Relationships.....☠️

Our relationships contribute a lot to how life unfolds. When you do something you told yourself you weren’t going to do, that’s a reflection of your relationship with yourself. When you swipe your card even though you told yourself you wouldn’t spend unnecessarily, that’s a bad relationship with your finances. The way you respond to authority could be influenced by the type of relationship you have with your parents or guardian. A healthy relationship can be an asset, but when you find yourself constantly unsatisfied with outcomes, nights out with friends begin to feel like an extra task rather than a rejuvenating get-together, even how we go about staying committed and accomplishing our goals and putting our own needs before others all stem from the relationships we’ve established with ourselves, others, or things and how these interactions can benefit us they can also destroy us.

Naturally, most people live with a combination of good and bad relationships. Determining if a relationship is healthy, strong, and beneficial versus unhealthy or deteriorating takes time to understand and utilize. Growing up as a black gay male, I rarely experienced having a group of other male friends. Most of my friends were girls, and although I loved and cherished all the memories and moments I shared with them, I often felt like an accessory and out of place. I refer to this feeling as “being left out of the girl’s bathroom party.” Sometimes, I would go into the girls’ bathroom with them, but most of the time, I wouldn’t. Similar situations like being the person friends call when they’re having relationship issues, but they never call to check up on you is unhealthy. Constantly having to minimize your feelings about how certain things make you feel to maintain friendships isn’t healthy. Expressing how one’s lack of empathy makes you feel creates an unhealthy relationship. I groomed myself into believing that to keep my friends, I would have to accept their actions at the expense of my feelings and love that person no matter how they made me feel unintentionally. It wasn’t until my relationship with myself strengthened that I realized the importance of standing ten toes on what I expected from myself, my friends, and others.

Building a healthy relationship with yourself can be a journey but truly rewarding! Embracing complete confidence in your choices and learning to nurture yourself emotionally, physically, and spiritually makes a difference. Building healthy friendships where you can feel motivation and encouragement from each other. Taking moments to understand each other’s values and emotional triggers. Listen when your friends are talking; do not wait for your chance to speak—have conversations about dreams, goals, and accomplishments, and hold each other accountable to stay dedicated. I love hanging out with my friends and staying out all night, but balancing that lifestyle while being on the come-up can be challenging. Having established healthy friendships makes it easier to decide whether to be outside and not just go because my friends invited me. I also know you can say no without each other feeling a certain way. Nothing compares to a night out when all your Sh*t is together; you can have all the fun in the world, and the friends you are surrounded with genuinely care for you.

  Mending broken relationships is a struggle. I still struggle to do this because of fear of disappointment, misunderstanding, and doubts about whether ending certain relationships was the best move. Mending and forgiving are complex, but being able to forgive yourself for mistakes you’ve made can be even more challenging. But don’t let things bring you down like in the wicked movie, Elphaba defied gravity; don’t let things bring you down or stop you. Be kind to yourself and others and create relationships built on support, love, and encouragement.