Lower companions
I grew up in South Florida, in a city called Coral Gables. It's a little place with Spanish-named streets and avenues just south of Miami International Airport and north of UM. We had streets like Granada Boulevard, Santander and Malaga. I lived on a rather french sounding street called LeJeune road.
After I graduated from Coral Gables high school (home of the cavaliers), I went to Florida International University. I believe there where around 30,000 students my freshman year, which meant there were a lot of young, beautiful girls, fraternities and parties.
There were also classes, of course, but most of college life was about having fun.
I worked in retail most of my high school years. I worked at shops at the mall like Old Navy, Pacific Sunwear and sold computers for a while at a place called CompUSA on Kendall Road. In college, though, I decided I needed something a little more fun, so I went to bartending school and went to work at bars and clubs in Coconut Grove.
The party scene is Miami is superb.
Great DJs, amazing women, and top quality drugs & alcohol.
A little drugs and alcohol didn't do any harm to anybody, right?
I worked at one of the top clubs in The Grove: Oxygen Lounge. As an employee, I could party at the club on my off night and I didn't even have to stand in line. Hell, I didn't even have to go through the front door. I came in through the kitchen, and I could bring a girl with me if I wanted to. An amazing way to impress the ladies.
It was so much fun.
But you also start hanging out with the wrong kind of people. Worst of all, is that you start copying some behaviors in an attempt to be accepted in this group.
your good friends and the people that love you start calling you less and you start seeking out other people that are not going to give you a hard time for wanting to party all the time.
And if you're not careful, after that you don't want to hang out with those people anymore. You start hanging out with new people who party even MORE, drink MORE and do MORE drugs.
You will devolve among the lowest common denominator in the group.
These are known as lower companions.
Now, you don't have to be an alcoholic or a drug addict to understand what I mean by lower companions, and OK, maybe I went a little dramatic there, but think about this: have you ever been surrounded by people your age that just spawned in the environment that they're in but don't do anything to take control of their lives and just keep doing the same thing that they always did?
Oh, This is just who I am, man
It can be difficult to break out of that.
The idea of people who don't push you to show up as your better self and have your best interest at heart comes in many forms.
Making change
We sometimes mistakenly think that the world is just the way it is.
people are the way they are.
The universe is in some kind of stasis or equilibrium.
WRONG!
Everything is changing, all the time, from the subatomic level to the great cosmos, things are always in motion. The question is are you doing things that get you closer or push you further away from your true self?
There's no instruction manual for taking control of your life.
You just need to start having tiny little behavioral changes that nobody notices or celebrates and tou need to step into the unknown without any guarantees of any kind.
and repeating these tiny changes over time is what produces change.
perseverance.
being able to do hard things.
Saying no to drinking or consuming on a Friday.
Avoiding that soda.
Working out for 15 minutes.
Wake up at 6:00am.
The stoics talk about "when you make beautiful choices, you are beautiful".
It might seem like we're losing our freedom, but we're really becoming free.
The commitments we make to ourselves will start to develop that muscle and have positive effects in the future.
raising the level
As soon as you start living your life with actions that are in accordance with the best version of yourself, you'll start attracting people whose life you will improve and you'll improve in the process.
Art, sports, literature, cooking, traveling, business, history, health, well-being.
People have many different interests and you can learn a little about all those things all while developing and growing from your own talents, hobbies and experiences.
This is how I feel right now.
I'm surrounded by friends I look up to and who I'm constantly learning from. I've found friends who are amazing chefs, activists, athletes and entrepreneurs who are happy to see me make progress.
I'm not saying I've got life figured out, by any stretch of the imagination, but I definitely feel like a better version of myself that when I was in college, and I feel that I'm surrounded by friends who are teaching me, learning from me and helping make the world a better place, one memory at a time.
It's getting late now.
I think I'll hit the sack.
Thoughts?
All images generated by me using Mid Journey.
That is the truth bud!! Friends can influence us so badly. Especially the wrong friends... And the moment you strive to have better for yourself they get bitter towards you..
It's best to cut em all down and start a new... You'll find feathers of the same flock!!
I'm so glad we have access to things like podcasts nowadays. It helps to have a deeper conversation with people who can inspire us to improve ourselves and the environment around us.
That is true.
One thing I've noticed was that the moment I started changing my habits the friends left all by themselves... Well now I've only got The Betty and one friend left... Honestly I prefer it that way.... Less noise!!
Besides you were born alone and you'll die alone...
Interesting read. Someone said that we are the average of the five people we spend the most time with and I think there really is something to it. Btw both my high school and university years were pretty wild too. But I don´t regret, it was fun and seeing how the students live their lives these days, I´m actually glad that I could spend those years the way I did :)
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Hey, who doesn't enjoy a good party! Ultra Festival was started in Miami. It was even an open festival the first years. But yeah, I also remember some friends that got addicted. Sad to see.
Right. Well here in my country (Czech Republic), drugs are not the biggest problem. Alcohol is. We are one of the drunkest nations in the world and we are even kind of proud of it, especially of our beer consumption that is by far the largest (per capita) on Earth. But eventually, it doesn´t matter if it´s drugs or alcohol. It´s the same kind of devastating addiction...
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Yes, my friend, university environments often force you to be something you are not. Especially in your case, it's not hard to understand why you behave differently than you are. But at least you got rid of those bad friends and changed. Although friends are not our role models, they have a significant influence on our character. Very significantly! That's why we have to choose them right. It is a blessing to be in an environment where you can learn from them every day. I hope you continue to improve your circle of friends.
I was just reflecting on how easy it is to get side tracked when surrounded by people who don't care if you present yourself in your best version. You become them.
Also, how wonderful it is to be surrounded by people that lift you up and teach you.
Wow, that is a nice read. If this was a story, it has a really wonderful character development. You enjoyed your high school and college, hit a bit of a low in life, but you got yourself out of it and is now thriving. This can be a very inspirational story to other young people that are going down the same path. Not a lot are able to recover, so it is good to hear of successful life stories. I know you are still making more out of your life, helping people, working with others. I hope you continue to thrive in this wonderful path you are now taking.
Thank you for your wishes my friend. I was in a rather pensive mode yesterday, thinking about so mane people I've let go because they simply weren't helping me grow.
Oh that is a very difficult thing to do. I've seen a lot of instances where people can't let go of others thinking they need them, but in fact, those people are milking them dry and stunting their growth. Some people are so good at manipulation that they make others think they need the manipulator, when it's the other way around.
I actually love the way you lived your life in school. I'm glad that you had so much fun back then but you were so sensible that you did not allow it affect your other lifestyles
As you said, little alcohol or drug does not do any harm to the body
Yeah, I had fun. It's very easy to downplay the harmful effects of consuming drugs and alcohol in an environment like this, hence the sarcastic "it doesn't hurt anyone" remark.
I'm much happier with the life I live today.
Hermano te entiendo, me proyecto a mi juventud viví en colombia de donde era Pablo Escobar y la mejor cocaína del mundo la probé yo , gracias a Dios hoy soy un hombre sano ..