If you are sick of the drama, you might be looking for drama free friendships. Really, I can’t blame you. I’m sure we can all agree that drama is a huge waste of time. Our friendships should build us up, not tear us down. If you are serious about avoiding the drama, check out these 7 effective tips to maintain drama free friendships.
One way to have drama free friendships is to eliminate the negative people from your circle of friends. You don’t need their bad attitudes to rain on your parade. Instead, choose wise people with good attitudes that show and deserve respect. You are better than all that other crap, anyways.
This is a hard one. Not many people like to take an honest look at themselves or admit their own faults, but if you are serious about wanting to remove the drama from your life, you need to self-reflect. Do you think you’ve ever been the source of drama in your friendships?
It is easy to get tangled up in some good hearsay. Someone comes to you with juicy details about another person you both know. Before you know it you find yourself sharing information you know that was told to you in confidence. Do yourself a favor and avoid all gossip, not just sharing gossip, but listening to gossip too.
Don’t let your wants stop you from celebrating with others. I understand that it sucks when your friends have something that you have longed for. Trust me, I have been there many times. Instead of feeling sorry for yourself and resentful towards your friend, know that your time is coming and in the meantime celebrate her new promotion, engagement or baby announcement with her. She needs you.
Understand that life isn’t always going to be grand. You and your best friend are going to disagree. That doesn’t mean you need to come at each other with vicious attacks and ugly words. Conflict isn’t a bad thing, but sometimes how we handle conflict can be horrible. Instead of blowing up at each other, take a moment to reflect. Does it really matter if her opinion is different than yours? Is there another solution to the problem, or something you can both compromise on? Always remember to focus on the problem, not the person.
If you value your time and know that you don’t have much of it to waste, you are likely to think twice before getting mixed up in someone else's drama. Take some advice from Sweet Brown, “Ain’t nobody got time for that.”
Maybe right now is the time to tell your friends and family that you can no longer be occupied with drama. Let them know that you now have a “Drama Free” policy and you aren’t going to put up with that crap from anyone. After you let others know of your new policy, you must enforce it. Cut people off when they bring drama. Ignore their phone calls, texts and banter until they are ready to follow your drama free policy too.
Living drama free is the best. If you have been swamped with drama for a long time, you will surely enjoy the new freedom, but it might take some time to fully cut all the drama out. What are some ways you have created drama free friendships? When you made the change, did you find that you were part of the problem too?