first children's book called The Hangry Lady, which will be published in the Fall of 2024. She also runs an art business called Melody's Portraits where she creates unique digital illustration, mixed media, and painted portraits of people and pets. She previously interned for IT Success, where she was responsible for completely redesigning their website, managing social media accounts, outreach, and creating engaging content. In her free time, Melody loves traveling, going to the beach, painting, singing karaoke, watching drag shows, spending quality time with her friends and family and journaling. She's also still a youtube kid at heart.