About six months ago I went through a period of change, I had pushed myself too hard and finally gotten to the point where I was a big, blubbering, overwhelmed mess feeling like I'd missed out on my whole life. Sexy, right? This delightful little moment of hitting rock bottom forced me to start making some big changes in my life. One of the biggest was to take a really good look at the people in my life.
Friends come in all shapes and sizes. There's the Facebook-only friends, who you hide from when you see them in public. There's the users, who only pop up when they need something or want to get together so they can spend five hours whinging about their life. There's also the life-long friends, who you see once in a blue moon but feel like no time has passed when you finally do catch up, as well as that one or two who are not just friends, but in fact you're soul mates!
When I finally took a closer look at my friend garden, I realised it was in need of some serious weeding. It wasn't until after the weeding was done I realised how influential my friendships with other people had been, how much the negative ones had been weighing me down and how important it was for me to foster positive relationships with other human beings.
Focusing on my few great friends created trust and security in my life. I knew they wouldn't be upset if I was busy and couldn't see them, I knew none of them would ever say a bad word behind my back and I would never say a bad word behind theirs. When we got together we would talk about positive, meaningful things like how our life-dreams and aspirations were coming along and we would laugh about fun, fond memories. We would never judge, criticize or berate each other, but would always be honest, after all if your new pants don't sit well on your hips, you need a trusted friend to tell you. Focusing on these few friends made me happier than I'd ever been. It still does.I had to make another big change too, this one had to do with me. I began trying my absolute best to give nothing but love and support to other people in my life. If I had nothing nice to say, I didn't say anything at all. If I felt jealous, I looked at myself and asked, 'Why? What's going on with me that I want what someone else has?" My fight isn't with another human, it's with myself. Maybe I'm upset because I wasn’t giving myself enough time to myself, so I started hitting to the gym and reading a book regularly, as this were the things that made me happier, heathier and wiser.
I don't know about you, but as a blogger I've had a lot of negativity come my way. Not just from the occasional internet troll, but from friends who look down on blogging or scoff at it and make underhanded remarks about it not being a 'real' career or a viable source of income. Quite simply put, "Ain't nobody got time for that." If you can't support me and my chosen path, I can't support our friendship and that's not fair on either of us, so, step off. Hit the pavement! Get outta here! Shoo!
The impact positive relationships with other friends can have on our lives is profound because friendship is understanding each other. To have another person listen to you in a time of difficulty, without judgement or fear of gossip, to have her understand and respect the gambit of emotions running through you, is invaluable. To have another friend support you and believe in you, tell you that you can achieve your dreams in life and you are beautiful and intelligent, is invaluable.
Gossiping, bitching and general nastiness between friends tends to start at school. We've all been bitched about and we've all bitched about someone. It's never a nice feeling to find out what someone else has said about you behind your back, despite this we tend to get sucked back into it. I know I'm guilty of it, I had the wrong friends in my life and when I was around them I turned into another person, someone I didn't like. Afterwards I felt really guilty about it, but guilt wasn't good enough, it had to stop. Saying something bad about someone else doesn't make you feel better, it just instills doubt in your mind and makes you question yourself.
Why do we waste time on bad friendships if all they do is bring us down and make us feel bad? If we're entitled to choose who our friends are, why aren't all our friendships good ones?
With this in mind, I weeded my garden. I got out my secateurs, pulled on my gloves and pruned away the crappy friends. I dug out the deep-rooted weeds that had been choking me, taking all my energy and turning me into someone I didn't like. I also took time to nurture the few friendships I truly valued, which turned out to be the small and perfect number of friends I needed in life. Just few, just handful. As for the rest, well, cutting them off mentally was the easy part, the hard part was telling myself not to feel guilty about it. I stopped engaging myself with them and slowly came out of the circle. It only took a few months to start feeling a difference and it was a feeling of white, crisp, cleanliness.
As women we have a deeply entrenched desire to put others first, heck, even when we cook dinner we give others the better-looking portions of food or the bigger share. When it comes to our friendships, it's time to put ourselves first. Life's too short to waste any time or energy on negativity, be it in the form of friends, gossip or anything else you can think of. Instead, cut out all the weeds and other junk taking up space and reclaim it for something positive. Reclaim it for you.
