Over the last year, I have lost almost all of my old friendships and gained so many new ones. The new people in my life have made me realize I truly deserve everything I have been lacking in my friendships. I’m turning 20 in a few months, and I believe I finally have a formula for maintaining friendships that are non-negotiable. I’m no longer interested in giving my all to relationships and getting nothing in return. Friendships and relationships are important and, therefore, what you expect and ask for from these people have to be a little bit more than what you ask for from everyone else. Your life is your own to fill up space with whoever you deem fit. These are my absolute musts. This list might go on but I’m starting here. If it isn’t mutually beneficial and progressive, I ain’t with it.

1. Support

This is what I’ve given to all my friendships, and I rarely received it in return. If you are my friend and I share my dreams with you, your job is to support me. If you see me making moves to chase my dreams, whether it’s my writing or any other venture, you should be sharing, promoting and giving me feedback. If you can scroll past something of mine that entails me trying to better myself, you’re sketchy. I don’t have time for sketchy. When I come to you with ideas or good news, I should not be met with crickets and you shouldn’t be inadvertently changing the subject. I’m over the friends that are consistently low key competing with you or trying to one up you. If you doubt my dreams, you can sit in the stands because we can’t be friends. As a friend, you should want to see me do well and in turn you should be supporting me. If you aren’t supporting me in ways I deem fit, you don’t want to see me do well and therefore you aren’t my friend. Period.

2. Respect

Gone are the days when I tolerate snarky and malicious remarks for the sake of keeping the peace. I am no longer passively ignoring blatant or discrete disrespect. Purposefully embarrassing me, calling me out in public, making me the butt of the joke, mentioning things about me that I am insecure about or generally downplaying me is gonna have to be a no. All of those kinds of friends can go! I’m not the perfect friend, but I am most definitely genuine and respectful. If you can’t engage in conversation or debate and respectfully disagree, you can go! Again I stress that this is non-negotiable. This includes respect for others as well. If you are consistently rude, brash or disrespectful to others and it makes me uncomfortable… bye.

3. Usefulness

Because truly some of the friendships I’ve had in the past few years have been useless, to say the least. If I can’t cry on your shoulder, (vice versa), come to you for counsel, or draw some kind of inspiration from you then we can’t be friends. This one’s a biggie because there are people I’ve called friends simply because of the number of years they’ve just been there (uselessly) or they’re good for banter and fun times. Those are acquaintances and truly that shouldn’t ever be confused with a genuine friend. This also entails how progressive a person is in their own lives. I used to a be a fixer. I used to try to fix people and polish them so that they were decent enough for me to have around. I tried fixing entire souls, that doesn’t work. I’ve tried fixing character, that doesn’t work either. If you don’t already have your shit together, I am not interested. If you aren’t interested in bettering yourself or growing with me, I will not slow down so that you can catch up. I will leave you in the dust.

These are a few of my demands. Simply because I bring my best self to the table all the time and I’m left sitting across from a bunch of losers. This year I met winners and I want more of them on my team. I deserve more of them on my team. What are some your friendship non-negotiables?