Change Your Friends For A Better Life

Ever heard the saying, “show me a person’s friends and I will tell you what sort of person they are”?  It has more truth to it than you may think.  Look around your own circle of friends.  It’s probable that you and they engage in similar types of behaviour.  If your friend spends lots of time shopping, it’s likely that you do, too.  You might have even found that, if you’ve been friends for awhile, you may share similar physical traits – a similar body-weight, for instance, or similar taste in clothes.  If there are some aspects to yourself that you’re unhappy with, unfortunately, your friends might be helping you to maintain them.

This is partly due to a psychological phenomenon known as Social Proof.  It’s whereby people follow the lead of the people they associate with if they’re unsure about something.  If you’re unsure whether you should be going out tonight because you have an early start tomorrow, but your friend does too and is already lining up the vodka shots, Social Proof might explain why you turn up late tomorrow.  It’s important, then, to choose the people whom we associate with carefully. 

You have to know what you want before you know whom to choose as friends, however.  Therefore, it is important to develop your own set of strongly developed personal values and attitudes.  Values are your own beliefs about what really matters in life.  Examples of values include ‘Abundance’, ‘Learning’, ‘Knowledge’ and ‘Teamwork’.  There are many lists on the internet that detail a wide range of values.  You might wish to scan one, and make a list of your personal top 10 most important values. 

Once you have identified your most important values, you should find, ideally, that your values guide your behaviour.  So, a person who values ‘Family’ should be attempting to maintain good relationships with their family members and should make an effort to spend time with them.  If you find that there’s a gap between your values and your behaviour, it may be time to re-assess your behaviour.  Given that we know friends influence our behaviour, it may also be time to re-assess your friendships.

This doesn’t have to mean we dismiss all our current friendships.  It may just mean broadening our social horizons, to include other friendships that are more in line with our personal values.  Someone who values ‘Creativity’, for instance, should seek to surround him- or herself with other people who also value being creative.  This will likely mean people who like to talk about art, who are imaginative and innovative, and who inspire you.  You can find these people through joining relevant clubs and associations, through internet forums and just by keeping an eye out for them.

Though there is some evidence that our choice of friends is influenced by our genetic make-up, it is certainly not impossible to consciously seek out people who will help us to grow into the people we most want to be.