How Do You Know Who Your Real Friends Are?
By Anubhav Srivastava ( Register for his Workshop – Build Super Confidence For Super Success!)
How do you know who your real friends are? Everyone wants genuine friends in their life. The kinds of people they can hang out with, have fun with, discuss anything with but also people who would genuinely stand by them and truly care for them.
However, the truth is most people who call each other friends do not really care about each other. In today’s world, the definition of a friend has basically become an acquaintance with whom you can have a beer, click selfies, go to parties and gossip about others. But beyond that, they don’t really care about you.
If you got into trouble, most wouldn’t bail you out, in fact, most would bail on you and go the other way. So how do you find who your real friends are? Well here are 5 ways you can find out.
Real friends don’t pull you down, they push you up.
I am not talking about friendly banter where one keeps insulting the other and vice versa. Most people can differentiate between friendly banter/insults and a genuine attempt to demean you.
A real friend will never demean you despite all your faults. He or she will teach you to value yourself when you wallow in self pity. Often when we face disappointments at our workplace or in other areas of life, which can often be very heartbreaking, it is easy to have our self esteem shattered. A true friend will lift you up when you feel low and instill you with self belief. And it is not that they are saying things just to make you feel better, they truly believe what they say when they remind you of your worth.
Real friends forgive you (Most of the times)
Most of us going to get into arguments at sometimes, and yet unlike in childhood where we fight and forget, most adult hold on to a grudge forever. Fake friends or acquaintances will nitpick on the tiniest of issues and hold lifelong grudges over them even if they pretend to be friends on your face. A real friend who cares, in most arguments will not hold grudges and even if they are hurt, they will eventually truly forgive.
However, this does not mean that you have the license to say or do whatever you want because a true friend is supposed to forgive. Well if you start taking your friend for granted and do unfair things to them, then you don’t deserve them. Everyone has a breaking point, do not bring them close to it. Also, some things can never be forgiven. So if you want the friend to remain in your life treat them with respect and dignity.
Real friends tell you when you are wrong.
In life you are going to make three kinds of people, the ones who always put you down no matter what. The ones who are flatterers or have some other motives and always keep praising you even when you are wrong and the third kind praises you when you are and cautions you or tells you the truth when you are wrong (atleast in their eyes)
We are all human and to make errors is human. No one is perfect and we are all going to stray at some point of the other. Someone who actually cares about you will tell you when they do think you are straying. They will be protective about you and may even tell you a few things that you may not like but at the end of the day, they are doing that because they care.
A fake or superficial friend will say yes to everything because
- They want to look like your great supporter because they have some agenda in mind
- They simply don’t care about what happens as a consequence.
A true friend is okay with you being upset with them for not supporting them but is not okay with you getting in harm’s way because they care.
Real Friends don’t abandon you during tough times
When you achieve success, you will often find that the number of friends you have goes up. People who would generally ignore you suddenly want to be friends with you. People and relatives you hardly ever knew suddenly turn up reminding of you of the “close bond” you once shared. But does the number of genuine friends goes up, really? No. It remains unchanged.
Perhaps the biggest proof of whether or not someone is a real friend will be evident when you are going through extremely tough times and times you are depressed. Nobody wants to go through these times, but they are beneficial for two reasons. First, if your heart is that of a hero, it is in this situation where you can really show how resilient and disciplined you are and how you are a true fighter. Second, it is in these situations that you will find out who is a genuine friend that really cares for you and who is just pretending to do so .
All the people who were pretending to be your friends will suddenly disappear just like they weren’t before. But those who really cared for you and were with you through thick and thin will stay. They will inspire you to never lose hope and always cheer you on so that you overcome all adversities once again and come back on top!
Real Friends don’t envy you during good times
A true friend is someone who doesn’t abandon you in tough times but doesn’t get jealous of you in good times either. We think that only someone who is there during tough times is a friend. Maybe they are a caring person, but also observe their behavior once you succeed or get what you want.
If someone gets jealous once you achieve success, especially if you surpass them, then they probably sympathized with you during your tough phase but were never really a true friend. They may not use you financially but if your success hurts them and they cannot see you happy then you cannot rely on such people either.
A friend of mine had a common friend who helped him out out of sympathy during his tough phase. The second friend claimed to be and acted like a true friend and well wisher to the first guy.
But the moment the first friend got a great job, the second friend told him on his face that he did not deserve to get that nice job and made him feel horrible when he should have been celebrating. When the first friend met a girl with whom he could have a happy relationship, the second “friend” deliberately tried to create problems between them and spread lies ultimately leading to their break up. If this wasn’t enough he started demanding his money back with an exorbitantly high interest, deliberately trying to bring the first friend down again.
Who the hell needs “friends” and “well wishers” like that? If you have people around you who show sympathy, but get jealous the moment it seems things are working in your favor, be wary of them.
Conclusion
I hope this article has been useful and has given you some clear tips on how you separate genuine friends from the fake ones. But how do you attract real friends in your lives? Well the simplest way to attract real friends is to be one yourself. If you want people to stand by you in every situation or want people who do all the things for you that have been mentioned, you have to be a genuine friend to others as well. The world is a give and take relationship. You cannot expect everyone around you to be there for you no matter what if you are the kind of person who would abandon them and never be there for them at their time of need. Granted, not everyone you will care for will bother to care back but in most cases, the most powerful way to attract real friends is to be a real friend.
About the Author
Anubhav Srivastava is an author, speaker and the director of Carve Your Destiny, a first of its kind inspirational documentary featuring some of the most famous personalities from diverse fields. It has been seen by over 1 Million People on Youtube. Anubhav has also been featured in numerous International and India Media outlets such as BBC , The Times of India, Hindustan Times, Rediff.com, Leicester Mercury and many others.
For one on one consulting or a motivational workshop at your organization please email anubhav101@gmail.com . If you would like to write a guest blog post on Anubhavsrivastava.com you contact me on the same email address.
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