Friendship should not be blown away by your changing. Give each other space to grow and new seeds of friendship will sprout.

Hello Friendship,

In the past few months I have had the pleasure of having some amazing discussions with family and friends.  One of the best discussions was with one of my BFFs.

18 months ago, before I started my new eating and life approach, we were very close.  We use to drink, eat and have lots of laughs together.  When I started to eat organic, stopped drinking and started to feel better, I noticed she was starting to get angry at me.  Ever the optimist, I excused her behavior as stress and forgave her.  But over time, I really started to feel upset in her company.  Finally I confronted her and we had a great discussion and things seemed to get better.

But then, the anger seemed to start to swell again.  So I decided I needed to distance myself from her company for a while.  I missed my friend, but not how she was treating me and my new approach to wellness.  I started to invest in new and existing relationships that supported my journey and felt the love and support I needed.

Well recently, I tested the friendship with my old BFF and guess what?  We had the most amazing clearing conversation.

It turns out my BFF really does support me, reads this blog and tells all her friends to read the blog too.  I also found out she had been angry at me too.   She lost her old BFF and did not know who this new person was in front of her and did not know how to relate to me.  She was angry and upset with me for changing on her. WOW.

But her is the beautiful part, I also learned she is a huge supporter of my dreams, feels I have become more at peace with myself, sees the benefits in how my marriage has improved and how great I appear to feel.

She spent a lot of time encouraging me to continue on my journey to help others and telling me how creative, thoughtful and giving I am.  I was blown away by her love, passion, support, and encouragement.

So while I pulled away, perhaps I allowed her space to grow too and see how we could still be BFF, just with new ideas and experiences in front of us.  Not all BFF break-up have a happy ending so I am grateful for the amazing discussion.

To clearing conversations with friends and family.

Jo-Ann Blondin, your 9CupChallenge partner

P.S.  I cleared this post with her in advance out of respect for our friendship as her support is important to me.  She was totally cool with it.  Hugs to my BFF.