At Peace & Happy

In spite of the crazy busyness that has assailed me at work and at play, I have never been more happy and at peace. My birthday is looming round the corner and already people are planning how to celebrate it - a sweet soul even offered to bake me a butter birthday cake.

As wonderful and sweet as my friends are, they are but just the icing on top of the cake. Over the recent months, I've counted the blessings of having good friends and toxic friends. Good friends are good - for obvious reasons. You feel safe with them. Affirmed. Loved. Accepted.

Toxic friends on the surface are bad for health. They can erode your self-esteem. Make you feel bad about yourself and things around you. They cause you to be emotionally bankcrupt and because of this bankcruptcy, you find yourself subconciously seeking for affirmation from people that you are not supposed to. And when you do that, you realised that it's never enough - two parched souls do not make a wholesome friendship. They will only suck the life out of each other.

In retrospect, toxic friends are good in the sense that they make you realise that you do not need their acceptance nor affirmation. You don't even need to expect them from others, even from good friends. Such expectations will only cause frustrations and accute emptiness in your heart - because friends are never meant to be that cake in your life. They are just the nice icing on the top.

Through such friendships, I've learned to set boundaries and leaning upon the assurance of God that He knew just what He was doing when He made me. And that was what gave me strength, meaning and purpose. The freedom to be who I'm meant to be and the peace that follows is just indescribable.

The good news is that toxic friends can transform to being good friends. It just takes time and effort on both parties to work out the differences and reconcile when they are ready.

So, thank God for friends - both good and toxic. It all does work out for good in the end.

Photo Credits: J