Episode 42: Coffee with Gabi! When Personal Growth and Healing Disrupts Relationships

This is something I don't think we talk about enough - but honestly, it's inevitable:

when you are intentional about healing and about personal growth and development, it WILL disrupt some of your relationships.

The fact is, healing and growing changes you. It causes you to value yourself more and to be clear about what your boundaries and standards are. There will be some people in your life who are HERE FOR IT! And that's awesome! These are the people who will be cheering you on, celebrating every step of growth, and leaning in to the person you are becoming. They are probably growing, too! But then there will also be some people, some relationships, that will be significantly disrupted because of your growth. It will mess with the status quo in the relationship. Your boundaries and standards will rub certain people the wrong way and there will be pushback, bad feelings, and even rejection. That can really SUCK and you may grieve, and that's okay! But ultimately, being in relationship with people who are unhealthy for you and/or who refuse to accept the person you are becoming are not the people you need in your life. There will likely be relationship pruning along the way, which will also make way for healthier and better relationships! So let's embrace the disruption and the discomfort. Why? Because WE ARE WORTH IT. :)

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this, and about your experiences! Shoot me an email at gabi@paintopassionlive.com or a DM on instagram, and let's chat!

And as always, if you're enjoying the podcast, please rate and review! Thank you soooo much!!

xoxo

Connect with Gabi:

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Website - ⁠⁠⁠⁠gabiruth.com⁠⁠⁠⁠

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(TRANSCRIPT) Ep. 42: Coffee with Gabi! When Personal Growth and Healing Disrupts Relationships

Note: Transcript is created by AI. Please excuse any errors.

Hey there, friends. It's me again, Gabi, for a Coffee with Gabi episode of Pain to Passion Live. Guess what? I know you will be shocked by this, but I am sitting in a parking lot again to record this episode, and I'm actually a day late because I'll tell you the truth, yesterday when I was going to record this podcast, I just was not.

I was having a really rough day. And the only reason I'm telling you that is because I think we need permission. Like sometimes we just need permission to have bad days and to have permission to listen to our bodies when they're like, Nope, we're not doing this stuff. So I literally took a two hour nap in the middle of the day and got exactly zero of the things that my to-do list done.

But guess what? Today I feel a whole heck of a lot. So I'm glad I listened to my body and didn't push through, cuz today I probably would've ended up sick or in pain or something like that. So hopefully that will be encouraging to some of you who have just needed a break. It's okay to take a break sometimes, but that's not really what I'm here to talk about today.

Today what I wanted to talk with you about is how personal growth and engaging in your healing can disrupt your relationships. It's true. As you heal, as you grow, you may find that there are some relationships in your life that get significantly disrupted, and maybe we don't talk about that enough because it is kind of a fallout of healing.

It is gonna happen. So how do we decide if it's worth it? Right. At the end of the day, you're worth it. You are worth getting the healing that you need, the healing that you deserve of engaging in the personal growth that you desire, and developing as a human being into the best version of yourself.

You're worth it. But there will be instances when that rubs against some of the relationships in your life in a way that there's really nothing you can do. So, for example, I had a friend a while back last year, and this friendship while I was enjoying being friends with this person and really hoping that we could have a great relationship for a long time, turns out.

Over the course of our friendship, I was healing a lot. Like I was on the fast track in a lot of ways. Um, just one of those seasons where you're growing by leaps and bounds, and I started to see some red flags. I started to see some real red flags in this relationship, and I wasn't just gonna give up on it.

But I did give her the opportunity to talk with me about it, and I shared with her some of the things that I was concerned about. I shared with her, um, some of the ways that I told her I refused to be treated and the way that I would accept being treated. She had a choice at that point of whether or not to accept that, of whether or not to respect those boundaries.

And I'll tell you right now, she smashed them. She smothered those boundaries, and she did not want to engage in a healthy form of communication or healthy relationship. And I lost that friend. It was dramatic. It was intense. It was brutal, but. I don't regret it. Not a bit. Yes, I was heartbroken. Yes, I was sad, I was devastated.

I did not feel happy about losing this friend, but I was able to process it and recover relatively quickly. Why? Because it was my personal growth that brought me to the point of knowing what I could tolerate and not tolerate what I deserved and did not deserve. And. That same personal growth and healing had allowed me to value myself enough and to respect myself enough to know that an unhealthy relationship is not worthwhile for my life.

So these kinds of things happen, you guys, and they might happen with people that you've known for a long time. It might happen with people you've known for a short amount of time. It might happen with family members. It really will. I don't know how many of you know this, but I have been no contact with my own parents for the last two years, and some of you might not like that.

Some of you might feel really uncomfortable with that information, but I don't see the point in hiding that or not telling the truth about that because it's not like anyone breaks up with their parents lightly and it's only been two years. It was at that 0.2 years ago that I realized it doesn't matter what boundaries I put in place, it doesn't matter what my standards are, it doesn't matter the person I become, their behavior is not changing and it's harmful and toxic to me and my family.

And so I had to make that really, really hard choice to go no contact with my parents. Um, has it been sad? Yes. Has it been heartbreaking? Yes. Has it been healing? Yes. All of the above. Sometimes it might be a relationship with a significant other that is hard. It's really hard guys, but at some point you have to value yourself and love yourself enough to realize that you don't have to tolerate toxicity, bad behavior, um, even.

Just being pushed aside or ignored. You don't have to tolerate that just because you have a relationship with a person, but that's why healing and growing and changing and developing as a human will disrupt relationships. So just to expect that going in. But the good news is it doesn't mean that your life will be lone.

It simply means that you're gonna make room in your life for the people who are right for you. And that is a gift. In the past year or so, I have been able to welcome people into my life that I have never seen coming. I never saw them coming, but it was simply my commitment to healing, to growing, to pursuing a life that is aligned with my values.

That has brought me into the presence of. Who are so good for me, they're so safe. They are on the same trajectory as me. Not that everyone has to be the same as me. Absolutely not. But there's so much mutual respect. There's so much mutual love and. It's beautiful, and I wouldn't have had the space nor the insight to go to the places that I've gone to meet these people.

Without the healing, without the growth, and without saying goodbye to certain relationships, it just wouldn't have happened. It's taken courage. It's taken guts, but dang, it's been worth it. So know that if some of your relationships get disrupt, Your relationship with yourself, first of all, will be so much better, and the relationships with the people that will have the space to come into your life because you've done some house cleaning will be amazing.

So have hope. Friends, you can also grieve. There's absolutely grief in losing people, and that's totally okay. Just because it's a good thing doesn't always mean it's a happy thing, and that's okay too. So feel all the feelings. But don't stunt your growth for the sake of harmony with another person because that harmony is fake and it's detrimental.

If it means that you are holding back, you're healing your growth and who you are for the sake of that relationship. Do you have feedback about that? Have you experienced this? Shoot me an. Send me a message on Instagram, let me know. I'd love to hear. And PS I still have a handful of openings for one-on-one coaching.

I would love to work with you and help you to heal and grow and chase after your dreams, if that sounds like something you'd enjoy. Go ahead and jump onto my website and book a free connection call with me. I'd love to chat with you, see if we're a good fit for each other and maybe we can work together.

That would be so awesome. I would love to do that with you. For you. Maybe we can even process some of these relationships and help you see clearly what's good, what's not good, and the best ways to move. Okay, friends, I hope you've enjoyed this episode. Thank you for being here. Thanks for having coffee with me every week.

It's one of the highlights of my week. You're amazing. You're worth it. I'll talk to you next time.