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Savannah writes, I've been following your plan for three years and I've done well for myself as a single parent.

I'm debt-free, I have a healthy emergency fund and will likely pay off my house in three years.

I've had to make many sacrifices and I've worked hard. However, some of my friends and family are struggling.

There's a constant stream of complaints at family and church gatherings about the cost of groceries, increased rent and house prices being unaffordable.

This is usually followed by snide comments about the haves and have-nots, which occasionally descends into assumptions that those who own their home and have investments

are rich, greedy people who benefited at the expense of others less fortunate.

How do I, as someone who has worked so hard to better my situation, deal with the hurt I feel

when I'm called greedy and selfish?

How do I not feel angry and resentful towards those people when I've made so many

sacrifices to get where I am? They're the ones who choose to complain about their situation

rather than do something to get out of it. What do I do? That's tough. You need some new friends i was going to say um man you as jZ once said you dust your shoulders

off and you head out the door man yeah um shake the dust off your sandals and keep moving uh yeah

you do you've got to, here's the thing.

One guy calls those people energy vampires, and they're sucking the blood out of your

soul, is what you're saying, because that's what negative people do that are victims

and complain and blame everyone else.

They're the opposite of people who provide hope, who provide encouragement, which refreshes

people's souls instead of drains them, right?

And so you have to say, all right, the people that I spend time with that are negative

is going to be limited

to the amount of energy I have to try to help them not be negative.

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