My Two-Cents: Pick of the (Friends) Patch

"What is something people can know about you just from looking at your friends?"

I heard this question the other day and thought it was some good food-for-thought. Our friends say a lot about us, which means it’s even more important to consider how we pick them. There’s a longitudinal Harvard study spanning 85+ years studying what makes us happy. The result wasn’t career achievement, money, exercise, good genes, or yada yada yada. Rather, it was positive, fulfilling relationships – which are one and the same with good friends. Knowing this, I would say that people can tell much about someone by looking at their friends.

Picking friends and maintaining friendships is no easy feat, especially when day-to-day life is a hectic shit-show and most of the people-sample-size we encounter is due to chance. We combat this chance factor by approaching picking out friends as an accrued skill. One we spend some time learning through trial, error, and re-evaluation. 

Everyone is a bit different, so the type of people you swarm to are obviously different. Furthering the idea that your friends serve as a sneak peek to you. So what’s the trick of nabbing people who you would want to serve as a reflection of you? Perhaps it’s finding people who are better than you are. Not smarter, not cooler, but more kind, more generous, and more forgiving. And then trying to appreciate them for what they can teach you and listening to their perspectives. That's how you get the Pick of the (friends) Patch.

This might be the Rosetta Stone of friendship because other people’s ideas are often better than our own. (That one hurt my ego to admit.) Finding friends that are better than you and challenge you is how you become better -- because we learn a lot of things vicariously. We learn how to read and write vicariously, by first watching our kindergarten teacher. I learned how to solve a Rubix cube vicariously (and thank god for that random guy on Youtube because I never would have figured that shit out by myself). We learn how to walk vicariously (actually I’m not sure on this one because it’s been a long time since I was two and learned to walk). And maybe most importantly of all, we learn kindness vicariously. I can remember specific times growing up when I watched someone else be kind, or stand up for someone, and admired the ability before I possessed it on my own. In hindsight, I was probably admiring the ability to be self-secure to the point where you don’t need to poke fun at others to make yourself look better -- that's real kindness. So picking friends that are better than us not only benefits us, but it shows others a reflection of ourselves. Or, in less cliche and corny terms, just don’t be friends with skanky bitchy losers!