I'm going to jump right in, you know how sometimes you have one of those friends? Like the one who seems to constantly put your friendship down, or don't fit in with anybody you hang out with? Or maybe they just lead a different lifestyle that you aren't comfortable with anymore. Those friends are what I look at as toxic friendships.
This is particularly easy to fall into when you are in college. Between trying to find what you want to do in life, participating in extra-curricular's, jobs, and having fun you end up meeting a lot of people. However, not all of the people we meet bring great meaning to our lives, and not all of them need to. Everyone should bring something to the friendship though, something positive. A great sense of humor, someone to talk about the deep things with, someone to go to lunch with, someone to make you remember to lighten up. These are great people in our lives, and we all have them, but we also have toxic friendships.
My toxic friendship is a really close friend actually. It's super sad because I know that she could be a great person one day and do things. Right now she's realizing that college is hard. Goodness is it, it doesn't come easy to everyone, and it is nothing like high school. Balancing being an adult, learning how to study, be somewhat responisble, and still knowing how to have fun? Its crazy. She hasn't learned how to balance that yet. Too much fun not enough study has lead to a really hard time, but no matter what she does she doesn't think any of it is her fault. Like any of it. She always has an excuse for why it turned out the way it did.
Now, I know that I've done that a bit but at some point you have to own up to your mistakes. The worst part? That isn't the worst part. She constantly tries to one up everyone around her, acts like she is better than everyone else, and she can be down right mean. I have one of my oldest friends who will come over to see me, and my toxic friend is often there (toxic friends seem to have a sticky tendency don't they?), and one day she confessed how often my toxic friend will act condescending to her. That isn't the only friend who has said something, and when it hurts people I care about it hurts me.
I know that I need to distance myself from her, and I have. It's okay to have a toxic friendship, as long as you don't let it become toxic to you. You may be the only good friend in their life, but if they aren't good for you please don't keep them around. It'll only end up hurting you in the end. Eventually they will realize how they've been acting, and I hope they change. More often than not they fall into the same old patterns. The best thing is to be honest, and if that means they don't appreciate it in the end, it't their loss.
My friends that I met through our toxic friend have all been saying the same thing lately. I go out to lunch with my guy friend, I'm babysitting our other friends cat soon, and today I went to the gym and lunch with a different friend from my toxic friend's group. We have great times together, and we are all so different it allows us to broaden each others horizons, I am so lucky to have them as friends. College is all about figuring out what we are doing with our lives, that includes who we want to keep in our lives. So, while toxic friends can be a drain sometimes they lead to other things like new friends, or wisdom on how to handle that situation. It's all a learning curve.
Are there toxic friends you have had? Or do have? Situations they've put you into? I'd love to talk about it!
