#31DayReset Day 21: Remove Negative People from Your Life

This post is Day 21 of the 31 Days to Reset Your Life Challenge for 2011. Learn more and sign up for the program here.

You may have heard this enlightening statement at some point in your life from Jim Rohn:

You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.

Do you agree? I do. The people you allow into your life can have a profound influence on your thoughts and actions. As a result, if you’re surrounded by negative people most of the time, your progress in life can be hindered.

In my own life, I made a personal commitment to myself this year to get rid of all the things that did not make me happy, which involved a massive Facebook unfriending and distancing myself from some toxic people in my life. And let me tell you…I never realized how toxic negative people can be until I changed my own worldview. Over the past few years, I’ve come to understand this fundamental principle from spiritual teacher Marianne Williamson:

Love in your mind produces love in your life. Fear in your mind produces fear in your life.

In other words, what goes in is what comes out. What that means for me is that I try to surround myself with loving people in order to produce more love in my mind, and therefore more love in my life. When I hang around people that constantly live their lives in fear, it literally drags me down into the dumps with them as well. Whether it’s negative food or negative energy or negative people, it ALL affects your body, your soul and your mind. Yesterday, you got rid of stuff you don’t need. Today, you’re going to remove negative people from your life.

Estimated Time to Complete: Varies

Make a list of all the people in your life who bring you down. These are the people you know or hang out with who are major Debbie Downers, who complain all the time and have nothing but bad things to say about other people. They are the cynics and the snarks who have nothing better to do than talk about how much everything sucks – people, work, life in general. This list might include all the folks you ignore when they call, text or email you because, well, just the thought of interacting with them is depressing. Get my drift?

  • Friends
  • Family members
  • Current or ex-romantic partners
  • Co-workers or colleagues
  • Old high school or college buddies
  • Facebook friends
  • Twitter followers

Do what you have to do to remove these folks from your life (or at least limit your exposure to them), whether that means not sitting next to them at lunch in the company cafeteria, declining their invitations to hang out or unfriending them on social networks.

The Elephant in the Room: It is not lost on me that the negative person you need to purge from your life might be YOU. If you are your own personal Debbie Downer, here is a special modification for this exercise.

  • Take your notebook around with you today and make a list of all the instances where you express negativity or cynicism throughout the day – either with your thoughts, words or actions.
  • For each instance, explain why you said, thought or did what you did. Be honest. Were you jealous? Feeling depressed? Angry or annoyed?
  • For each instance, brainstorm what you could have said, thought or done instead. Could you have looked at the glass half-full? Saw the situation from the other person’s point of view? Showed compassion instead of cattiness?

Take Action and Reflect: When you’re done, please share your experience with us in the comments! Was it difficult to let go of certain people (or the negative version of yourself), either in your mind or literally? Who did you let go of? How did you do it? If you blogged about today’s assignment, please post the link in the comments so we can read it!
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19 comments

  2. In making my list, I realized that the most negative people in my life were those closest to me. Then, in figuring out how to address the problem, I realized that, in 4 out of the 6 cases, I’ve been afraid to speak my truth to these people over the years and let them know just how much their negativity bothers me. In trying to be nice and not hurt their feelings, I’ve been enabling them; no wonder they think I’m “that girl” to bring their drama to and constantly bombard with complaints.

    So for those 4 people I’m going to be super-scrupulous about telling them when they’re going overboard, limit our conversation time and content, and speak up about how they make me feel…and if they get upset about it, that will just have to be their problem, not mine.

    Otherwise, I’m actually kind of glad that I’ve already started this process this year. I completely deleted my Facebook a while ago; I’m back on now but only friending proven-positive people. What’s more, today I finally laid the game down flat for my soon-to-be-ex: we’re not getting back together and I’m not falling for any more of his games and have no room for such in my life, no questions asked. It felt good being decisive and CHOOSING for once and finally standing up for myself. Here’s to new beginnings!

  3. Friends – limiting my exposure to them but gradually just moving from them

    Family – Same as friends

    Facebook friends – deleting anyone that say something negative or complains alot

    Twitter followers – Same as Facebook friends

    Old coworkers – not a problem

    Old high school/college friends – not a problem

    Current/ex-romantic partners – not in contact with exes because they are exes for a reason

    ME – I have to admit I was the elephant in the room but I’m currently working on seeing the brighter side of things, enjoying life more, being more positive, and stop placing everyone’s problems on my shoulders. Im still a work in progress!!

  4. This is something I learned years ago and I must admit that it helps very much. You are clearing room for positivity to come in. It’s crazy that those people you are getting rid of still won’t understand why it’s happening but that will be for them to work through… eventually.

    • I truly understand wher you are coming from….The only problem I have is trying to turn negative people in my life into what I see they can be. But I always get disappointed in the end. Thanks for confirmation that the action that I am doing is not in vain!

  6. I hate to admit this but it’s me. I’m the negative person. And I really try not to show that to other people or take it out on them but I think other people can still pick up on the fact that I beat myself up a lot. It’s easy for me to be encouraging of others but I’m not like that with myself.

    This past week was rough because I started a new job and I had a rough time keeping up with my workload. I was very hard on myself for not performing the way I wanted to. And that made me think back to every instant where I screwed up.

    I tried to tell myself that hey, it’s a new job, all new jobs have a learning curve, no one is perfect etc. But I didn’t feel much better after telling myself that. I feel like I have to be perfect and when I miss the mark by a little or a lot it just hurts. Purging this negative view of myself has been very difficult. I probably need to go back into therapy and work this out.

    • I have been very lucky in most of my friendships. I still have two friend thats I am extremely close with from grade school and newer friends who equally valued who I have known for 3, 5, and 10 years I have. I feel blessed with a really good group of positive people in my life.

      I believe that word freindship is just as powerful as the word love and should not be used lightly. Over the years I have ended friendships with a few women who I thought would be life long friends. The issues were all slightly different but at the core I felt that the time, energy and support I provided were no longer equally balanced. I spoke honestly with all of these women when I began to feel a shift in the relationship. Although we tried to work through these issues in the end I continued to feel as though my friendship was being disrespected and so it had to end.

      I am grateful for the positive learning experiences that came out of these relationships because it has helped to enhance and deepen all of the friendships I have today.

  8. See, I have two issues:

    1. My mother is a major Debbie Downer for me and she NEVER has anything good to say about anything – even when something good happens. Thing is, my mother suffers with chronic pain (which would put anybody in a bad mood) AND I live with her. Now, I am planning to move, but she she will still be a major part of my life and the life of my son. So, what can I do ’bout that?

    2. I am often the Debbie Downer in the room. I try not to be, but I get pulled down and then I pull down others. I have been making a concerted effort to be more positive and to allow myself to be happy, but . . . . I am going to do the recommended exercise today and I’ll let you know how it goes. As always, thank you for everything.

    • It’s very possible to maintain a relationship with your mom (or any family member) who brings a negative vibe. My grandma is one example for me. Years ago, I realized that her complaining about EVERYTHING was simply a plea for someone to listen. Now, I limit our phone calls to 15 minutes, I listen to her stories + ailments, then I go about my business to do something that makes ME happy. I began to see my role in her life NOT to “fix” her (we can’t do that for anyone anyway), but to offer support. Perhaps that shift in mindset could work in your case as well?

  9. Friends – did my last cut-off right after Xmas. Painful but worth it.

    Family members – same as friends. Painful but worth it.

    Current or ex-romantic partners – not in contact with any of them.

    Co-workers or colleagues – not a big problem for me.

    Old high school or college buddies – same as friends & family.

    Facebook friends – pared mine down about 2 weeks ago via hiding updates or de-friending for good.

    Twitter followers – most recent pare-down was less than a month ago. Those were/are some miserable people & I couldn’t take seeing it anymore.

    Me – used to be the negative one. While I still complain from time to time, it’s definitely decreased & I’m more mindful of it, to the point that I stop myself most of the time if I get too deep. I’ll re-frame to see things differently.

  10. Pingback: 31 Days to Reset Your Life: Recap and Reflect | Happy Black Woman | Personal Development for Success in Life + Business

  11. I cut off the negative people in my life the last go round and I’m forever greatful for it. This time around I didn’t know what to do so I didn’t comment. I realize I had a lot of negative thoughts in my own head over the coursr of this and i have been actively combating them but I think I’m going to delete people from my FB and really limit my time on there if not delete it copletely because lately every time I go on it puts me in a bad mood, I don’t completely understand why, I just know it does and I’m definitely feeling like it’s probably about time to let that go.

    • ab, even though you work people who ar putting off a negative vibe, if the conversation is not related to work you should try to change the subject or make an excuse to walk away from the conversation/person to avoid having to hear/see the negativity.
      Read my latest blog post…Signs that gentrification is coming

  14. Friends: I make myself scarce, don’t respond to texts, IM messages, etc.
    Family members: I have a lot of toxic family members, but who wants to cut off family members? Instead, I just limit my interactions with them to just holidays.
    Current or ex-romantic partners: I don’t have much interactions with ex-romantic partners.
    Co-workers or colleagues: I tend to focus on my tasks. I don’t participate in office drama or rumors. I also take frequent breaks.
    Old high school or college buddies: I don’t speak much to friends from high school, yet most of my college friends are pretty non-toxic. The ones that are toxic, I keep interactions with them to a minimum.
    Facebook friends/Twitter followers: I either mute them or unfollow/delete them.
    Read my latest blog post…In Case You Missed It: The Week of August 15th, 2011

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