Art of Allowing Mindset

I was watching the episode Patriot Act, on Boston Legal on my DVR, and Jeri had a line that jumped out at me.

“Friendships are like back yard gardens. We always mean to tend to them, we just seem to put to put them off until next week.”

Friendships are important they give us support, fun, adventure, love… they need to be tended. When I was growing up some how I got it in my head that it was hard to make friends. I had good friends but there always seemed to be an underlying thread of “its hard to make friends.”

When I started coaching and creating programs ten years ago I was amazed at the limiting beliefs that were holding the women I was working with back from creating what they really wanted in life. I dove in to everything I could find about how to identify them and release them. I recognized that “its hard to make friends” was a limiting belief I had held since I was very little.

I decided I wanted to let go of that and come up with a new belief that would make it easier for me to allow more friends into my life. Here is a quick look at the steps I took to let go of “its hard to make friends” and replace it with “Its easy and fun to make new friends”

1. I wrote out the different kinds of friendships I wanted to have- acquaintances, deep friends, out to the movie night once a month friends…

2. I wrote out what I felt were the qualities, feelings, actions, that made me a good friend in those different kinds of friendships

3. I wrote out a clear definition and description complete with qualities that were important to me in each kind of friendship

4. I wrote out the 3 qualities that were “must haves” for me in the lighter friendships and the 7 qualities that “must haves” for me in deep friends.

5. Then I looked at the friendships I had, I sorted them into the different kinds of friendships and I looked at how many of the friends I had fit the clear definition of each kind of friend and if they had the “must haves” qualities.

6. The people that had all the qualities I wanted in the kind of friend they were I set the intention to “tend” to my friendship with them. To nurture it, appreciate it and enjoy them more when I was with them.

7. I made sure that I was being the kind of friend I had described I wanted to be in step2

It took work and commitment to follow through on my intention but within 3 months I had friends in the different kinds of friendships I had said I wanted and each friend had the “must haves” qualities I was wanted. Some friends dropped away, and I found it was easy and fun to make new friends.

My life is so much less stressful in social situations because I let go of my old limiting belief of “its hard to make friends”. My life is so much richer and filled with happiness because I decided to set a clear intention for my new belief of “It’s easy and fun to make new friends”

One thing I added to my new belief last year as I was thinking about what I wanted to create around friendships was “my friendships give me and my friend the best in each of us with no attachments to time”

What makes a good friendship for you?
Are yours balanced with each person giving and actively participating?
What kinds of things do you do to tend to your friendships?

I would love to know, at the top of this post click on the “comments” link and let me know how you are tending to your friendships