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When to Cut People Out of Your Life

When to Cut People Out of Your Life

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 EDITOR’S NOTE: Please consider supporting the new Permission to be Powerful print magazine here. Dear Permission to be Powerful Reader,This is your permission slip.To block, unfollow, delete, walk away, ghost, vanish…Whatever you need to do. You do not need to explain. You do not need to justify. You only need to protect your peace.Let me start with a story.There’s this girl. She’s well-liked in the dance scene. Sweet reputation, soft face, poised demeanor.But the one time I danced with her? It felt like punishment.She was cold. Distant. Hostile even. I didn’t know what I had done—only that I was being made to feel like something dirty. Like I’d stepped into her space without permission, and now I was being silently shamed for existing.That was a year ago.And I’ve thought about that dance a lot since. I remember the shame I felt—this quiet, internal scramble of “What did I do wrong?”But looking back now, the better question is: Why the f**k did I accept that treatment for three whole minutes?Let me be clear:The dance floor is sacred. You don’t bring that kind of venom to a space meant for joy. You don’t get to humiliate someone in silence and think that’s okay. You don’t get to dehumanize me and stay on my friend list.So I removed her. Not out of pettiness. Out of self-respect.And I’ve made it a policy since:If you ignore my message, you're gone.If you talk down to me, you're gone.If you guilt, gaslight, manipulate—you’re gone.I do not keep people who devalue me.It doesn’t matter if you're cute. Or “nice.” Or connected. It doesn’t matter if you’re family.I’ve spent too much of my life being treated like I was invisible. Not anymore.I used to struggle with guilt. That was my kryptonite. I’d let people walk all over me if they could just make me feel bad about saying no. I had to meet my “final boss” just to get free. It was psychological warfare.But it also woke me up.Now? You disrespect me once, I step back. You violate my boundaries, you get downgraded.Phone calls become texts.Texts become email.Email becomes nothing.You earn access to my energy, and once you show me you can’t hold it with care, I take it back.I don’t do appeasement anymore.I don’t do nice guy.I don’t sacrifice myself to keep the peace.You don’t get to treat me like I don’t matter and still stay in my life.This is not cruelty. This is clarity.Your mind is a vessel. You can train it like an athlete. Get clear on your values. On what you will and will not tolerate. And then enforce those boundaries like your life depends on it.Because it does.You think people change. That they might. That they should. That if you just say the right thing, or hold out long enough…They’ll finally hear you.They won’t.Change isn’t something you can demand. People don’t grow — they calcify. They don’t evolve — they fossilize. And if they were unkind? Unreliable? Self-absorbed? Give them 10 years and they’ll be even more so.I used to wait around, hoping certain people in my life would evolve. I thought if I gave enough chances, explained it the right way, stayed calm, held on a little longer — they’d wake up and realize how badly they were hurting me. Instead, I stayed in relationships years past their expiration date. I held on to dead weight and called it loyalty.But here’s the truth:You don’t stick around waiting for people to change. You walk away when they don’t.The alternative? You get eaten alive.Let’s say someone in your life always crosses a line — some comment, some behavior, some habit that grinds you down every time. And you think, “Next time I’ll speak up. Next time they’ll change.”But when you finally do say something, they double down. Or deny it. Or blame you.That’s the moment you realize: It was never going to change.And the sickest part? You feel ashamed for hoping. For being naive enough to believe they were capable of growth.Don’t waste your life on that kind of disappointment.If you find out that your husband is cheating on you. He won’t change.Stop hoping for that, he abandoned you a long time ago.You’re caught up with what’ll he think, and what’ll she think…And what will my parents think.But if you knew dead to rights they would never change…What now? How does that change the calculus?For me, it broke the spell that kept me enmeshed with toxic people. You’re my family, but you don’t own me.You don’t just get to keep taking up space in my life if you insist on being a low-life.People out here claiming to love you…Yet they show you the same compassion as a thug in a dark alley?WTF is that all about?There’s such a thing as being surrounded by the wrong people. Every single person in your life could be draining you. That’s rare — but it happens. It happened to me.And I’ll tell you something I wish someone told me sooner:The alternative to being treated like dirt isn’t loneliness. It’s peace.I’ve ...

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