Make room for good relationships this year
Author advises decluttering bad friendships and keeping valuable ones
Clean your room! Roll up your sleeves and assess the mess. Sort through the clutter, and only keep what you need and want. Then close the door quick.
We’re talking about cleaning up your relationship room because whoever’s in it impacts your wellbeing. You invited them in, so it could be time to show them out.
“While you can’t quite kick anyone to the curb without causing a substantial amount of drama, you can, however, box them up and put them on a shelf, so to speak,” says Dr. Ivan Misner, co-author of Who’s in Your Room: The Secret to Creating Your Best Life.
Research shows friendships that bring us down are actually worse for our well-being than having fewer friends. Actually, friends may be more important to well-being than romantic and family relationships, but friends in need are not always friends indeed!
“The best part of a big clean is that it’ll free you up to spend more time with people that add value and joy into your life, thereby making you happier and more fulfilled,” says Misner, who’s been interviewed by NBC’s Today Show, Forbes, Fortune, Entrepreneur and more.
What you need to do is to put a metaphorical doorman in place and then curate your room to create your best life, says Misner.
Be very careful about who you let into your room, and learn how to manage the relationships you have with the people who are in your room.
Why not just totally dispose of the toxic human debris? “Let’s say you kick them out of your life. Good riddance, they’re gone. But are they really? Can you think of someone who was in your life that is no longer part of your life? What did they do?” Just remembering their toxicity means they’re still in your head.
Misner adds that you may be able to get people out of your life but you can’t get them out of your head. If they are still in your head, they are still in your room. “You will make decisions for the rest of your life with that memory and that experience — good or bad. Kicking them out of your life doesn’t get them out of your room.”
NEW ROOM
Dr. Ivan Misner’s tips to curate your room and well-being:
First and foremost, be here now. Wherever you are, be present fully and completely.
Think about the things and people that are truly important in your life and hold on to them with all your might. Let go of the rest.
Communicate and enforce boundaries clearly and politely. “People may be in your room, but their baggage is not allowed in.”
Master the art of benign neglect. Start intentionally distancing yourself by increasing the time between your responses.
Suggest virtual meetings instead of in-person ones. Keep in-person meetings short. Give parameters as to how much time you have. Gradually but consistently reduce contact. “Think about good friends you had that you’ve lost touch with over the years. Now do that, but do it with purpose.”
Whenever possible, speak when he/she calls, but only initiate a call occasionally and make it gradually fewer over time.
Use homeopathic doses. Structure your interactions with this person. “For example, instead of telling them weeks in advance that you’ll be in town and can meet, tell them shortly before you arrive and keep your available window specific and small.”
When they do call, say you’re so glad they called but you only have five minutes to talk before you head into an appointment.
Instead of meeting one-on-one, set group outings to water down your dose of this person.
TYPES TO KEEP OUT OF YOUR ROOM
Gossip addicts: These people cannot keep a secret, and they love sharing other people’s secrets. They want to be in the know, and they want everyone to know they are in the know. Self-destructive individuals: These
people continually make bad choices in life, and it is everyone’s fault but theirs.
Slash-and-burn zealot: They think almost everything that anyone else does is wrong and they are completely right, and they will purposely undermine all efforts by others because they want their agenda to prevail.
Emotional vampires: They suck the life out of you and the people around them. They make people miserable and are consistently negative about almost everything.
THINK ON THIS
“What if you had to live your life in one room? Whoever you want to interact with in life is in that room. There is only one door. It is a one-way door. Whoever is in your room stays in your room forever. Whoever comes into your room impacts your life directly in many ways. If you knew that this person would be in your room forever, would you have let that person in your room?
“We design the room we live in, along with the people who are in it. We can do that consciously, or we can do that by happenchance. The choice is ours. Understanding this idea now, who are we going to let in our room from this point on?”