cutting out toxic people in your life

one of the hardest things I have had to do during my healing journey, and actually, one of the first, was to cut out all negative and toxic things out of my life. and I'm talking, cut cut cut "as fast as you can to remove the cancerous tumor" kind of cut.

my therapist just looked at me and said something along the lines of, "you're miserable because you surround yourself with misery."

Mic.....DROP.

and so began the carving away. I switched out detective murder shows where people are feeding their neighbors to pigs, and instead watched all the Frasier, Big Bang Theory, Seinfeld, The Goldbergs, and any other funny, lighthearted tv shows and movies I could. NO DRAMA.

I also stopped following anyone on social media that was 1. miserable or 2. my thoughts made me miserable seeing there stuff. I wanted to post a giant sign that said, "it's not you it's me!", because this is back in the day when you couldn't just mute people on Facebook or instagram. You had to click that big black UNFOLLOW button, and they might, gasp*, know what you did.

but I was committed to feeling good. only good things. ONLY GOOD THINGS!!! and that included everything, including people.

there was one person in my life, that I was really close with. and I mean cloooose. almost as close as you can get. she was a good person. she had a kind heart...underneath her trauma. but she basically, well, how do I put this nicely? Was. a. giant.B.

She just couldn't be happy. She had co-dependcency issues, enmeshment, mother wounds, father wounds, low self-esteem, sad sack sally syndrome, miserable cow mothering disease.

all she could do was gossip about other people, find the negative every sitch and story. drag people down if they had any success. make fun of herself. body shame. talk crap about her kids, in front of her kids (AHHHH!!!!)

but how do you cut out someone who you love like that? and that lives so close to you?

because you are committed to healing. and loving. and you can't help others, and you can't give love, if you don't put your self needs and self love first.

so I gave her some boundaries, and she FREAKED. OUUUUTTTT.

I told her, "I'm going to walk away when you are talking negatively about someone or something." and "I can hear that you are angry and upset, and I'm sorry, I know you can figure this out."

So I stopped spending as much time with her, and lovingly ignored her little tantrums and pouts, and silent treatments and "I told you so's" when the boundaries and space were just so uncomfortable and made me look like a horrible person.

but you guys, here's the thing...I started to feel so much better. And as I felt better, I didn't need to have her around as much. I didn't need someone telling me how everyone who had wronged me was a horrible, good for nothing loser, just to make me feel better.

I didn't need someone to talk to and complain to when the world was falling apart. Because, oh my gosh...I was starting to notice that the world was actually...could it really be?awesome?

I stopped seeing her as all of her past mistakes, and started to just meet her energy where she was. And if her energy was low vibing or on a complain train, I just didn't pick up. I didn't listen. I gave my attention to something else.

I asked God to help heal her. I asked God to help her see how safe she is now, how protected she is, how her needs and desires are awesome and not sad anymore. that her life isn't small and pointless, that God could show her how amazing she is and what a good job she has done.

I also prayed that God could get her to calm the bleep down and relax. I prayed that she could trust Me and trust God that we knew what we were doing. Trust that this is part of the process, she did an amazing job raising me but it was time to let me take care of myself.

I prayed to God that she could see how every mistake has been ok, that it was time to relax and take a back seat. But first I had to just get space.

And it worked. Sure she was mad at me. Sure she pouted. Sure she got really really angry and tried to keep telling everyone how crazy I was and what a mistake this was and I was a horrible daughter, and mother and friend and person.

But I kept the space. And I kept praying she could feel better. And I keep praying that she can continue to heal.

Why? Because I love her.

Because that horrible, no good, miserable cow of a person? ...was myself.

It was my ego personality. I was living 100% unconscious through my ego mind, and she was one scared, miserable and addicted person. She was tough, sure! And funny, oh so funny. But she was toxic. She believed the was better than other people, and special, and this specialness disease (as my life coach put it) had made her paralyzed and miserable, because if she was so special and amazing, if she messed up she had let THE ENTIRE WORLD DOWN.

It was so much easier to do nothing and be miserable.

So I gave her space. And she needed space, and I needed the space, and we needed God to do his thang and heal this biz up in here.

And it totally worked.

As I took care of myself, and had space from her fears, and negativity and toxic beliefs. My heart healed. I gained confidence. I could see what I needed and what was good for me, without her constant fears and protections.

I could confidently make decisions without her nitpicking everything and trying to tell me what to do.

And she slowly healed, and calmed down. I take care of her, I love her, I know she was doing her best, and I gave her space to relax.

I trusted God and trusted the space.

And so, if you are still here, bless your friend, you are amazing! Thank you for being here! But if you are still here, it is time to cut out the most toxic person in your life, and that is your ego. Your ego is anything you say after "I am". Because anything after that statement, is just a belief. It isn't real.

You can cut out negative and toxic people and things because it isn't who you are.

Who you are cannot be named. Cannot be contained. Does not have limits.

Who will find at the end of a self discovery journey is amazing, and she is waiting for you with loving arms. You just first have to ditch the lousy mouth miserable cow you've been hanging out with for oh, forever.