*late* new year's resolution.

“I’m learning to love the sound of my feet walking away from people who aren’t good for me.”

I am an introverted extrovert. I love being around people, and I am fortunate that I have a lot of friends and people who care about me who surround me. One thing that I’ve noticed as I’ve gotten older is that it is HARD to make adult friends. Like, y’all, it’s not easy. I am a very fierce friend. I stand by my friends & I love them hard.

But, at some point, I felt like I had to consider those friends who may not put as much effort into the friendship as I chose to. Recently, I’ve been actively paying attention to my friendships. Now, I know that being busy is a real struggle. I know that people have a lot going on, so do I. I’m no stranger to being busy. Between working full time, being in a full-time PHD program, a newlywed and moving across the country, I KNOW busy. But I’m talking about those friends who put little to no effort into our friendship.

It’s hard to know when it’s time to cut someone out. But at the end of the day, you have to consider how these friendships are affecting you. It sucks to feel not good enough or not important enough for their time.

Toxic friends are bad listeners. Toxic friends criticize you for being yourself. Toxic friends are quick to anger. They envy your success and achievements. Toxic friends care more about themselves than what’s going on with you. They don’t think about your feelings and only want to hangout when they don’t have a better offer. They don’t keep in touch and they don’t care to change their behavior.

So my *extremely late* new year’s resolution for 2018, I’m cutting out the toxic friendships. If you don’t lift me up, then I’m not going to continue to make an effort only to be let down.

So to all of you who:

Actually text back

Celebrate my highs

Help me through my lows

Lean on me when you need help

Let me lean on you when I need some love

I appreciate you more than you know. I love you and I love knowing you.

xoxoGabrielle