How to Embrace Healthy Friendships and Maintain a Distance from Toxic Ones
By PeggySue Wells
Who are you choosing to be your friends? If your circle of friends consists solely of people who need to be rescued, and individuals who join you in poor-me pity parties, it’s time to expand your circle.
My relationships are healthiest when they include
· someone I mentor
· my peers
· someone who mentors me
Healthy friendships do not allow me to perpetually be the victim, nor do they drain me dry with their own insatiable needs.
“Never approach a bull from the front, a horse from the rear, or a fool from any direction.” Cowboy wisdom
Friendship Fears
I sometimes fear becoming too vulnerable in a friendship because
· I fear being rejected
· I fear competition
· I fear appearing to be needy
Research shows that people feel balance when they experience interactions with family, friends, and work associates. When one of these categories is missing, we experience a level of loneliness. While rejection happens in relationships, when I am healthy and my friendships are quality, rejection will still be disappointing, but not overpowering.
Healthy friendships
· encourage me to be the best I can be
· don’t buy my excuses for staying stuck
· have unselfish motivations
· can say no to each other and remain strong
· share feelings honestly
· can trust each other to honor confidences
· are accountable
· are available
· give each other freedom to fail — as we all will on occasion
· are built on equal footing
· ask each other about progress on our goals
Healthy friendships are not
· always there
· everlasting. They can be seasonal.
· competitive
· envious
· exclusive
· rescuing
· smothering
· testing
“Oh, the comfort — the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person — having neither to weigh thoughts, nor measure words, but pouring them all right out, just as they are, chaff and grain together; certain that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping, and then with the breath of kindness blow the rest away.”
Dinah Craik, A Life for a Life
Relationship Check
I attract healthy friendships when I am healthy. Here are questions that help me bring my best self to my friendships:
· Am I seeking fulfillment from another?
· Am I drawn to people because of our common pain? Or do I relate to the greatness and potential in others?
· Am I focused on the opportunity to participate together in community?
Healthy friendships are a two-way street. I bring my best self to my friendships when I am:
· Content with my age
· Content with my weight
· Developing my talents
· Not sabotaging my potential
· Working with my limitations
· Not taking on more than I am able
Toxic associations talk about others while beneficial friendships focus on ideas, dreams, and potential. When a typical topic of conversation is a common enemy (political, family member, neighbor, or work associate), this is a negative relationship. People who talk poorly about others to me are talking poorly about me to others. This scenario never ends well. It’s time to change the conversation and/or change the relationship. These associations don’t have to be completely jettisoned — and in the case of work associates or family members that is not even an option. But I can move them to an outer ring of my relationships where our conversation is less intimate and always more uplifting.
I am involved with healthy relationships when my friends and I both dream big and accomplish our goals. Vibrant friendships support and encourage each other to be our best.
“Friends … they cherish one another’s hopes. They are kind to one another’s dreams.” Henry David Thoreau
Call to Action
Click here to get a list of quality questions and conversation topics for improved relationships.
