“Friendships have an expiration date. Some of those dates are after our own although most are before.” – Kelly Rudolph
In October of 2014 a “friend” I’d stood behind and been supportive of turned on me. In addition to the friendship her toxic behavior and false accusations ended, she was influential in a group I invested my time, energy and passion into for over a year so that ended too. I was happy with the way I managed her yelling untruths in my face in front of people I cared about. My words were simple, “I’m going to go now,” and I turned and walked away. My personal growth accomplishments allowed me to stay calm and collected. Two things happened after that:
- I released the emotions from her and the group to learn the lessons I needed yet never miss them or wonder, “what if…” because that would be toxic to my future.
- I wrote an article on the topic of toxic friendships for YourTango that landed on their home page.
Two weeks ago today, Yahoo! Beauty published my article onto their site! As you can imagine having TWO articles on Yahoo in the same week has been exceptional! I’m honored and grateful.
The topic of toxic friendships and relationships is a hot one and unfortunately happening in many people’s lives, which is why the big websites jump on it.
What does this have to do with YOU?
You need to know how to identify a toxic relationship in your life and have tools handy to shift your perspective quickly so it doesn’t bring you down. You also need to know how to let it go and keep the toxicity from the breakup of a friendship or significant other from polluting your energy that creates your future.
Here is an important excerpt from my article:
As crazy as it sounds, people don’t do things to us. They do things for themselves to get their needs met. If someone helps you, they did so because it makes them feel good to help. If they attack you, it makes them feel big and strong for the moment. If we take everything personally, we won’t have any self-confidence at all, which results in low self-esteem, which creates a lack of healthy boundaries to protect us mentally, emotionally and physically. That leaves us where most of us are today—feeling uncomfortably vulnerable with our emotions flapping in the breeze of other peoples’ words and actions.
Click Here to read full article.
We have to get our needs met somehow. And cheating, smoking, abuse, volunteering, loving and sharing our gifts with those we can help all fall into the category of getting our needs met. When you know what your needs are, it’s a heck of a lot easier to get them met. And the simple truth is you need to meet them yourself so that your friendships and relationships are free of guilt, blame, shame and obligation. Just think if instead of reaching for that glass of wine to accompany your “whine,” you had a healthy, empowering way to get your need of certainty, significance or connection met? What if all you had to do was learn what basic needs every human including you has and develop a strategy to meet them …on your own terms? The Positive Women Rock community is based on empowerment and certainty about our ability to create a life you enjoy and future you look forward to. Begin your free 5-Day Mini eCourse right away by signing up for my free Life Strategies.
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