“You don’t ever have to feel guilty about removing toxic people from your life. It does not matter whether someone is a relative, romantic interest, employer, childhood friend, or a new acquaintance – you don’t have to make room for people who cause you pain or make you feel small. It’s one thing if a person owns up to their behaviors and makes efforts to change. But if a person disregards your feelings, ignores your boundaries, and “continues” to treat you in a harmful way, they need to go” ~ Daniel Koepke
I am currently going through a tough and turbulent time in my life right now, going through a tough wave and trust me when I say it’s so easy to preach a sermon of motivation and so much more difficult to apply these sermons into your life.
One important thing I have come to realize in these dark times is that sometimes you would drift, find yourself in a mess and not even know how to get redemption or how to get your life back on track and that’s totally okay, it is part of the phase and process of survival to edify and strengthen you.
So I am affirming and declaring that it will be okay, I know I will overcome and emerge stronger and wiser and so instead of dwelling on this phase I am choosing to purge and cleanse my life thoroughly.
If you are going through such a phase I want you to know this, the struggle, limitation and obstacles are only here to make us stronger and better. A tough phase can sometimes be a reawakening call, a call to take a step back and thoroughly reset, cleanse your life and that is exactly what I’ll be doing today.
You also do not have to wait for an awakening call to properly purge and cleanse your life releasing all forms of limitation in your life is a mandatory process of growth.
It is one of the most important things you must do, if you have intentions to grow, you have to be able to take out the toxic people and habits in your life. Becoming your best and true self will require shedding who you used to be, people with limiting and negative energy and habits that are obstructing you.
Today we will be focusing on eliminating the toxic people present in your life and the process it entails. Toxic people are people who, through their actions and inactions, harm your physical, mental, emotional, and financial health.
Have you ever had friends you had to cut off just because they were never impacting anything positive into you? Those are exactly the kind of toxic people this article is referring to.
Removing toxic people from your life is something you have no choice but to do. To attain the highest statuses of success, you need to get rid of toxic relationships. But then again, how do you even know you are in a toxic relationship?
Well, in this article, you are going to see some of the signs that will point out that you might be in a toxic relationship. The same way you need to get rid of toxic habits, you need to get rid of toxic people too. We all need to detoxify ourselves.
Before we dive deep into this, I want you to affirm these to yourself to make way for releasing, purging and cleansing.
I am releasing——————– To Gain more
Fear———————–Peace
Self-doubt————-Self-trust
Feelings of lack—————-Gratitude
Pain from the past————-Healing and clarity
Shame—————-Self-acceptance
Negative self-talk———A healthier inner dialogue
Worry—————-Mindfulness
Resentment————–Happiness
Comparison————Trust in my path
Negative people————-Space for optimism
Ironically, the toxic people in your life are some of the hardest people to leave. Why? Because they are the masters of emotional manipulation. The toxic people in your life know how to emotionally manipulate their victims into believing that they are not toxic.
However, most times, their actions do not match their words. In case you are wondering what exactly should be looking out for in toxic people, here are a few of them:
1. Toxic People Mostly Take Without Giving Back
Most toxic people in your life are not bothered about what you are getting in your friendship/relationship with them. Their actions and inactions are centered around what they are to gain.
Getting into a business deal with a toxic person is one of the riskiest things you can do. In fact, it is suicidal. Toxic people are self-centered and do not really care about the other party.
2. Toxic People Are Emotionally Manipulative
Most toxic people in your life are aware of their toxicity and so, they employ emotional manipulation as a device to get what they want. Despite being aware of your inability to help them, toxic people would say things that would make you feel guilty for not being able to. This way, they are able to penetrate your emotions and get you to do what ordinarily, you would not do.
3. Toxic People Amplify Your Failure
Failure is an inevitable feat, and at some point, everyone has to fail in order to succeed. However, the reactions of the people around you matter a lot.
How do your friends treat you at your low times? Do they make fun of you, or lift your spirit up? If they do not do the latter, then they are definitely not worth being your friends.
It is important to note that toxic people are not necessarily your enemies. Your friends and relatives can also be toxic. In this article, I will be listing 10 toxic people you should get rid of. Grab a bar of chocolate/get a cup of coffee and enjoy the ride…
1. Those Who Spread Negativity
The toxic people in your life, take delight in seeing your downfall. You should avoid people who only specialize in spreading negativity. Such people receive brilliant ideas with pessimism and do not appreciate newer approaches to things.
To achieve utmost success in life, you are advised to avoid these people at all costs. Ensure that you only surround yourself with people who are interested in giving you nothing but positivity.
2. Those Who Criticize You All The Time
Another set of people that should be avoided are those who have nothing to offer than criticisms. They are people whose only specialty is looking for faults. One’s efforts can be frustrated when they are always met with criticism, and not words of encouragement.
Now, am I saying criticisms are bad? No! In fact, you need criticisms to grow, constructive criticisms. The toxic people in your life do not want to criticize you, they want to break you with their words.
3. Those Who Are Self-Centered
The third group of toxic people that should be strongly avoided are those who are always self-centered. Self-centered people are only concerned about themselves. They prioritize their gains over everything else. And of course, self-centered people are not trustworthy, because they are only looking out for themselves, and no one else.
A self-centered person does not know the importance of sacrificing for a friend. They are the worse set of people to go to when you are hurting because, by nature, they do not care.
4. Those Who Are Deliberately Hurtful
As much as you can, you should avoid people who derive pleasure in hurting you. Of course, I am not referring to physical hurt. Hurt can come in many ways.
Toxic people are the masters of emotionally hurting people. When you notice that someone is constantly bringing nothing but hurt to you, and derives pleasure in ridiculing you in public places, you should ensure that you cut them off as quickly as you can. Everyone deserves happiness and so if all they have to offer is nothing but hurt, you should cut them off.
5. Those Who Are Envious
The toxic people in your life, are not pleased by your growth. The envious are those who never want to see you grow. Some people rationalize your wins as an avenue for competition. To them, you are in a competition and they would never support you.
The moment you notice that someone is constantly making every good news about you, seem like a failure to them, and is always comparing your progress to his, you should ensure that you cut them off. These are envious people, and would definitely stall your growth process.
6. Those Who Constantly Limit You
Having a circle that is as goal-oriented as you, is a rare blessing. When you find yourself in a clique that is unproductive, your potential will be most likely suppressed.
Where there are persons who do not aspire to do great things or are not intentional about their own growth, they see your energetic self as being “overly ambitious” and as such, try to talk you down in ways that you doubt yourself at times. It is always best to leave such people.
7. Those Who Rob You Of Your Happiness
Toxic people in this category are people who are not enthusiastic about your achievements as much as you would have expected them to be, given the proximity you have with them. They try to downplay your hard work, always finding ways to make you feel unsure and insecure about yourself. This can be very traumatic especially when they are people you feel you share a bond with.
8. Those Who Are Fundamentally Lazy
Persons under this category are persons who are unbothered about life generally. They do not even care about their own selves in terms of breaking grounds and achieving things, let alone feel inspired by yours. You are very susceptible to adopting this lackadaisical attitude towards your growth too if you keep moving with them. It is always best to cut them off.
9. Those Who Keep Disappointing You
These are persons who do not care about your feelings. They do not regard you or how you may feel with their continuing inconsiderate actions. They hurt you and then show little or no remorse. They are unrepentantly toxic. Do away with them.
10. The Shady Manipulators
Shady manipulators are people who use knowledge of your weaknesses to shame and guilt trip you into doing things you don’t want to. Their dealings with you are mostly with ulterior or selfish reasons. They are very crafty people who through their words, breakthrough your self-confidence and are able to manipulate you into doing their bidding. They use your emotions against you.
Every relationship, be it platonic, romantic or blood relations, is at least either symbiotic or parasitic in nature. Symbiotic in the sense that, at least one of the parties benefit from that relationship. A parasitic relationship is one where one of the parties is consistently harmed by the other party.
Undoubtedly, relationships with toxic people are highly parasitic. Oftentimes than not, victims of toxicity are more affected emotionally than physically. This is because toxicity is shown more during verbal communications. A toxic relationship is a dangerous threat to mental health. It has serious consequences on its victims, some of which are:
1. Feelings Of Low Self-Worth
One of the biggest wins of a toxic person is breaking through the walls of their victim’s self-confidence. You begin to question your adequacy and your worth. You begin to feel so unsure and insecure about yourself so much that it manifests in your interactions with other people.
2. Depression
Victims of toxicity are very likely to be depressed. Repeated exposure to toxic behaviors tends to affect them psychologically and emotionally thereby causing them to gradually withdraw from their otherwise bustling self.
3. Feelings Of Helplessness
Toxic people, when not cut off early enough, will have a good grasp of their victim’s emotions. They make their victims feel helpless as they are either able to influence your decisions to suit their own designs or upset you so much that you lose hold on yourself.
4. Insecurity
Feelings of insecurity are feelings of self-doubt. Insecure people feel uncertain and anxious about themselves. They lack confidence and assurance about themselves, even in the face of no apparent threat or reason to feel that way.
Toxic people make you feel drained and unhappy about yourself, thereby placing pressure on you to change something about yourself.
5. Pessimism
Continuous exposure to toxic behaviors changes your outlook to life and things generally, sometimes, long after you may have moved on from such relationships. You tend to distrust people and keep to yourself a lot. You feel unnecessarily suspicious and have a hard time socializing with people.
As said earlier, cutting off toxic people doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to make enemies with them. The toxic people in your life should not necessarily be your enemies. You could just keep them at arm’s length and deny them every access to your feelings and emotions. It is easier to identify a toxic relationship from the outside than when you are in one.
Most times, victims of toxic relationships do not see these red flags easily, or worse, they have become so accustomed that they see no harm in them anymore.
Some try to give excuses for the toxic party’s behaviors or get defensive when they are questioned about them. Most persons cling on to toxic relationships because they feel indebted in one way or the other to the toxic party.
An instance is a toxic relationship between two lovers, where the woman would rather cling to her toxic partner because her entire existence is hinged on his financial support.
When a relationship is toxic, it stunts your personal growth and blocks you from growing into your full potentials. Nobody deserves to be in a toxic relationship. As hard as it may seem, you have to let go and move on with your life.
Toxic relationships can affect your physical health. Brooding and depression could cause you illness.
FOR YOU:
Hey there! It is always best to observe new people before letting them in your personal space. Listen closely to those subtle jabs coated with humor. They tell a lot about how the other person feels about you.
A healthy relationship does not drag you down, remember, it inspires you to be better. Taking out toxic people in your life is not something that should even be negotiated.
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