It’s spring, and you know what that means: buh-bye snow and time to do some cleaning!
But it’s not the typical green smoothie cleanse I’m craving. I’m spring-cleaning the mess of feelings I’ve padded myself with this winter.
As I start to remove some of that excess emotional weight, I realize that a lot of it is attached to over-engaging emotionally with a few “close” relationships that maybe shouldn’t be so close.
Let’s just say it: I wanted to write an article about getting rid of relationships that no longer serve us because I have one in my life!
She and I were really close. But then I had a baby, and things got AWKWARD as she became more and more scarce during my postpartum can’t-stop-crying and haven’t-slept-in-months and who-am-I and what-the-hell-happened-to-my-body phase of mommyhood. And I got angry. Why wasn’t she there for me when I needed her most?
As much as I want to just clean house, cut her out of my life, and try to move on – what I really need to do is re-evaluate.
According to friendship-expert and CEO of GirlFriendCircles.com, Shasta Nelson, “Friendships are the training ground for becoming the people that we claim we want to be.”
Let that sink in – because that shifts this whole friendship conversation…
In her Emerging Women podcast interview, Shasta says we too quickly bail on the uncomfortable awkward moments in our relationships, thereby abandoning potential intimacy-building moments.
The highest levels of friendships we can have are ones where we can be truly vulnerable, even (and especially) during the awkward moments. On the opposite end of the continuum are our acquaintances and more casual relationships – where we get to awkwardly practice loving people who are very different from us.
I do tend to expect way too much (and too soon) from relationships. Not everyone has to be an immediate best friend, and relationships can shift their levels of importance over time. Seeing relationships in this light tempers things a lot and takes some serious emotional baggage off of me (and my friends).
This cleanse really helps that process. Join me for 15 minutes a day to work off the emotional weight that’s built up this winter:
Day 1: Evaluating your Values
What are my top 5 relationship values? In my closest relationships, am I exhibiting these? Where can I get better?
Day 2: Assessing your Friendships
List your friends and answer the following questions about each relationship: Is this a healthy relationship? Does it have the potential to hold most of the values that I see as important? What (if anything) is keeping us from growing closer?
Day 3: Appreciate, apologize and/or accept
Integrate your findings from Day 1 & 2. Apologize to those that you may have pushed away when it got awkward. Accept that some relationships are not going to grow stronger, and acknowledge the beautiful relationships that are currently growing.
Day 4: Go have a friend date with yourself!
I often expect so much from others before first figuring out how to be a friend to myself. Remember that playing and having fun are important features of any relationship. Go out and do something you enjoy: take yourself to a movie, go for a hike or start an art class. Chances are, if you’re having fun with yourself you are going to have more fun with others.
Day 5: Maintenance
How are you going to check in with yourself and your relationships? How will you handle jealousy or blame in your relationships? Can you find time to journal at least once a week and take yourself on a date once a month?
In three months this may change. Make sure to have the flexibility and grace with yourself and your friendships when changes arise.
Jennifer Louden is both a personal coach and social commentator, who has taken the concept of “comfort” and self-care, and made these essential concepts irresistible and essential to women around the world. Jennifer is a cultural visionary, harnessing her extraordinary ability to recognize women’s comfort as both a fundamental need and an innate desire. Jennifer is an established media favorite, known for her humor, honesty, and ability to deliver tangible tips and heart-expanding insight with grace and passion. As a best-selling author of The Woman’s Comfort Book and 5 other titles, she draws on a wealth of stories and experience to regularly enliven blogs, radio, TV & magazines like Woman First, Self, Woman’s Day, Health, Yoga Journal, Whole Living, Good Housekeeping, Shape, and Ladies Home Journal. Jennifer’s media appearances have included Oprah, MSNBC, CNN, and close to a hundred news shows in most major markets. She’s hosted her own radio show on Sirius, been a monthly columnist for Body+Soul (now Whole Living), enjoyed numerous satellite radio and TV media tours, and has been a major presence on the web since 2000. She is a leading spokeswoman for finding your center and creating a healthy life in the midst of the busiest life, and then extending that healthy living to your world through social change. She believes: Self love+world love = wholeness for all. 
Shasta Nelson, a female friendship expert, is the Founder and C.E.O. of GirlFriendCircles.com–the female friendship matching site in 35 cities across the U.S. and Canada where women of all ages go to make local friends, and is the author of Friendships Don’t Just Happen! The Guide to Creating a Meaningful Circle of GirlFriends. She is regularly appearing in the media offering her expertise on such subjects as creating new friends, learning how to to forgive our friends, social media’s impact on our friendships, and the characteristics of healthy friendships. A few of the TV shows she’s been on include The Today Show, Katie Couric’s Show, The Early Show, and Fox Business. She’s relied upon by writers and reporters from such magazines as Cosmopolitan, Essence, Parents, More, Redbook, Good Housekeeping, and Glamour, and for such newspapers as The New York Times, Chicago Tribune, the San Francisco Chronicle. Her spirited and soulful voice can also be found at ShastasFriendshipBlog.com and in her Huffington Post column where she regularly contributes on relationship health. She also teaches, lectures, and hosts Friendship Accelerator events in her hometown of San Francisco and throughout the U.S. 
Jensine (Yen-See Nah) Larsen is an award-winning social media entrepreneur, international journalist, and speaker. At age 28 she founded World Pulse – a digital media network connecting women worldwide and bringing them a global voice – after working as a freelance journalist covering indigenous movements and ethnic cleansing in South America and Southeast Asia. Today World Pulse is powered by 60,000 women from 200 countries, many who are using internet cafes and cell phones from rural villages and conflict zones, collectively improving the lives of 2.2 million people. After successfully launching a print version of World Pulse magazine, in 2007 Larsen turned her eyes to the future of communications technology in the developing world. She pioneered an interactive global women’s newswire where women worldwide – including those using internet cafes and cell phones from rural villages and conflict zones– can speak for themselves to the world and solve global problems. Most recently, Larsen has launched a new program that is training women in digital empowerment and citizen journalism that is fostering a network of vocal women leaders from some of the most forgotten regions of the world. Today women from virtually every country in the world are connecting through World Pulse and producing a multiplier effect of change. Women previously unknown by the global public are having their stories picked up from World Pulse by the BBC, CNN, the UN, and the Huffington Post and beyond. 
Having coached and developed more than 3,500 leaders in six countries since 1998, Sara Harvey Yao specializes in the area of Executive Leadership and Ego. Sara’s clients refer to her as the “Ego Whisperer” and appreciate her precise ability to hone in on the root cause of leadership challenges and quickly resolve them.
Stacey is an inspiring, energetic and authentic facilitator, coach, speaker and author – and the CEO of Connect Growth and Development. She is an advocate of bringing humanity back into the workplace. She has held positions over the last 20 years in evolutionary industries performing leadership, strategic and design vision roles in business, accounting and finance, consulting, client relations, software design and development. Stacey paired her degree in Business with a Masters in Applied Behavioral Science to create the “work love of her life”.
