There are some people who come into your life to make it better. There are other people who go out of your life to make it better still.

A Spanish friend of mine (Jorge, you know who you are) posted this on Facebook and it really resonated with me, even though it sounds quite harsh. I’d been thinking about how important it is to surround ourselves with a community of positive people who have our best interests at heart and who truly care about us. We will thrive better without people who criticise us, try to control us, bully us or make us feel small. I fully accept that positive feedback and criticism is helpful from good friends, but negative disapproval  from so-called friends that brings us down is something we can readily do without.