I was listening last night another motivational speech from Jim Rohn. It was one thing which I always tried to convince others to do and never quite managed :choosing better friends. Now I can understand that you can't force someone to see if they choose to remain blindfolded. Once you understand that you can give a solution to a person and the responsability of acting belongs to them, you set yourself free.
In this short speech there are 3 essential questions that I think each of us should constantly have in our mind once in a while:
1.Who is it around me?
2.What does that do to me? How do I behave around them? What do they make me do?
3.Is that ok?
Throughout my humble life experience I was always amazed how people didn't see how their entourage screwed them over. I constantly heard "but he is my childhood friend", "only they accept me how I am", " I am too old to make new friends", "don't you dare analyse my family", "why do you care, mind your business" etc. I agree with the last, I should have minded my business as fast as I observed their narrow mindness and inflexibility.
The idea behind of what Jim Rohn is saying is that the influences we allow in our life are shaping our future. I always analysed the circle a person has and what he/she does about it. Slowly, through trial and error, I learned who to avoid, especially in my quest for a partner and in my search for friends/mentors. I also analysed my own family members and ways to deal better with some toxic behaviour. You see, bad influences are everywhere, the question is what are you doing about it?
I thing long term. I look at some things like: what achievements do they have? If they give me an advice for my personal life I look at theirs: if someone with a history of bad relationships, miserabily scrolling from partner to partner, ignorant, belligerant, offers free advice...I pass. People project their own stuff and call it advice.
As in for a partner I came to 4 major conclusions:
A. Avoid momma's boys. With all the respect I have towards mothers, I strongly believe that a reliable partner has to be independent and stop hiding under a mother's skirt. If you are over 30 and mommy still washes your clothes and cooks you daily...It is a huge red flag. Unless there is major handicap involved, an adult has to do their own stuff after a certain age. Of course, some over dominant mothers lure their children into this unhealthy pattern of treating them as babies through adulthood while they are also putting them down, saying " You can't do this or that" while being overprotecting. Toxic and bad. Such mothers will be an obstacle in their attempt to find a partner.They will sabotage. I noticed from my experience that parents like these usually are unhappy in their marriage, have no other hobbies, have no ideals and dreams once getting old and their only "hobby" is to constantly intrude in their child's life, from treating him like a baby after 30, calling 10 times per day and practically never allowing them to set themselves free. A total "no thanks" for me. I would not like such a partner and definetely would not like to have my kids being raised by such grandparents. Think longterm.
B. Avoid people who can't say no in a respectful way. Yup. Very important. People who can say no have a healthy system of putting boundaries. This is connected to number 1. If you learn to politely say no, even to your mom, dad, sister, brother up to friends, coworkers, strangers..... You improve the quality of your life enormously. Sometimes a no can save you from doing something you don't want, spilling out a story you don't want to spill, give up a dream you do not want to give etc. Imagine a life with a partner with no such thing. They will push your boundaries too and disrespect them. Saying yes to all bad influences and you having to constantly fight to put them on the right track. That is no longer a healthy relationship, it becomes a nagging mother-bad child thing. I have no energy to fight the bad pattern of my partner because it is not my duty to change them. They have to constantly work on themselves and set boundaries in order to have a stable and happy home. And yes, I think again long term: I do not want my kids to watch and repeat such a behaviour. So yet again a "no, thanks".
C. Avoid procrastinators with no vision for the future and who don't educate themselves. I dislike lazyness enormously. People who sleep up until late complaining the day is too short to do something. People who fail to deliver things in time. People who postpone. People who give up. People who always look at what others do and gossip their success. People who put you down with negativity and telling you " you can't do this". Negative procrastinators. If you take a look at their family members.... You can understand from where does it come from. The idea is.... We can't choose the family, but we can choose how we behave and adapt and change. There were people coming from horrible families, but through education, discipline, perseverance, changed their fate. I do not want someone I can't rely on, someone I always have to push from behind to get things done, someone that I have to force to read a book! Of course that I would not even consider spreading the genes of such individual and have my kids take "example" from an ignorant procrastinator.
D. Avoid people who fail under pressure and tough life situations, leaving you high and dry and who have poor money managing skills. Life will throw plenty of lemons towards you. And sometimes it will give you honey to make the sweet lemonade. When all things are fine and dandy, everyone is at their best behaviour. I want to see what happens under pressure. When things fail. When money is an issue. When the job is an issue. When all pressure is down upon your shoulders.... What do yo do? I noticed that most people crash. They start to behave badly and blame the partner. Take the nerves upon her/him. Blame the weather, the system, the money, the everything. Sitting down drenched in poor entertainment, consumed by technology and complaining and doing nothing. This is how most people deal with pressure. Contempt. Denial. Procrastinating. Complaining. Anger towards everybody. They change nothing and expect change. Usually people who crack and reveal their bad behaviour under pressure have a tendency to find excuses. For everything. They can't take responsability and they never offer solutions, they only see the problems. I also noticed that people who lacked faith and spirituality were dealing poorly with life's adversities. I value a spiritual partner, who does not mock religion although he might not agree with some stuff. Faith and spirituality is very important for me.
As in for the money thing, I strongly avoid people who try to "buy happiness" and have bad vices (smoking and drinking a big no no) People who can't stick to a budget, people who spend it all and then look up in the sky hoping for something. I dislike big spenders on minor things. Those who live paycheck by paycheck without making an effort to diversify their income. People who are happy with not growing. I think that I will want to have my kids learn financial education and endurance in dealing with stress and I will definetely not choose such a person to be my partner. Moral and financial education comes from the family. So although we can't pick the family where we were born, we definetely can choose the kind of family we want to have with someone.
So think about the influences from your life, have the strenght to cut the bad roots, to learn and to improve, to search for the right kind of people in order to have the brightest future!
Your genetic material is golden and your education priceless, don't throw it at the wrong person. I have found that one simple question that I ask myself in my mind while trying to assess a potential date helps me a lot :"if this would be the father of my kids, what would they learn from him? Could he be an example?". Once you think longterm, you narrow down the options and cut through the bullshit. All of this experience came from my mistakes in choosing the wrong people, friends, partners. The best thing from mistakes is learning from them.
Have a great day and toodle loo!
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