Do you ever stop to think why the people in your life are in your life? It’s something I’ve been thinking about for a while, but only something I started doing something about in the past couple of years.

I subscribe to the ‘five people’ idea; that you’re the average of the five people you spend the most time with (see How the people around you affect your personal success), but I never really did much to change it or its impact.

If you think about it, it’s crazy that people come into your life at random and you just let them. We let strangers interrupt us with questions in the street, we give up time we’ll never get back in all kinds of ways, to friends and relatives and co-workers and people we’ll never see again. That’s what makes social media so interesting – it forces you to consciously decide whether or not you want to let someone into your life, or be a part of theirs. Away from the screen, we take a lot for granted.

I used to be one of those people that gave up their time for everyone. Stop me in the street? Sure, why not. Want me to visit you? I’m there. Cake? I’m already in the kitchen.

I had no filter. I spent a lot of time doing what other people wanted me to do rather than what I wanted to do. I spent a lot of time listening to people and adopting their opinions and absorbing all their stress. The craziest thing of all was that I did it to stop myself (and them) feeling bad, or guilty. It ended up just making me feel worse. I was exhausted. I was lost. I wasn’t even sure who I was or what I wanted or where someone else stopped and I began.

It wasn’t all bad. I had a lot of fun experiences and great memories and I learned a lot (in a good way, because a lot of event organisers persuaded me to go to their events and I did). But it was overwhelming and exhausting. After reading Happiness By Design I realised that my outlook was totally wrong. One point made in the book is that if you’re consciously choosing to sacrifice happiness now to be happier later, it has to be worth it. Because happiness you don’t have now is happiness you’ll never get back.

When I applied this to time as well, I realised how crazy my approach was. I’d be stopped by people in the street asking me to sign up to things or donate to a cause or switch to their company, and I’d stop (even though I had no intention of doing those things) and talk to them to be polite, simply because I felt guilty otherwise. I stopped doing that. I realised it was wasting time neither of us would get back, and they might lose the chance to stop someone else who would actually do what they wanted. When it happens now, I feel a bit bad for maybe two seconds. But that’s a lot better than how bad I feel wasting my time on something I don’t care about (see What I learned from quitting Facebook).

Over the past few years, I’ve been pretty ruthless about cutting people out of my life. Relationships should be mutual, and too many of mine were one way. This is probably in part my fault for being a pushover and a people-pleaser, but some people took advantage of that. Some people didn’t. A lot of articles talk about ‘toxic’ people. I don’t think it’s as simple as people being toxic or not. There are a lot of different factors at play. Some people are good matches, some people aren’t. On top of that, people are always affected by their past experiences, their present situations, and other people’s issues. People handle things in different ways, and communicate at different levels, and may have been good for you three years ago but aren’t now, or vice versa. There may be elements of a single person which inspire you and other elements that utterly destroy you.

At many points in life you’re stuck with the people around you and don’t have much choice about it. In addition to that, you meet people randomly based on the decisions you make every day and the relationships you build with them often come about fairly randomly too. It’s not possible to control anything, but it is possible to declutter. Just as you should have possessions that spark joy, you should have people who do the same thing.

Based on that, I decided that there needed to be rules for the people actively in my life. This way I can spend more time doing things I love with people who stimulate me, are supportive, and care about my happiness (and with whom I can reciprocate those things). I’m friends with all kinds of people: millionaires, benefit claimants, conservatives, anarchists, drug addicts, religious people, transgendered people, pansexuals. People who’ve won the lottery and lost it all. People who have everything they want and nothing they need. I don’t discriminate. The rules are very flexible guidelines. People are individuals, and there’s no one-size-fits-all blanketing. I’m not standing there with a clipboard checking boxes. I don’t consciously tell people about these rules or they’d probably feel forever judged and paranoid; they’re more for me. I’m comfortable with just having people meet enough of them enough of the time.

It’s a good way of working out what you want from the relationships in your life and what you want to change.

Creating rules for the people in your life

To start with, create a list of attributes that are important for you to have in a friend. (This can also be done for any kind of relationships you have: romantic, work, networking, family, etc. but is likely to be more frustrating for those you have very little influence over). They can be as vague or specific as you like; you could say ‘generous’ or you could say ‘is willing to cook at least once a month’. If you find it difficult, think about the people you spend the most time with and what you love and hate most about them.

Next, go through the people in your life (if there are too many, think about ones you’re particularly unsure about or you spend a lot of time with) and answer these questions:

• How does this person make me feel about myself (and other people)?
• Is this person supportive?
• Is this person ever critical of me? (If they are, is it in a motivating way or because of their own insecurities?)
• Is this person in my life by default?
• If I think about meeting up with/talking to this person, how does that make me feel?
• Do I have to make a conscious effort with this person?
• Does this person make an effort with me?
• Do I have conversations with this person that interest me?
• Can I be myself with this person?
• What are the best things about this person?

Feel free to add/remove questions based on your own priorities. From here, you can figure out what’s important to you in other people. There will be some things you’ll want to apply to everyone in your life, and some things that will only work for specific groups of people or in particular contexts. How flexible you are will also make a difference. It’s important to remember that people bring different things to your life and a good pro can outweigh multiple cons. You can easily incorporate rules that are dealbreakers if you want to, or assign specific priorities.

Example rules

If you’re interested, here are some of my rules:

1. Be supportive (but realistic)
Let’s face it, I can get a little crazy sometimes.

2. Be interested in contributing to my happiness in some way
This could be as small as sending me a kitten picture or making me laugh. It doesn’t have to be anything major; it might even be something you do subconsciously.

3. Being honest is more important than being nice
Assuming you can’t have both ;)

4. Ask don’t tell
Everyone likes to have a sense of autonomy. Ask me if I want to do something or how I feel about something rather than telling me or making assumptions.

5. Know that I’ll be there for you when I can
And if I can’t there’s a very good reason.

6. Don’t blame me for your own problems
Venting is totally fine. Blame isn’t.

7. Be interesting
If you got this far, I definitely find you interesting. Things I don’t find interesting: endless conversations about how much you’re planning to drink at the weekend or what your favourite brand of cat food is. Wait, what do you mean you don’t have a favourite brand of cat food??

What rules do you have for the people in your life?