I think we've all heard those motivational quotes. You know the ones.
"You are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with. Choose wisely."
"Show me your friends and I will show you your future."
"Surround yourself with people who are smarter than you."
Basically, some version of audit the people you spend time with; and by the way, ideally they should be better than you are.
Now, motivational quotes serve their purpose. They are short, sharp, and powerful. They can convey an idea in very few words. They can inspire. But because of their brevity and impact, they can really only focus on one idea at a time. The challenge here, and why some people get so riled up over them, is that life isn't quite so clear cut or focused. There are so many grey areas, contextual layers and reasons why these may not work for you.
I do agree that the people surrounding you do impact you greatly. I think the problem herein is when people start to take these ideas to extremes.
For example, if you will only hang out with people who are your betters, the proverbial fifth in a group of five - do you realise these people allowed you to become number five? If everyone only seeks to spend time with people they consider above them, they wouldn't spare any time or thought for those they consider less "smart" than them. We reach an impasse.
Life is about balance. We take, and so we must give.
I love this quote by Michelle Obama. It's a reflection of a really balanced inner world.
We should have three categories of friends, always:
- The people we follow. These are our mentors, the more experienced, the people who we can learn from and who, in emulating, make us better people.
- The people we accompany. These are the people at the same life stage as us, who speak the same 'language' as us because their understanding of the world is similar. These are the people who we can commiserate with, take comfort from, and have as company on our journey.
- The people we nurture. These are the people we give back to. Because someone has given to you, in the same way, we can now help these people to learn, progress, and mature in their life journey. In teaching others, we also cement our own learning and pick up new skills.
We see this principle everywhere, even in our family units. Our parents and elders are initially our life mentors. Our siblings, cousins, and other relatives around a similar age, the people who we accompany. And the younger siblings and relatives are often the people we nurture.
One thing I really love in my USANA team is that the system encourages and rewards similar principles. We have business leaders that we look up to, team members who we work with, and less experienced team members that we mentor in turn. A balanced lifecycle that keeps nurturing and giving.
When this system is out of balance, it affects us as well.
- If we lack mentors, we start to become stagnant in our lives. We stop growing as a person.
- If we lack peers, we often feel lonely, that people don't "get us", that we are not understood.
- If we lack mentees, we can become impatient and dismissive, or perhaps selfish without realising it.
Have you heard this quote before? What do you think? Leave a comment down below!