Seedust

Humans by nature sort through unnecessary individuals like tossing bad apples. However, unnecessary people are not equal to close friends who create toxic waste.

Toxic friends are those who bring more negativity than not into our lives. They will praise us one minute, then gladly throw us in the gutter and look the other way. Toxic friends are unpredictable, pushy, needy, competitive, and jealous. Yet, as much as we complain about them, we can’t seem to get rid of the cancer for one reason or another…

Putting up with a friend’s unruly stab and smack is a real mental hazard. But breaking up with her has a whole new meaning…. Consider it as an abusive relationship. You try to express your disappointment, yet she take no responsibility. You tell her she has let you down, she says you have let her down a thousands more times… You tell her again, she laughs it off. As long as the battered friend continues her role as a martyr, the toxic friend have no reason to stop doing what she does best.

It’s a classic case: To stay or leave… Get hit by a flaming boulder or smell fresh peonies?

The toxic breakup may be torturous in the beginning, hurtful during the climax, and confusing at the end. But it when it’s all said and done, your weight has been lifted. You are now free to go.

The whole point of the breakup is to put a stop to the negative relationship, to make yourself be heard and understood. After that, it’s up to the two friends to begin a new chapter and keep it as the end.

I started writing about friendship this week after seeing the significant roles people play in my life (read below). The few key friends I have in my life are the ones with mounds of respect and sincerity for others. And they don’t demand much in return. They have supported and loved me unconditionally, no matter how much I fell or cried. They put up with my snide sarcasms, bluntness, and loud howling laughter, because they know and accept who I really am. They are the second best people next to my children and mother.

Writing this piece brought so much comfort for me… smile.

My words of advice with some key points that should be practiced more:

1) A simple ‘thank you for being a good friend’ goes a long way than a gift.

2) A sincere interest on how they are doing, rather than just venting or talking about yourself.

3) A follow up call every week or two shows you are thinking about them.

4) Being able to apologize or express a disappointment sincerely and openly is key to better understanding.

5) Unconditional love (a true friendship needs this too).

6) We must meet, travel, eat, drink, dance, laugh, gossip, and grow old together.

.

It’s unfortunate when a friendship flops. Realizing that you never knew the person you thought you knew… This has happened a few times over the years and the pattern is unforeseeable at times.

Befriending someone who makes you feel like you won a jackpot one year and then the glass is empty the next. It’s sorta like the worst one-night stand in women years.

Here is one ultimate Girl-Breakup that is so classically memorable, not your usual cat fight. About a woman who one day floated into our lives like a golden feather. I’ll call her Stiletto Robot.

Rain, snow, or shine, Stiletto Robot wore stilettos heels everyday. She radiated a huge bleached smile with an unforgettable angelic personality and killer outfits to go with it. Her 24/7 supreme happiness and open-mindedness were uncanny. You just wanted to stand next to her, and everything would be alright. Not once did her behavior exhibit any flaws. She never had a bad day, and this baffled me to frown. She was the patented robot, made-in-Japan, with no glitch.

Stiletto Robot often caused her new female friends to have self-doubts when buried underneath the covers on sleepless nights. Because next to her, we felt like hormonal defects… Strangely, unlike other women, she kept everything under her sleeves when it came to her own personal affairs. Never complained about her husband or child.

Her facade, I couldn’t buy, because no one knew what her dirty laundry smelled like. I couldn’t trust. Would you?

Lo and behold, one summer day, Stiletto Robot and her family vanished. They packed up and bailed to a different city as if they were escaping from Rikers… She left without informing any one of her friends…The nerve! Friends? Stiletto Robot didn’t consider our relatinship of two years too warmly. She left without ever looking back. This gave me the shivers.

Sisterhood, loyalty, honesty, which makes up the power of friendship, had no meaning to Stiletto Robot. Surely, she wasn’t a run-away from the authorities, nor a schizo or suicidal. As perceptive as I maybe, to this day I can’t comprehend what went through her crazy golden feathers.

What did we learn from this knock-off ending of a friendship? That our invested time was a waste, not to mention the trust and bond we thought were real. What we gained were a several pairs of high heels we purchased for ourselves to wear when standing next to her… Baahaaaa! After she left, we went back to wearing our old flats and sneakers. How pathetic…

Stiletto Robot entered our horizon with a single mission: to dress our fat and crooked feet in high heels. Then she vanished… The End.

The Way It Should Be

Four Things Make Us Happy Here

by Robert Herrick

Health is the first good lent to men;
A gentle disposition then:
Next, to be rich by no by-ways;
Lastly, with friends t’ enjoy our days.

Do you know what kind of friend you are?

The importance of friendship is deeply rooted within the soul for most females. This is a universal attribute for women across the globe, oui?

Let’s take it up a notch… We need our girlfriends to help us mend our hearts after a bad breakup. We need them almost everday. If we don’t have a shoulder to cry on, eat, laugh, gossip, console, guide and explore with, then where do we go? What do we do?

Said this before and I’ll say it again. My fantasy is to go on a month vacation with my girlfriends, to be cleansed and be merry.

So comes a book that ultimately defines the role that our besty buddies play in our lives, and why we need them so. Bounce: Living the Resilient Life, by Robert Wicks, suggests we need four types of people into our circle of friends: the cheerleader, the prophet, the harasser, and guides.

Therese Borchard, a blogger on Huffpo defines these four characters, clear and simple:

1. The Prophet

The prophet is the type of person that calls us on any misguided attempts at something, makes us accountable for our behavior, and prompts us to be honest, even when that is not easy. The prophet challenges us, and can be a royal pain at times, but ultimately helps us to find freedom. Says Wicks, “Prophets point! They point to the fact that it doesn’t matter whether pleasure or pain is involved, the only thing that matters is that we seek to see and live ‘the truth’ because only it will set us free.”

2. The Cheerleader

To balance out the provocation and questioning of a prophet, a person also must have a few cheerleader friends: folks who offer unconditional love, support, and acceptance. Wicks says we need the encouragement of the cheerleader as much as the criticism and feedback of the prophet because “burnout is always around the corner when we don’t have people who are ready to encourage us, see our gifts clearly, and be there for us when our involvement with people, their sometimes unrealistic demands, and our own crazy expectations for ourselves threaten to pull us down.”

3. The Harasser

After we’ve been criticized and loved, we need to laugh. That’s why we need harassers, the third kind of friend, who helps us to see the humor in life’s frustrations and calamities. They help us to mock our unrealistic expectations, of ourselves and of others. Says Wicks, “This type of friend helps us regain and maintain perspective.”

4. Guides

Such persons listen to us carefully and don’t accept the “manifest content” (what we say and do) as being equal to the “total content” (our actual intentions plus our statements and actions). Instead, they search and look for nuances in what we share with them to help us to uncover some of the “voices” that are unconsciously guiding our lives, especially the ones that make us hesitant, anxious, fearful, and willful.