Why Bad Relationships Are Worse than No Relationship at All
Ah relationships. The web that weaves and connects us to one another.
I’ve been focused on good and bad relationships at the workplace lately. See, I’ve put my heart and soul into helping and empowering desperate corporate employees who just don’t know what they are doing wrong at their jobs.
Is that you by any chance? Because I was right there with you. Smart. Talented. Hard-working. A top performer. Alway smiling, being all pleasant and professional-looking, even when I didn’t feel like it. If you work at corporate, you know the drill.
Alas, none of that was the answer, or the code, to climbing the corporate ladder, getting promoted and making the money I deserved. (Don’t worry the story gets much better after I figure all that out.)
That brings me to one of the lessons I learned – about what is in the code of getting ahead – relationships, honey. And obviously, knowing the bad relationships from the good ones.
Relationships that make or break your success and happiness, not just at work, but in life.
Whether you are running a business or doing business with someone, whether you are sleeping with them or you’re just friends, whether you are trusting your child’s life into their hands or hoping they would give you a hand in a dilemma in your life, you gotta know your relationships. Well.
Without any relationships, you are a loner living out your days in isolation.
But what’s worse, far far worse than that, is when you are in bad relationships and you are hanging out with the wrong people.
As a well-meaning adult reading this, you might immediately associate the wrong people with people who do drugs and sleep around or drink too much and do other unmentionables that may impart lesser than desired influence.
Basically, people who don’t have their act together.
Um. Yeah. As a general rule, don’t get involved with such people unless you are in a position to help them. But that’s not exactly who I am talking about.
I talk about the not so obvious.
The people who seem all nice and proper on the surface but are really a bad influence on you. The people who may even be related to you as a family member or a long-time friend, but they are holding you back, and you are too afraid to see that. The people who are abusing you, not physically so much as emotionally and psychologically, the people who may even mean well on some level but because they need professional help and don’t seek it, they come running to you, ruining your life and polluting your mind with their rubbish in the process.
After all, what are friends for? Right?
Well, not for that!
And just to clarify, I am not saying don’t be there for your friends and family. Are you kidding? Of course be there for them if you can be of help but not if being there is no use to them and is a net negative for you.
The 5 Commandments of a Relationship Gone Awry
So what are the signs that it’s time to let go of a relationship, to walk away, to say goodbye, to close the door. You know, to end the darn thing and move on!
I could say “well it depends” and it might in a lot of situations but here are 5 quick and clear signs that it’s absolutely time to let go of a relationship fast. If you see any or all of these signs, get your exit plan together or you will suffer consequences, sweet darling. This goes for work relationships – so yes, bosses and co-workers fall in here – as well as personal intimate relationships.
1. You can’t trust them anymore.
Trust doesn’t mean you sit next to someone at a cocktail party and have a chat you can’t recall the next day. Trust means with nobody around, you give this person your hand to help you cross a bridge and not let go of that hand. Trust means knowing that for a fact, that person won’t let you down. Do you trust the person you are in a relationship with? Would you bet your life on it?
2.You dread spending time with them.
And sometimes, this emotion doesn’t show up until after you have spent time with them, and you wonder why you wasted your time. You get all anxious and mad at yourself. You decide to ignore them only until the next time around. You have to pretend you are enjoying being around them only to drive yourself crazy later with the truth, which is you dread spending time with them.
3. You do things for them out of obligation, not desire or love.
The day that we start feeling obligated to do something for someone is the day that we have to examine that relationship from top to bottom, inside and out. Whoever made you bound to anyone else? It’s a free world, and even in an arranged marriage, I pray for you that there is a way out. If you do things out of obligation, not love, it is a clear sign that it’s time to let go.
4. You feel bad about yourself when you are around them.
They make you feel guilty, anxious, small, insignificant, and they constantly berate you – whether with fake love coated on top or not – about how you should be doing something else with your life, maybe you need to get married or have kids or get a real job or be more sociable or whatever this person deems necessary for you to do. People you are in a relationship can love you and give you advice and suggestions for betterment at the same time. Don’t put up with anyone who puts you down. Ever.
5. You feel trapped and imprisoned in the relationship.
Marriage is not a prison, a bad marriage is. Commitments are not the problem. Commitments to wrong people are the problem. Children are not a trap. Not wanting to have children and then having them from peer pressure is. You were meant to live a free and happy life. Yes, you. And no relationship should ever take that away from you. If it does, time to let go baby.
Your turn: So there, my darling, you have it. Now I dare you to look at the key relationships in your life and see whether you are experiencing – and perhaps denying – any of these situations. Share your thoughts in the comments.
It takes knowing yourself, trusting yourself and having confidence in who you are and what you want to end a bad relationship. I invite you to grab your free confidence course below:
I am Farnoosh, the founder of Prolific Living. So glad you are here. My mission is to empower you to unblock your creative genius to live your dream life.