do people come with an x button so you can delete them from your life?

it's been a year now that i decided to make my life lighter. i started with my home and my belongings and have eliminated a lot of "garbage" mostly by detecting false needs... this has been going well.

then i started to eliminate garbage in form of thoughts and feelings, my online itneractions.

then activities, obligations, more false needs and things that wasted my time and energy.

now it is time to move on to people in my life.

i have been thinking about eliminating some *friends* who just don't feel good. one friend sucks the life out of me with his neediness, another exhausts me with his misogyny, even if it is subconscious... i think i will simply keep myself away from them, avoid seeing them and such. i ve been keeping a gossiping control freak out of my life for several months now and i successfully "deleted" an ex a few weeks ago.

my criterium for knowing who i need to chuck out is how i feel when im having an exchange with them, as well as when i'm not.

sometimes i get an unpleasant feeling, as if the person is jealous of me in a way and doesn't really wish me well, or trying to control me, or feels free to "correct" something about me when i haven't given that permission... with the people i feel good with, these corrections are most welcome and appreciated. with the others, they feel like annoying intrusions/invasions to my personality... maybe because they come from a need to prove themselves as better, than from interest for my improvement and development.

sometimes communication is simply odd, i'm not sure the person is listening, by a seemingly odd response, or they listen but their social skills are somehow... not on the same wavelength as mine. for example when i say "i got this such and such diagnosis from the doctor and now i have to take this pill and do so and so" and the person just ignores what i said, instead of offering a simple "oh, i'm sorry darling, hope you're not in pain" something simple that shows, i aknowledge what you say, and i feel with you.

or when i have a friend who will only talk about themselves and their problems for two hours straight, every time i see them, without as much as "hey, and what have you been up to?" i totally understand that a friend can be like that at times, and that's ok, but if they are like that all the time, then they need probably a psychologist for it and not a friend.

the opposite can also feel weird. when someone only wants to hear about you, but they never share anything about themselves. when you ask them something they give you a vague or general answer and turn the focus back to you.

or people that are constantly "pill-happy". i don't know what else to name this condition, and I know i am a very joyful person myself, with good amounts of energy. it's just that there are people whose happiness doesnt feel so genuine to me, or it feels kinda "pushed", as if they are making themselves "sound" and "show" happy rather than be happy. it can get very tiring, too.

and then i also realise i don't want some people as friends, because when they are away on vacation or they haven't called in a while i don't miss them at all, they hardly come up in my thoughts in fact. and it gets even worse because when they do call, i might even get an irritated feeling like "oh, it's you... i don't feel like speaking to you now" or... "oh, you... i had forgotten you exist..." but of course saying something like this would be very rude and hurtful...

i wonder do i need to tell these people why i do not wish contact any more? the thing is, i have sort of tried in a nice way but it didn't work. the message didn't get across, and when i was more direct about it, they got cross. i don't particularly mind what they think of me "know-better-bitch?" but harsh concepts/criticism to one's person and behaviour can hurt... even if they are put in neutral words. especially when I know that this person has some problems with themselves, like not feeling as good as everybody else, then it sort of puts a greater responsibility on me to be even kinder with them?

but then again, if i want to treat all people as equal, why should i make exceptions for them? maybe it is time for them to simply grow up? and maybe it has nothing to do with them at all, and it is about me?

i think feeling inferior or feeling superior are two sides of the same coin: you feel somehow different than the rest of the world. it is a failure to aknowledge that you are just like everybody else, and you could be anyone else. and if i treat people differently, i will reinforce this belief in them.

all this elimination of garbage has made a lot of space for many new, good, happy things. good luck, love, happiness, contentness, wonderful new people and many many lessons and moments of insight have been coming to me. i think they have been coming because i have been inviting them to do so, and trying to keep my eyes, my ears my heart open for them.