You get what you tolerate.

We teach people how to treat us, we get what we allow. We live in a world where people would use you if you allow them to. It takes courage to set standards for your life as people would constantly take advantage of your insecurities. If you continue to give people the benefit of the doubt, eventually they would get the benefit and you get the doubt. This is a personal philosophy of mine: If you are not going to be there for me in my struggle, you are not going to come near my castle. As Maya Angelou once said, “If people show you who they are, believe them”. If people are always taking from your cup, you would not have anything to give eventually,

A lot of us allow ourselves to be used because we do not have or set healthy boundaries. I know it can be hard to set boundaries or say no, especially to family and friends. Knowing yourself (self-awareness) makes you see people for who they are: The narcissist, the drama king or queen, the codependent, the manipulator, and the gaslighters, etc. You need to say yes to yourself first, it might sound selfish but you need to care for yourself before you can care for others. We stay in toxic and destructive relationships as we convince ourselves that we can not live life without some people. The challenge with that thinking is that your time here is finite, but you keep allowing toxicity into your short life, which is not sustainable.