I didn't notice until @UDP bolded this line, but I think this is very important. What is unique about our help. If you particularly appreciate my listening and derive a special relief from our relationship (I mean "relationship" generally, not necessarily romantic), I would love some gesture that shows you think our relationship is special, something you wouldn't do for your other friends. E.g., putting in the effort to initiate an outing related to my interests, giving me a small trinket that shows you've noticed my personal preferences, giving me verbal compliments or a title like best friend (or girlfriend *grumble grumble*).
I do the aforementioned things too, and having one of those returned might better convey appreciation than, for example, returning listening or simply thanking us for/commenting on our advice. This is because these things take effort, attention, and initiative on your part, whereas listening/thanking are somewhat passive and too general--things you could easily do for casual acquaintances.
Ha, am I showing EII's tendency for emotional accounting? Anyway, be careful if you try it though, because if you get it really wrong (e.g., accidentally treat a vegetarian EII to a steakhouse meal), it will be worse than if you didn't do anything at all. Though gestures with smaller deviations would still be adored (e.g., accidentally take me to my second favorite theater instead of my favorite one).
This is probably true. Can you give an example so that I can be on the lookout for things I should be appreciating but am currently overlooking? I think it was nice when my LSE friend helped me organize my taxes, but it didn't make me feel particularly appreciated/special since it didn't take much extra effort for him (we are on the same grad school fellowship so he basically just told me what he did). I guess another element in the "special gestures" I asked for in the previous paragraph is that they take some kind of significant effort.
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Am I sounding too demanding? T_T I don't actually expect any of this from anyone, but I'm just saying these are the things that would make me feel really appreciated.
Maybe a good example is when my friends threw a surprise dinner party for me. I had spent the past year organizing birthday festivities and drawing cute cartoon cards for everyone, so I was kind of sad when no one even remembered it was my birthday (it was in the summer, and we are all in grad school, so we were away) or showed any indications of wanting to celebrate it even belatedly. But I was like, oh well, next year I'll just remind them myself and organize something for myself. But then, about half a year later, they surprised me with an "Economist appreciation dinner" and a card they all made together, each of them having drawn a cartoon of me. :') I was over the moon; this card is one of my most cherished possessions. (I suspect it was organized by an ILI friend, if anyone is interested in the typing of this incident.) (Somewhat ironically, I had brought gifts for everyone to the dinner, because I thought it was a normal end-of-the-semester dinner. I hope that saying that doesn't come off as show-off-y, just trying to show I'm not asking for more than I give. <__>)
In summary, three elements of gestures that would make me feel appreciated:
- Something personal that shows you know me well, something particularly meaningful to me
- Something that takes some effort
- Something I did not have to ask for myself.
By the way, I'm happy there's considerable interest in showing appreciation for the EIIs in your lives (much thanks to @Zero for starting the topic)! I hope that something in this thread is helpful to you.




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