It’s Hard to Soar with Eagles When You're Surrounded by Turkeys

My dog thinks he is a cat.  It's really not his fault - he was brought into our household when he was less than 6 weeks old and had only cats to learn from.

After watching my 80-Lb dog playing with a ball of yarn with the cats one day, I took him out to the dog park.  Almost immediately, he began acting like his new friends: barking, chasing a ball, and slobbering all over himself.  At this point I realized: "What a great example of a lesson I have been trying to teach my kids": 

"We tend to behave like the people with whom we associate, so if we want to be taken seriously in life and business, we better choose our friends and colleagues carefully".

Surrounding yourself with the success models will automatically steer your life and your efforts toward success. A success model is someone who either has achieved a goal you are working towards or can guide you in the path towards achieving it. On the other hand surrounding yourself with the wrong crowd will make it much harder for you to succeed. Whenever you spend a lot of time around a person, you naturally become more like them - whether they are a good or a bad influence.  

Your initial impression might be there are no undesirable relationships in your life, but the fact of the matter is, for some people the only thing standing between them and success is the people with whom they associate. Examine the people around you-your family, friends, acquaintances and the people with whom you work, determine the effect are they having on you, and then decide whether or not these relationships are supporting and expanding your ability to create the desired results in your life.  For some people in our lives, the answer is clearly "yes". But if you're not sure, then it's time to take a closer look at these relationships. If you find that these are "toxic" relationships, the sooner you eliminate them, the better.  If it is not possible, or too awkward, to discontinue the relationship, then at least minimize it, but don't be mean, and don't reject them as people.   When you DO spend time with these people, do your best to direct the conversation - have them talk about things that they love, so that you can experience the positive side of them - you may even become their success model.

We should all strive to create an environment where we can flourish.  When we surround ourselves with positive, intelligent, and energetic people, we feel that positive energy; we find that we are able to achieve those goals that we set out to and we are able to rely on our friends to support us and guide us through decisions. When we surround ourselves with people who have the same goals and attitudes, we are creating a positive, growth-creating environment.  When we go the next step and surround ourselves with people who have what we want, we are able to draw from their knowledge and wisdom, and are able to see, first hand, those things that are important to us in action, including relationships, fitness, and finances.  

If we create an environment that encourages us, then we are able to achieve our dreams.