In My Life I Want People Who Add Up, Not Subtract

It is important to surround ourselves with people who add to our lives learning and long-term positive qualities. These are people who are worthwhile or, better said, who deserve our joy and our smiles.

For this reason it is good that we do a good review of our relationships and determine what is good for us and what is bad for us in order to maximize the benefit we obtain from our bonds .

In this sense, something we must be very clear about is that not everything is black or white. For this simple reason, there will be times when someone will alter our well-being and at others when the same person will add to make up for the previous loss.

However, there are people or relationships with which we glimpse the horizon of a dark future is inevitable. This is where we have to work harder to avoid being emotionally manipulated with something negative.

 When they reward us with evil

There are people who cause a real disaster in our lives and who revolutionize a vital moment with masked intentions and negative feelings, blinded by selfishness and contempt.

In the beginning and as a consequence of extreme cases, we do not give credit to what we are seeing, obstructing our ability to “see with other eyes” that person who takes us away. In other words, it’s as if we were blindfolded to reality.

What makes it difficult for us on this journey are the expectations that hinder the action of putting emotional distance to release ourselves from the people we suffer with and that undermine our feelings, thoughts and goals.

Emotional distance takes us away from the pain that brings us closer to unhappiness

Rather than letting ourselves drown when we have these emotional vampires in our lives, we have to be aware of who they are and how they are able to make the glare from our eyes go out so that we suffer emotional difficulties.

So, in order to take an emotional distance, the first thing we must know is that there is nothing and no one that deserves to rob us of our essence.

This is a maxim that should always accompany us in life, because our attributes cannot be dependent on what others want.

If we let go of our principles to please others or to please their selfishness, we are sending ourselves a message that circumstances can take ownership of our emotional freedom.

The Benefits of Emotional Distance

The benefits of emotional distance are very clear. Thanks to it, we can distance ourselves from the fear, pain, addiction and toxicity that foster unhealthy relationships.

In this sense, we must keep in mind that, in a healthy relationship, failures are not just one person’s fault, but each member realizes or allows negativity to reign.

In any case, there are negative patterns of behavior and interaction that are established that we must get rid of.

Only by getting rid of this psychological burden will we achieve that our self-esteem is protected and that the bad intentions of other people do not diminish us. Only then will we be ready to help these people in trouble.

Because it is important that, if we still have the will and can make an effort, we make them understand that they transmit toxic behaviors, that the real conflict is within them and that, if it really interests them, they can change their way of relating.

Be a fair person and don’t lose your essence

We all want the people around us to add positive things to our lives. However, when something unfair happens to us or there is a pain point in a relationship, suffering can cause our thoughts to become infected with prejudice and victimization.

Avoiding this requires a great capacity for inner work that generates healthy inner dialogue.

In the face of sudden, intense pain what we should know is that the anger generated is temporary and that the damage does not necessarily have to have a consequence, although we may want it at some point.

On this issue of resentment, there is a very good and illustrative story that we would like to cover in this text:

On a beautiful day, suddenly, a daughter comes and says to her father:

-Dad, I can’t stand the neighbor anymore! I want to kill her, but I’m afraid they’ll find me out. Can you help me with this?

Without hesitating, the father replied:

-Certainly, my love, but there is a condition… you will have to make peace with her so that no one suspects you when she dies.

You will have to treat her very well, be less selfish, kind, patient, loving, grateful, always reciprocate, listen to her more… do you see this powder? Every day, put some in her food. And she will slowly die.

After 30 days, the daughter returns to tell her father:

-I don’t want her to die. I love her. And now? How do I cut the poison effect?

The father then answers:

-Do not worry! What I gave you was rice powder. She won’t die because the poison was in you.

As we see, nurturing resentments we die little by little, because when someone hurts you, it’s as if a snake had bitten you. Their fang wounds may be small, but they contain a potent poison capable of destroying us in a short space of time.

The most common poisons in these cases are revenge, victimization, an eye for an eye and the need for blind justice.

Little by little, they make our thoughts, behaviors and emotions corrode us from within and we lose vitality and hope.

This shouldn’t scare us too much, because holding a grudge is as human as forgiving or making mistakes. In fact, they say that those who do not love, do not forgive, and that the person responsible for forgiveness is the love of life, towards others and towards oneself.