Toxic Friendships

Greetings everyone!

I wanted to talk to you all a little bit about the friendships in your lives.  The work that I do for everyone puts me in a unique position to study relationship dynamics from many different points of view. I get to see people at their best and also at their worst.

As the years have gone by I have noticed more and more that many of my clients have fallen prey to someone in their lives who was supposed to be a friend. Sadly, those who pose as friends and make us believe in them are the ones that we are most likely to allow to hurt us.

Now don’t get me wrong! I am not proposing that every person who tries to be your friend has some ulterior motive and will in the end screw you over! That is not it at all. However, there are some categories of “friends” for which you should be on the look out.

We all might have some of the characteristics outlined below. But if you have a friend that falls heavily into one of these categories, you should take steps to figure out if they are truly a friend, or are they someone who you really don’t need in your life. Most of the time we don’t realize until it is too late that we have involved ourselves with a Toxic Friend.

Since women fall most prey to this type of friend, I will address it from a female point of view. Of course, these guys exist, too!

• Connie Controller: This is the friend who cannot get out of a conversation without telling you, “You know what you ought to do….” and then proceeds to tell you how to run your life. Generally speaking, The Controller’s life is probably in a shambles and since she can’t control it, she will try to control yours. This is also the friend who has to say where the two of you will have lunch, what the dress code will be for going out, etc. Most of the time if this person is your friend, you have gotten used to her telling you what to do and you go along with her program without even noticing it.
  
• My Idea Minnie: This friend cannot leave your idea or suggestion alone. If you say you want the two of you to bake chocolate chip cookies, she will want to bake chocolate chip MINT cookies. If you suggest something to her, she will generally negate it. A week, or month, or year later (when she figures you forgot about what you said), she will do the thing you suggested and claim that she came up with the idea or doesn’t know where she heard it. Maddening!
  
• Polly Passive: But she is really aggressive. Most of us have experienced passive-aggressive behavior and at one time or another we have probably all fallen into doing it ourselves. However, if you have that friend who constantly manipulates you with passive-aggressive behavior prepare yourself for friendship misery. Polly Passive is often a do-gooder friend who will want to do all kinds of favors for you, seems to put herself last and everyone else first, UNTIL the day she wants to call in those favors. “Well, you know that I did work those extra hours at the office so you could go see your sick grandma, but that’s okay, I understand if you can’t lend me $10,000.00 to start my business.” Her other trick is to make you feel guilty and sorry for her. “Oh I don’t want to burden you with my problems.” Then of course, you fall into the trap of saying, “It’s okay, what’s going on?” You know the rest of that story.
  
• Betty Blamer: This one always wants to know your opinion, wants to do what you want to do, always wants you to make the decisions. Of course, later on, when/if something goes wrong, she skillfully finds a way to remind you that it was YOUR decision that was wrong. You will never get her to make a decision because she likes to be blame free.
  
• Cookie the Coveter: She always compliments you and tells you how lucky your are to have your car, job, husband, family,whatever. She oozes admiration and acts like your biggest fan. BUT she will always remind you how “lucky” you are, assuming that everything you have was handed to you on a silver platter. She is busy trying to figure out a way to get what YOU have vs. working towards getting something on her own. While the other toxic people may only be an annoyance, she will be much, much more if you don’t watch out for her.
  

Just because someone may have some of these qualities doesn’t mean they aren’t worthy of your friendship. However, if you feel they are too toxic, find a way to start to spend less time with them.

Of course, there are many, many more types of toxic friends. Which ones have you come across? How did you deal with it? Just answer in the comments section! I would love to hear from you about this subject and any tips you might have for how to deal with toxic friends in your life.

Love, light, and peace,

Mambo Sam