Why You Should Surround Yourself With Success

Sounds like another one of those no-brainers, doesn’t it?

Yet the sad truth is that it is not commonplace; usually, people like to surround themselves with people that like them. This is in no way exclusive to successful people or even people that have any added value to their lives other than to set an example of what not to be. Many times our family, friends and associates can keep us from getting ahead in life, despite their best intentions. Whether it’s who we want to marry, what business we want to run, what job we want to take, what food we want to eat, what we do with our sex lives, how we raise our children or even the education we seek. These people most likely do mean well but in expressing their lack of support in whatever way they choose, they ultimately keep you from getting to where you want to be.

If you’ve ever wondered why you’re not getting ahead in life, I think the best thing to do is to take a snapshot of your life at this very moment. A great way to do just that is to ask yourself a series of questions and write down your answers, like: Who do you surround yourself with? Are your friends successful people that you respect and want to be like? Does your family urge you to fulfill your dreams? Who holds you back from your dreams? Do I have enough people in my life that are positively pushing me forward to do what I want to do? The point is to identify who holds you back and who urges you forward and to surround yourself with the latter as much as possible.

Now of course, family is family and you don’t ever want to push them away but if they are holding you back from becoming what you really want to be, you should simply separate them from that part of your life. The same goes for your close friends and this can be done respectfully, so as not to push anyone away. Often, I hear success stories where people look back and they’re glad they did just that and their family is almost always proud of them for being driven and making their own life. Your real friends want you to succeed.

Making your own life is what it’s all about. Sure, you’re going to get pressured into many things in your life; however, the main bullet points in your life should ultimately be your decisions in action.

Making Active Changes

Now that you have your list, you should use another piece of paper and draw a line straight down the center. On the left side, you should write “cages” at the top and the other side you should label “elevators.”

At first, this is going to sound a little bit silly but just hang in there. On the left side, write down all the names (no matter who they are) that you feel hold you back and on the right, the people that drive you to be successful. Once you’re done with that, take a good hard look; that’s your future staring you in the face. Does it look promising or like a down-slide? If you have more people on the right than on the left, congratulations! But if you have more people on the left, then it’s time to make some active changes in your life.

Now as I said before, you never have to cut anyone off completely but to ensure your own success in life, you should consider putting some distance between you and the people on the left side. You can do this simply by filling up your time with the people on the right side, or you can work on building your “elevator” column.

You may be wondering what these funny terms mean, but just think about it. A cage boxes you in and keeps you where you are; you’re able to look out at the world but you can’t go anywhere. An elevator gives you a choice. “What floor?” Then it lifts you up to where you want to be.

Trust me, once you’ve started putting yourself on that path to success, you’ll feel such a sense of accomplishment that you’ll wonder why you never did it in the past. So get out there and surround yourself with *positive* people.

The Power of Osmosis

Osmosis is defined on Dictionary.com as “A gradual, often unconscious process of assimilation or absorption.” When you surround yourself with positive people, you will become positive or when you surround yourself with successful people, you will become successful; however, if you surround yourself with negative, unsuccessful people … you will most likely assimilate. You’ve probably witnessed this and not even realized it.

Just think back to high school. I’m not sure who you hung out with but I liked to hang out with everyone: the jocks, the nerds, the in-betweens, etc. What I noticed even back then was that when I would hang out with the nerds, my grades would go up. Then later on when I started to play football, I noticed my grades went down but I started becoming more popular and getting invited to parties. Later on, there was a time when I refused to do either of those and I just focused on building web pages, programming and being my own kind of nerd. I noticed that people started hanging around me.

No, not the jocks– they were angry at me for ditching football. The nerds were always studying and they’d be together, focusing on school and the like. I spent a lot of my time in the computer lab working on building my skills so the types of people that would hang around me were a lot like me and I latched onto that.

It was later that same year that a couple of those friends and I started our very first business. We were going to design very simple web pages for people and split the profits. I believe we did all of three websites and our interest died out. Hey, I never said I was successful in high school but the point is that my friends and I got together, formed a common interest and gave it a shot. We didn’t pay attention to what everyone else was doing because we knew we wanted money and we wanted to make it using computers.

Similarly, surrounding yourself with like-minded individuals (that is, people who also want to be successful) will act as a fire under your seat that will drive you and those people forward.

Just be careful not to be the guy that holds everyone else back.

Don’t Be That Guy

Much like there are people that could possibly hold you back from your dreams. Do a self-check and make sure you aren’t holding anyone else back from their dreams. See, dreams are a funny thing and sometimes other people will make sacrifices in their lives to give theirs up for other people. It’s a form of martyrdom that is honorable but leads to various forms of unhappiness. Don’t worry, I’m not pointing the finger at you but just keep an eye out.

You should be the positive force in other people’s lives and urge them to be successful in their own endeavors. Always be an elevator rather than a cage.

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