Letting Go of Unhealthy Friendships

I love this picture, a black and white picture of two people's pinkies barely holding on. A grip is still a grip, though. It'll keep you there as long as you hold on.

I look back at moments in my life where I felt this way. I could just sit and feel things losing its color, losing its relevancy, and losing its time in my life. The only problem was that, even though I knew there was no longer anything good for this to be here, I was still holding on. That small grip made it so difficult to actually get better.

You're gonna face a lot of difficult moments of realizing things are bad, and you won't be able to avoid the fact that, in order for things to get better, something might have to change. Someone or something has got to go. We try to come up with ways to make things better without really moving them around, without really sacrificing anything. I see the word sacrifice as letting go of something important to you for something of much greater value.

There was a time when I had so many friends, so many of those fun friends that everyone liked and everyone wanted to be friends with. It was fun for a while, but towards the end I started realizing that something was wrong and that I felt wrong. I wasn't happy, and I didn't really have friends that I could trust. And, while I still had the perks of fun and popularity, I was sacrificing honesty, integrity, grace, and my honest voice and opinion—all just to fit in.

I realized that sacrifice was very dependent on what truly matters to you. As much I said that I loved and cared about people, I would rather sit and talk about people because I valued gossip more than I valued standing up for those that couldn't even speak for themselves.

It took seeing the bad side of these friendships and being hurt myself for me to realize that it was all temporary, and it would come back and hit me even harder. It was hard to decide what I had to let go of in order to be better. But, if you really want to start over and move on to something better, first of all, you're gonna have to take out the trash and the mess of a house in order to see what a clean house looks like. Second, only then can you make room for the things that will actually make it a safe home.

You have the power to create a home from absolutely nothing. To shape and decorate the best way possible for who you are. You will slowly start inviting friends, relationships, and dreams into this home. I suggest you have a vision and you try to align it to something good and positive, and I suggest that you do everything you can to truly believe in it and stick to it so that moving on doesn't feel like a waste and burden. Letting go of the past can rightfully be a hard moment of mourning. But it can also be a moment of relief and celebration that it's time to be better.

I have great friends and relationships that I might have never found if I was still chasing after people that had me lost. Life is about change and growth and it's okay to let go of what's not right for you. That won't hurt anyone who truly cares about you and wants the best for you as well.