“I don’t want to keep hanging out with you because your life isn’t going anywhere and I don’t like who I am when I’m around you.”

That’s a hard thing to say to someone. It’s also hard to wake up every morning farther and farther away from your goals. One friend wanted to drink and eat junk food every time we hung out, which is not how you get a six pack. One ex-girlfriend wanted me to spend 100% of my time with her, which left no time for my writing. Cutting people out of your life feels like a failure. Like you’ve let them down or you’re hurting them on purpose. They probably will feel hurt, but you have to remove some things from your life to make room for something better. 

Sure, it’s easier to maintain the status quo with whatever fell into your life by accident, but your best life involves pulling weeds from the garden of your life. This doesn’t mean they are bad people or anything is wrong with your old hobbies or interests. The thing is, people rarely stumble into their best life. It has to be cultivated, trimmed, and guided. You have to put thought into what is and isn’t helping you get where you want to go, and let go of things that hold you back. 

This means that there will be emptiness, solitude, and loneliness…all because you are removing things that aren’t serving you. Be careful – it’s very easy to internalize that emptiness or loneliness as failure on your part. Often after I let go of friends that are bad influences, I get lonely and have thoughts like “If I was better or had my life more figured out then I wouldn’t be alone and lonely right now.” That’s like a gardener who got used to all the green weeds in his garden and feels weird now that it’s just dirt and a few flowers. Don’t miss the weeds. Give yourself time to get used to the space you created, and look for truly valuable things to put in that space.

I promise life gets better after the weeds are gone. Now something wonderful can now take the place of what was stagnant before. You have to break up with the abuser to make room for a loving partner. You have to cut loose the junkie friend to spend time with the ambitious and fun people who lift you up. You’ll have to go to a few meetups nervous and apprehensive before you know the crowd and feel comfortable there. It’s okay.

Make peace with weeding your garden. Take a deep breath and tear out what shouldn’t be there. You will be amazed someday at the beauty of what it becomes.

Further Reading: Making these changes is scary. The motto  “Do it Scared” has helped me and many others pull the trigger on scary decisions in the past, and maybe it can help you too. Read more about that here.