On Inner Circles

There is a saying that goes like this:

"you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with"

This relates to the law of averages, which is the theory that the result of any given situation will be the average of all outcomes.

Whether we like it or not, it is only fair that we admit we are almost always greatly influenced by those closest to us. Our relationships with the ones closest to us affect and greatly impact our mindset. Their way of thinking and perceiving the world and their core beliefs will impact our perspective. Our daily habits will be influenced by how they spend their time. Even our relationship with money and having to take financial life choices will also be hugely influenced by the collective pattern of how they spend theirs.

There is another saying that goes:

"birds of a feather flock together"

It is only obviously natural that when you hang around with someone for a long period of time, you will find out that you have unconsciously picked up on some of their traits in the long run. We all adapt to the slang of those we hang around and we pick up habits, wording, speech, communication styles, etc. along the way we become more and more similar to who we choose to hang out with. At some point in time, we average out as we have absorbed certain traits from those around us and they have blended into one core in us.

It is not that you have to take on their values, but you will have in-built support for whatever characteristics they share. Your personality doesn't have to necessarily change to the point of you becoming the average of others but you will definitively pick up some of the personality traits of others.

So if you hang around lazy people most of the time, you will most likely end up catching on to their laziness and eventually, you either get dissatisfied with yourself and the place you are at in life or you get blinded by the laziness that you become convinced you are the most normal human being there is. The same goes for when you choose to be in a circle of successful people, you would most likely become successful in the long run and that is because you would observe and pick up on the habits that formed them into the successful people they are now and that will most likely give you the motivation to work more on yourself in order to meet them at that level.

Of course, we have the illusion that we are our own person but extensive research on human behavior has shown that we are more affected by our environment than we could think and like to admit.

If you want to be up to anything big in the world, especially if it’s something about which the world does not agree, you definitely want to find people who are in the same state of mind. Being selective of who you let in on your inner circle is something crucial to the life you envision and want to have.