Lilith and Agatha.
A friendship since school, a year of weighed words – and the day the swamp got named, left, and turned into air.
The names are invented; the story, she says, is not. It's the anatomy of a slow poison: a friendship since school where one grew and the other punished the growing – remarks, expectations, a displeasure to be managed. The detail that stings most is the smallest: staying longer at meetings so as not to hear, later, that she had given too little time. Anyone who has weighed every word of a message knows which swamp this is.
The turn comes late and costs her: ending it was painful, and even afterwards she braced for the next message. Then the space the friendship had occupied started filling – guests, hobbies, breath, health. The Art of Letting Go describes exactly this economy: what you release stops spending you. And her closing counsel – notice what poisons you, and walk away however hard it is – carries a promise she earned line by line: the good arrives into the room you cleared.
She kept nothing of it but the lesson. That's what this blog is for.
There's a girl – let's call her Lilith. And since childhood she has had a friend, Agatha. They'd been friends since school, knew each other from every side; you'd think there was nothing left to be surprised by. Usually, having walked a road like that, you live through all the stages of friendship, and as you grow up yourselves, the level of the friendship grows too. The betrayals, the envy and the other unpleasantness fall away. But it so happened that Lilith grew very much spiritually at exactly the moment when Agatha wasn't ready to step toward her own fears – and she devalued Lilith's work in every way, so that Lilith would stay down on her level. There were many moments when Agatha struck Lilith with remarks, hung her own expectations on her – all in all, plenty of red flags, so to speak, for Lilith to reconsider this friendship. But, as we're all trained to do, Lilith was afraid of being inconvenient and of choosing herself. Time passed, the relationship grew more and more toxic. Lilith weighed every word she wrote to Agatha, because Agatha was forever displeased. She picked her words and phrasings, was afraid to decline a meeting, or even (comically) stayed longer at one, so she wouldn't have to hear later that she had given too little time… Time passed, it all kept piling up – and at some point Lilith learned that something good and important had happened in Agatha's life, which she had hidden from Lilith for almost a year, because she thought Lilith would ENVY her and be upset…
And most likely that was the final red flag, when Lilith's eyes opened. She tried to talk – and was told to get her head fixed… That happens too. Then she was blocked, unblocked – in short, a whole carnival.
Lilith made the decision to end this friendship, and it came to her painfully and hard.
And what is this story for? By the way, it isn't invented – only the names are changed))
For this: after that decision, at first Lilith was afraid of seeing a message from Agatha, didn't know how to react, and feared she'd be pulled back into that relationship.
And then the changes began. She felt like inviting people over (after Agatha's behavior Lilith had a fear of guests); she had energy for herself and her hobbies again; even her health improved. She understood what a weight she had taken off herself, how she could breathe. And the fear that Agatha would write disappeared too. Because Lilith now knew for certain she would not go back into that swamp. She had given too much of herself away for nothing. And heard only negativity and insults in return.
Sometimes it's hard to notice what is poisoning you. But if you have noticed – walk away from it. Remove it from your life, however hard that is. Endure through it – and then you will see how much GOOD comes into your life)
Thank you for reading.
If her words reached somewhere mine don't – good. That's what this blog is for. Take what fits and leave the rest.
– Jan