Life is Too Short for Toxic Relationships

This has come up a lot for me, really having moved to Northern Idaho. First of all, they’re a little nervous about the world ending up here, and I’ve just never been that way. I’ve never really thought much about it. So it’s just interesting to see that kind of culture up here. And my friends are really awesome. Like they’re not nuts. They’re like a tempered way of preparing for disaster and very deep, deeply faithful Catholic families. I really enjoy them. And then the other thing that happened was I created a TikTok account for my business, the business coaching I do. And when I created it, I would go in and, and make these TikTok videos around the Made for Business Society and the Mary Mastermind. And, and I’ve been enjoying it, but I didn’t go look at TikTok for a while. I actually just went in and did the videos.

And then I noticed that some videos were performing well and some weren’t. And so I thought, Well, I’m gonna go look and see what videos are on TikTok. And that was my first experience with it. And I see now that it is an incredibly seductive place. The way that I did not feel super pulled into Instagram and Facebook. It totally pulled me in and I don’t know what everyone else is watching, but very quickly, TikTok figured out that I like business videos, real estate investing, ADHD authoritarian parenting tips, authoritative parenting tips. It kind of cultivates really quickly what you like and then it shows you exactly what you like. And as I followed business people and finance people and real estate, I began seeing a lot of graphs of things.

And then I caught myself feeling a little more anxious than normal. And you know, I’ve shared before that I tend to suffer from depression, not anxiety, but I was feeling anxious and it was very clear to me that these TikTok videos were just jacking up my brain. And I think I caught it soon enough to just be like, Oh, don’t look at those . That has not been a part of my life. But between, I think living up here and then watching some of these videos that were just giving a lot of doom and gloom information, conflicting doom and gloom information by the way, not consistent. So it was all over the place. I was feeling anxious about being prepared for something either in our business or with my family or food or things like that. And I caught myself and I was just like, You know what, Sterling, I have no idea what’s gonna happen.

We don’t know any of these things, and I don’t even wanna speak them out loud cuz probably none of them are true. So I don’t wanna add to anybody else’s anxiety, a whole bunch of scenarios. And I just thought it didn’t matter. I cannot predict the future. There have always been challenging times ahead, even if we don’t know the timeline and what God asks of us is to live with peace. So in all scenarios, the punchline is the same, is to live with peace. And no matter what happens, I wanna become a saint. I wanna live with peace. I wanna lead my husband and my children and all of you to heaven.

And I don’t want to waste time being afraid. And that feeling that I was experiencing, which was kind of new for me, this, this just kind of feeling of background worry. I just thought that’s how some of you feel about the difficult relationships in your life. You’re kind of like always chewing on things about your mom or always chewing on things about your sister or your cousin or the people that you’re gonna have to see that you don’t ordinarily see. And you chewing on it is the same thing as your brain watching five to 62nd TikTok videos and your brain is like swipe, swipe, but it’s doing it with its own stories and it’s creating anxiety and worry and it’s building up in your body and it’s literally stealing your peace right now. Even though nothing has happened, nothing has changed, and you’re not even in the same room as that person that you’re worrying about. And I want you to get to where I got to where I was just like, No, that’s enough. God did not give me a spirit of fear, but of peace, love, and self-control. And it’s the same thing with those relationships, man. Either decide that you’re gonna do the work to improve them or let it go.

And let me break down those two options cuz within those two options or a couple sub options, okay? So for example, my husband and I, very strong personalities, we have to learn how to communicate with each other better, right? That is not one of the relationships where I’m gonna go, Oh, this is a hard relationship. I’m just gonna let it go. I’m gonna work on that relationship. And so I’m gonna stop complaining about it. I’m gonna stop thinking, Oh no, I can’t do anything about this. He’s so difficult to live with. I’m gonna roll up my sleeves and I’m gonna read some communication books. I’m gonna learn about psychology. I’m gonna read ful and sheen in the sacrament of marriage, and I’m just gonna educate myself and learn because I’m willing to put in the time to improve that relationship. So worrying, chewing on it, not on the table, are we gonna work on it or not?

Okay? So there’s work on it and you might have a friendship that has turned sour or suddenly you just kind of feel bitter or yucky every time you see this friend. I just want you to stare at that face on and just go, Hey, am I gonna work on this or not? Am I gonna work on it to improve it? Okay, that’s option number one. And obviously depending on the relationship, you could decide how much time and effort is worth putting into that. Option number two is letting it go. Now, there’s two ways that we can let it go. One, we can drop into acceptance over the way that the relationship is. It’s just fine. This is the relationship I have with my sister. It’s not what I want, but it’s fine. I accept it and I’m not willing to put in time and energy right now and we don’t have to decide for forever. But like right now, that person’s not gonna get my extra time and energy to improve this relationship. So I’m just gonna accept it the way that it is. And the second version of letting it go is to either set boundaries or cut it off

Where we put up some roadblocks and we say, All right, I’m willing to be friends up to this point. If you treat me like this, if you talk to me like this, it’s a no fly zone.

Or to just say, I’m not going to pursue this relationship right now. Now sometimes you can just do that without having to communicate it. You can just say, You know what? This relationship, I’m just gonna let it kind of fade into the background. I think that’s particularly true of friendships or distant family relationships. That’s kind of happened with my brother a little bit and his wife and I really love them, but they have pretty much opposite political, religious, spiritual, all that beliefs as we do. And they live eight hours away. And so I think fondly of them, but also I know that we’re probably not gonna hang out in person a ton. And so ever since we moved eight hours away, it just has kind of slowly faded into the background. I’m not angry, I’m not upset, but I also am not putting in the time to say, Hey, let’s, you know, let’s pack up our families and meet each other in each other’s cities. But I will probably call them on Thanksgiving and be like, I love you. How are you guys doing? How are the kids? Right? So to me that’s that kind of let it go category. And really it just means like let it be.

The thing I’m letting go of though is worrying or chewing or stressing or judging. We wanna either commit to growing it and fixing it or working on it or just let it go. And so I want you to just recognize that this life is short. We don’t know what’s gonna happen. And maybe, maybe difficult things are coming, maybe Jesus is coming for the second, the second coming. Either way, your job is to have more peace. Your job is not to live in anxiety and fear and worry. And I don’t want you to live in no man’s land with these relationships either. Just decide. And it might be uncomfortable and it might be painful, but do you know what’s uncomfortable and painful? Living a life without peace? And no one’s doing that to you. You’re doing it to yourself. And so I just wanna give you a little bit of hope that you’re stronger than you think. The worst thing that can happen to you is a feeling. And you can have the best stinking holiday season you’ve ever had in your life this year if it used to be full of stress and chaos and crying and feeling rejected and unloved or frazzled. All of that is optional. That is my favorite kind of testimonial in Masters when somebody messages me and says, You know what? We used to go to my mom’s every year for Thanksgiving and it was terrible. And this year I went and I managed my mind and I had a good time.

My mom didn’t change, the conversations didn’t change the way I talked to myself changed. That’s it, man. Let me just tell you, that’s just an incredible thing. And I know it’s incredible because I’ve had that experience in so many areas of my life. Things that used to just really be stressful or overwhelming to me. And now I just handle them. And so the last thing that I wanna leave you with

After you’ve decided, you know, am I gonna work on this relationship? Am I not gonna work on this relationship, is this idea of telling your brain that you are safe. And I’ve talked about this before, but you’re gearing up, right? You’re gearing up for the holiday season, whatever that means for you and your family. For me, actually it doesn’t usually involve contentious family relationships. It actually for me involves sadness that we don’t have a lot of family. Most of the time I’m doing Christmas just with my husband and my kids. And so I am more prone to kind of spiral into depression and sadness around that. But even in that, I know that when I start to feel sad and I can feel it, my body right now, like even just thinking about that brings up all this sadness in my body. I just tell my brain, Hey, I love you and you’re safe. We’re creating our own family. You got this. Let’s plan something fun. Fun for you, fun for the kids. It’s okay that we don’t have a big family that looks great on a postcard and gets together and has a Rockefeller style picture. I was trying to think of a name of a family. And I don’t think Rockefeller is it, but I think you guys know what I mean.

And so when you’re sitting in your car and you’re getting ready to go into a room or a home and it maybe isn’t what you wanted, maybe you’ll encounter people or you won’t. You’re gonna have a lot of thoughts and feelings. I don’t want you to negotiate with your brain and try to explain it all. Okay? There’s a moment for life coaching and then there’s a place where you just tell your brain you’re safe. I love you. You can handle this. And that’s all you have to do. That’s all you have to do. And then you know what? Eventually you’re not gonna be in that room. You’re gonna be in a different room or a different home, and you’re gonna feel safe again, and you’re gonna feel fine.

We don’t have to fix everything every year. We don’t have to repair every relationship. That’s challenging. But my hope for you is that you do what I said in this episode, which is you either commit to working on the relationship or you kind of let it go. And letting it go just means letting go of the worry and the anxiety. And then you learn how to comfort yourself in moments of distress. Your only job in those moments of distress is to calm your nervous system down. I love you. You’re safe, you can handle this, you’re gonna be okay.

And if you do that, you’re gonna have a much different experience of the holiday season. And if you wanna learn more about that, I’m gonna teach a class on Monday, November 14th in Masters. It’s part of our prepare the way curriculum. You know, we’re spending three months on teaching you guys how to have peace and it’s been amazing. And you know, if this is a big thing for you, just join Masters and come hang out with me on Monday. Raise your hand. Or you can even type anonymously into our Q and A box and you can say, Oh my goodness, I don’t see Sterling, how I could possibly have peace about this relationship. Let me tell you about it and I will coach you and I will help you to have peace.

And I know it’s possible because Jesus says that it’s possible. And God never changes and he never lies. I love you guys so much. I love this podcast. I wish I could see you all in a room someday. I wish I could see all of you who listen because it’s such a personal relationship, even though I don’t get to see your face, isn’t it? And I take it really seriously that you come and that you listen. And I really pray and I really say, All right, Lord, what do they need to hear? And I hope it’s helpful. You know, we wanted to create a podcast that was life changing, that listening to this podcast could change your life. So if you have a friend who has a difficult, difficult relationship in their family, which is probably all of our friends , I don’t think I know of a friend who doesn’t have some contentious relationship in their life, I want you to send them this episode. Just say, You know what? God put it on my heart to send this to you, and let’s just help heal each other. Let’s help each other to have these tools.

All right? Mamas the world offers you comfort that you were not made for comfort, you were Made for Greatness.