Who You Spend Time with Matters
- By: Jessica Faust | Date: Apr 16 2019
I believe in the theory that you are most influenced by the people you spend the most time with. Whether its business success or personal health, who you surround yourself with has an impact on your thinking and even your doing.
If you don’t know what I mean just take a look around. The most successful writers spend time with the most successful writers. They didn’t just come to that either, they started out that way. They connected early in their careers because they had the mindset for great things. They built each other up throughout their careers.
Take a look at the people around you. If you aren’t spending time with those who lift you up, you aren’t spending time with the right people. Surround yourself instead with people who are in line with the goals you want and see for yourself. This is what will inspire you and take you to the place you want to be.
Trust me when I say this isn’t an easy road to take. It might mean separating yourself from some people in your life, especially those who tend to bring you down, cause anxiety, or just don’t support you. But when you are free, or distanced, from those people, you will find yourself achieving the goals you desire.
I have felt exactly what you are talking about, but it took me a long time to come out as a gay man, early forties. No gay man exists without a certain degree of internalized homophobia. Notice I said “certain degree” because it is so variable. I accomplished a great deal in spite of it, top of my class in college and med school. After getting through that things got a lot easier for me, because I did not feel I had to be so careful around people and could be myself.
I was listening to Pete Buttedgeidge (spelling?) last night talking to Rachel Maddow. I remember Buddha and Judge to remember how to pronounce it, but they were talking about “coming out” on national television. Twenty years ago that could never have happened. I couldn’t serve my country because I was honest on a questionnaire about it and was given a 4F classification. It was the Viet Nam War, so it may have saved my life and I felt it was an unnecessary war. so it doesn’t matter that much. It was the principle of the thing. Like Pete I hope it is the norm to serve for at least a year or two. Israel has everyone serve.
We are making incremental progress forward / backlash then forward / backlash. By the way, I did send my query letter to another individual at Bookends as you recommended, Moe Ferrarra. She seemed like such a likable person from her posts. I think I would like working with her.
Thank you for sharing this.
So true! You learn quickly how invaluable your team of encouragers are.
Interesting advice. I think it’s important to have supporting writer friends because sometimes family just doesn’t understand how you can , and want to, spend all this time and energy on writing something that may never be seen by anyone but yourself. You need the kind of encouragement that is real and not fluffy, acknowledging writing is a hard process but still fantastic, at least that’s the kind of encouragement I hope to get and give. Thanks for words.
Perfect timing to read this post. Thank you!
It took me a while in life to find those people, and now I have them. They are all writers/authors, but their support extends to all aspects of my life, not just my writing. They nudge, kick, hug, cheer and smile exactly as I need to keep me moving towards my goals. I was getting their before they came into my life, but it is so much better with them along for the ride.