Hey, do you like my cheap little 20 year old glasses that I had to buy because I left my good glasses on the plane? But they have found them, so I’ll get them back Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So Q&A Sunday, because it’s Sunday. And I went, “Oh, I did this last Sunday.” Oh God. It’s just been a bit… When you travel, you get a bit out of whack with who you are, where you are, what day it is all that kind of stuff. Anyway, [inaudible 00:00:29], that is not an excuse. This week, I had legitimately been asked a couple of questions about people regarding toxicity. And no, we’re not talking about toxic shock syndrome. Which at a school camp, I swore I had, I thought I was going to die. I went to a teacher. It wasn’t. It was just period pain.
Darn it. So we’re talking about all these memes and things that are going around at the moment about just leaving the toxic behind in 2019 and going in 2020 with all that stuff removed. And I think that is… So I’ve been asked, “How do you do that? Legitimately, Sam, what are the steps to directly do that?” I think the problem with that is sometimes you actually can’t. It’s enough to say… Now I’m not talking about… So please don’t send me messages trying to say, “Sam you didn’t talk about this.” I’m not talking about situations like domestic violence or abuse or any of those things but get the F out as quickly as possible in whatever way, shape or form that I’m not a specialist that has dealt in any of that kind of stuff, but there is so much help and support out there for that kind of thing.
I’m talking about situations like a work environment where there’s been too much gossiping or negativity, or you’re not getting paid well enough, you are getting bullied a little bit. I’m talking about friendships where maybe you pay for everything all the time, or people are again negative or trying to support your dreams or your views, or you might be gay and in the closet and everyone you surround yourself with is really homophobic. Talking about those kind of toxic situations where you do have a bit more control and it’s not anything illegal or completely dysfunctional. That’s the stuff we’re talking about. So you see a meme and it says, “This is me waving goodbye to toxic people and everything in 2019. And I’m marching into 2020 with no toxic in my life at all.” Now, a lot of the time that can happen. So I’ll give you a couple examples.
o you’re in a work environment where you feel a little toxic, but you might have bills to pay, school fees to pay. You might not have any other options at the moment. You might be studying and then helping support your study. So it’s just an oversimplification for people to say, “Well, just leave and move on with it. Go do something different.” Sometimes you can’t and sometimes you don’t have the strength to do that. And sometimes you’re doing bits and pieces behind the scenes to set you up. So you can do that in the future, but right now it’s not going to happen. So you need to do… I’m going to go that B word. It’s all about boundaries again. But again, this is not the kind of thing where you need to walk into the workplace and go… And sometimes you can walk in and go, “I’m not putting up with that…”
Sometimes you can, and sometimes you can go in and go, “You know what? In 2020, these are my working hours and I’m not working outside of those hours. So if you come to me five minutes before I mean to leave, sorry it’s not going to get done.” And then some workplaces you do have the flexibility and the ability to do that. So I would suggest doing that. Go for it. In terms of toxic friendships, those means go and get rid of the toxic people in your life. You don’t need them. You don’t need them.
Sometimes it’s your mother. Now I shouldn’t have said that because mine’s dead. My mother wasn’t toxic. So just to preface that. She had her issues, but I definitely wouldn’t call her toxic. Sometimes again, there are people really close in your life and you can’t just shut the door on their face and nor can you walk up to these people and go, “I’m so sorry, but you’re really toxic. So you just need to get out of my life.” No, don’t do shit like that. That’s unnecessary and it can be hurtful. And you think maybe it’ll slap them in the face and they’ll look at themselves. But most of the time it doesn’t. And it will just cause an even yackier situation. So see them less start saying no more often.
Say you have a… trying to think of an example of someone who might not be someone close to me, who’s going to watch this video and think I was talking about them. Say, you have a toxic daughter. There you go [inaudible 00:04:58].
What?
She’s going, “What.” You can’t just shut them out. But it’s about saying no. Say that toxic person in your life invites you to something, say no. No explanation. You can even say, “Thank you for the invitation, but no.” And someone in a situation if they’re gossiping, this is a big one. Gossiping and negativity and judgment. When you’ve got those kind of people in your life, it’s a lot easier instead of saying, “Guys stop that behavior, or I’m not coming here again.” You can say that. Absolutely, and it takes a lot of strength to say that. And sometimes people need to hear that.
And then that’s about setting up a boundary. So you say, “Okay, I don’t think us having this conversation is beneficial. I find it an easy, unnecessary. Next time you start talking about this, I’m going to leave.” Now you’ve set that boundary. Absolutely then, so the next time they do, do that, that is up to you 100% because you can’t control their behavior, it’s up to you. 100%, the minute they start gossiping or acting in judgment or being narky about someone or something, and that’s goes against what you just said, you have to stand up, “I said, this will happen,” and leave. End of story. No more discussion needed. That’s about you setting up that boundary. So like in customer service, if you get sworn at in a phone call in customer service situation for example, I remember years ago being taught this. Like a gazillion years ago, when I worked at doctors. You don’t need to put up with someone swearing or being mean to you on the phone.
You can say, “Excuse me sir, I won’t tolerate being sworn at. The next time you swear at me, I’ll terminate this call.” Next time they swear, you don’t need to say anything, terminate that call. It’s the same in friendships, it’s the same with boundaries. If they’re doing things that you’re deeming toxic or toxic to you, because to them, they might not be. To them, that might be a completely normal behavior. They may feel great about what they’re doing, how they’re acting and the things they’re saying. And so it’s not up to you to change what they’re doing. It’s up to you to go,” This is unacceptable to me,” and to either leave or not put yourself in that situation.
So for those of you that are looking at all this stuff, going around saying, leave this behind in 1919. Oh my God, suddenly we’re at 100, 2019 and move into 2020 without all that negativity, don’t feel bad if you think you can’t just do that. Sometimes it’s the iddy bitty steps that are the best ones to actually take. So remember just say no to actually going into the situation to start with. But it’s in a workplace to try and set up some bit of boundaries about hours, behaviors, that kind of thing. And if it’s about friends and people you know, who are doing things that you deemed toxic, remember, it’s not about changing them. It’s about you going, “This is unacceptable to me,” and leaving or shutting down the conversation. And sometimes you don’t even need to tell them, you just need to act. Okay. Take that power. So that’s I guess my message to you about how to get rid of toxicity in your life in 2020 is about you owning the power to actually do that.
So just say no, shut it down, walk away. It’s as simple, okay, it’s not simple. It’s… Nobody is simple. It’s not easy. There you go. It’s simple, but it’s not easy to actually do that. So next time cousin, June is having a bitch about aunty Mary… Shouldn’t say Mary, because Mary is my family. What’s a name that’s not in my family. Auntie who?
Janice.
Auntie Janice. There you go we don’t auntie Janice. We’re watching friends at home. Bitching about auntie Janice. Shut it down. Leave. Don’t tolerate it. Simple as that. Okay. So here’s to the last couple of days at 2019, how exciting have a great day guys. Bye.