I am sharing the news of our home purchase with my close and dear friends – it feels so good to share with this news with the people I like and admire. I’m grateful to be living in this place and to be sharing my joy with people I genuinely like. It feels so good to share my happiness and to not feel as if I have to temper it or play it down in order to make someone else feel better. I can rejoice openly with friends who honestly want what is best for me and I am noticing those friends with whom I am second guessing my choices to share this happy news.
The people who can only offer half-hearted support. The people who are going through their own trials may not be able to give support and that is ok. I am not going to weed these people out of my life but I am paying attention to which friends are going through something themselves and those who perhaps view our relationship as a competition. It is a gift to share this joy and being deliberate in who I share joy with is just as important as the choice to share pain or sorrow.
I am realizing that sharing joy is much like sharing pain – we must be selective with whom we share opportunities and our woes. Not everyone is able to give unquestioning support. Not everyone has enough to give to others. We are all on different journeys in this life. We are all sharing the path for but a short while, we must be as good to one another as we can manage, give what we can and go on. I am not lingering. I am open right now only to those people with whom I can celebrate and share both the highs and lows of life without reservation. I am opening the windows to let in the light and only the light.
I am becoming selfish. Selfish with my time, my energy, my resources. I am only sharing what limited energies I have that are extra. I simply do not have energy for those people that are not my people. We all know those dementors and vampires that wish to suck the life or joy out of the room or others. The people with deep wells of need that long to absorb whatever light or grace you have to give. I simply do not have room for that sort of person in my life anymore. I am moving on, I am moving forward, I am walking with grace and only taking with me those that share my calling.
Each of us travels a difficult path, I cannot walk my path and yours. I can only walk this journey the best way I know how and that includes being kind to myself first, loving myself first, and in order to do that to the best of my abilities I need to distance myself from that which drains me. When I do this I can give time and space to all the things that fill me up.
For me it is meditation, hot tea, reading good books, painting, writing, and petting my dog. I love walks in the evening and I have rediscovered my love for playing basketball in the driveway. I love friendships that enrich my life and sustain me – I love quality time with the people who love and support me. I am grateful. Truly deeply, grateful that I have learned so much and now know that I do not have to waste my time in relationships I’m not so sure about or people who make me question what I already know. I only have time for friends that feel like cool water, people who refresh and revive me.
Those dear souls that reawaken my interest in life and guide me to new discoveries. Those sacred and wonderful people who give me life and do not take what they are not willing to give back in return. How lucky am I to have survived the false and feeling friendships of my twenties to come away with some real, true gems that I plan to carry with me for many years to come.
It takes a lot of work to sift through the sand to find those good people that not only make life bright and beautiful, but to know how to invest in them and in yourself enough to keep those friendships going for the long haul. What a blessing experience is, it teaches us so much that we finally reach a place where we know the lesson. How wonderful it is to be in this place in life – I’m proud to have made it this far. And I’m grateful to overcome all that I have to reach this place. The view is grand and I am grateful to be here to see it – not everyone who starts the journey gets to reach this peak. We are the lucky ones.
What do you do that fills you up best? How do you take care of yourself by nurturing healthy and mutually supportive relationships?
