Photography by Sandra Vijandi
Relationships can be strange, especially platonic relationships with friends and family. These relationships can shape us more than romantic relationships can. Sometimes these relationships can bring us so high, and other times, they can be toxic, leaving you constantly feeling sad, down and unsettled.
I'm at that stage of my life that if someone's (I hate to sound so cliche but) not adding any value into my life then there's no room for them anymore. As brutal or selfish as that sounds, it's reality. In my 23 (and a half) years if there's one thing I've realised; people can be really selfish, and the only one who ends up hurt and upset is myself. So over the last three years I've had to change my outlook on life and make some adjustments.
I used to be that girl that would get so caught up in the little things If someone said something mean about me, or they upset my feelings over something so minuscule I found myself constantly crying upset. It wasn't until 3 years ago when someone I thought to be a sister and a best friend broke my heart that I knew I had to change my outlook and really started to care less about the little things.
I truly am over the moon with the handful of friends that I do have as I know I can always count on them, but because it was so hard for me to move on from this broken relationship (I may sound dramatic to some, but for me, it was one of the hardest things I've ever had to deal with) I thought that I would share some tips that have helped me along the way.
1. Negative friendships hurt you more than anything
It's time to let go of this relationship. This person tends to use their jealousy to undermine you and your achievements and knock your confidence down. Jealousy is toxic, and it's even more toxic coming from those you see closest to you.
2. Reevaluate if it is a balanced friendship
Friendship or any relationship for that matter is a two way thing. Personally, I've had enough of people only messaging/calling me when they want something. There's certain people I only hear from when they want something, but they never actually just message to see how I am. I'm not the sort of person to openly talk about any issues going on. I feel like the person should care enough to ask, that's just me I guess. And after years of constantly giving, constantly messaging to see how people are, I've given up on them and reserve my time, energy and effort for people who I know actually care about me, and not what they can gain from me.
3. Look at yourself
Now I'm the first to admit, over the years there are certain friendships that I could have made more effort with. I could have called more, I could have messaged more. But I didn't. When I left my primary school at the end of year three, I had a pen pal and we continued to write to each other all the way up to the middle of secondary school. Just recently, I found that I hadn't sent my reply to her last letter, thus, the penmanship ended. I would say that I am a very supportive friend, I say it how it is, and I tend to expect the people around me to be the same, not undermine me, make a joke of me and when they don't 'behave' the way I deem to be 'normal' I get upset and frustrated. I'm working on this.
4. It's no one's fault.
Despite your best efforts, some relationships still breakdown. We get to that point in our lives where we just outgrow the people around us. I feel like over the last three years I have grown the most and I've noticed that sometimes we outgrow each other and sometimes we just grow into different people. We get to that stage where our priorities change, and some people don't like to see that positive change, so the best thing you can do is to just cut the amount of time you spend together. And because it really is no ones fault, whenever you do meet up, it's great to catch up and reminisce about the good old times.
5. Walking away from a bad friendship opens more opportunities
Once you're rid of the people that don't add much to your life you have more time on your hands, time to do things you want to do, meet new people that uplift you. In the blogging community it can get really lonely, your non blogger friends don't really understand it, they don't understand the support that you need and it can get a little frustrating. I am fortunate that my closest friends have tried to understand and are always there supporting me and I've been given the opportunity to meet lots of other bloggers, some that I can actually call really good friends who support, bring me up and are constantly there with any answers for my strange blog questions!
So there we go. These are my little tips for handling friendships. Have you found yourself having any of these thoughts? What did you do?
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