(This is the third in the series of articles inspired by Jordan Peterson’s book 12 Rules for Life. In total 12 articles will be created (one for each rule). The articles do not summarize the book’s contents — each one merely originates from a particular idea highlighted in one of the chapters. Enjoy!)

Remember a time when you met that one person you instantly hit it off with. You had similar interests. You were excited by same things You enjoyed the same music, movies and maybe even outlook on life. All these similarities forged a strong relationship between you two — a friendly or perhaps even a loving one.

This seemingly perfect chemistry, in the beginning, a honeymoon phase if you will, was thrilling but you failed to notice the little cracks and discrepancies appearing beneath the surface of it all.

Maybe you changed. Maybe they changed. The truth is you both did.

Who you are is a fluid concept and it’s only natural that over time — as you gather new experiences — you change. You start taking interest in different hobbies, genres of music and life goals. You can call it growing-up or evolving. The semantics are irrelevant. Change is inevitable.

Consequentially once close friends start to slowly but surely grow apart. The once shared interests are getting abandoned and replaced as both of you transform as persons. This is the test of your friendship: Can you accept and love your friend even though they aren’t the same person as when you first met them?

It’s uncomfortable and difficult for people to do this and usually, the following dynamic emerges: One party begins to evolve and change more rapidly than the other, so the other party gets into the panic mode. The latter shows in increasingly clingy behavior, wanting things to “stay the same” and discounting the new path the other person is now on.

You get a person stepping on the gas pedal, while the other one is anxiously hitting the breaks.

You can be both parties in various relationships — you can be the one dragging someone down or the one that gets dragged down. This article is written from “being-dragged-down” perspective. It’s about what you do when you find a new path you want to follow and people close to you don’t approve of or outright sabotage it.

It’s a pernicious situation that causes problems most people, including myself. This is my attempt at coming up with a way to do it right.

But before we get into “what to do”, I want to share my personal story relating to this subject with you…

LET’S GET PERSONAL

Back when I was 12, my best friend and I had a great relationship. We played the same sports, had the same taste in music, we both played guitar and could daydream for hours about how our future as rockstars will look like.

The catch was our friendship existed at a period in our lives when we change the most. As you try to figure out what you want to do with your life your interests jump from one thing to another (plus the girls enter the picture). We started to drift apart. I focused on sports (I wanted to play pro basketball). He was still all into guitars and rock n’ roll lifestyle. These two paths don’t mesh together well. I was about discipline and tough workouts. He was laid-back and focused on music, booze, and girls.

“You know you are a rocker, not a basketball player, c’mon let’s go play”, he would say to me a bunch of times. The more he said it the more I resented him. I wanted him to accept the path that I chose and that we could still be friends. After I ruined my knee (the end of pro basketball dreams), he thought I’ll return to “where I belong” (music), but I instead focused on studying personal development, business, and marketing. Once more, I got the “You know you are a musician man, not some *insert whatever*”.

I tried talking to him that I’m not that person anymore. While I love music, I got over my dream of being a guitar player. I slowly started to move away from him and letting the communication die. I stopped accepting invitations to hang out with him as I felt like the ulterior motive was always to get me back to “what I meant to do with him”. Eventually, we stopped conversing altogether and I don’t remember when I saw him last.

It was a difficult and uncomfortable situation but it thought me a valuable lesson.

LEARN THE ART OF ESCAPE

No one can deny it’s hard to let go of old friendships even when they became toxic, yet it’s crucial that we learn how to get out of them. Too many of us are trapped in some form of a relationship that is not only no longer beneficial but actually toxic to our aspirations.

Therefore, it’s utterly important that you understand the dynamics of this phenomenon and most importantly learn how to escape harmful relationships with other people in the best way possible.

When you start evolving as a person and drift away from who you were before or the role you played in a certain relationship, you often feel a bit of guilt. You feel like you are leaving your friends or maybe even yourself behind. It’s when the comments of “That’s not you” and “You are okay just the way you were before” hurt you the most. Friends tend to label your evolution as something unnatural, that you are betraying who you are and becoming a completely different person. This intensifies the feeling of guilt and makes change more difficult for you.

WARNING! BRUTAL HONESTY REQUIRED

Before getting further, I must address one essential thing to remember. Often times people change in an unhealthy direction and then label all people trying to help them as “nay-sayers” and “haters” holding them back. Before judging your friend’s behavior, take a very close and hard look at yourself and how you are changing. Is this change really for the better? Are you pursuing worthy goals or trying to gain superficial things? Are you driven by healthy intentions or shallow motives?

If you find out your goals, motives and change aren’t really for the better then stop reading this article. You don’t need to cut off your friends. In fact, be grateful that you have the kind of friends that will call out your bullshit and tell you are doing wrong things or doing things wrong. Go work on yourself and find worthier goals to pursue.

If you indeed feel, after critical evaluation, that you are changing for the better, that you are evolving into a better and more competent person, then maybe it’s time to do something about people dragging you down.

UNDERSTANDING THE UNDERLYING DYNAMICS a.k.a. PEOPLE AREN’T EVIL

But before you go all out and judge and condemn them for it you must understand them… They are no different than you are. You have been the one dragging people down before, maybe you are now and for sure you will do it at some point in the future.

Understand that there is no malicious attempt behind their actions. You and your friend were once equals: same interests, same goals, same perspective on life. As you evolve this bond starts to unravel and it’s uncomfortable for your friend to see you go to a higher level while he stays in the same place. He doesn’t want you to succeed more than him, but NOT because you don’t deserve it, but because he doesn’t want to feel bad about himself. He wants things as they always were: you two together as buddies.

Fear of abandonment is also a strong motivator. “You are changing and for sure you will leave me”, his brain goes and in reaction to this he tries to belittle your progress or tries to convince you to stop evolving and go back to the “old times”. Your friend actually believes you would be better off doing things the old way, even though behind it all is nothing but self-preservation.

A whole article could be written just about reasons why we want to pull others back but I think the above couple paragraphs are enough for you to get the main point: There’s no malicious intent behind your friend’s actions. Don’t resent them. Feel for them instead. Then proceed in a thoughtful manner…

Instead of cutting them off right away, I find this next thing to be more beneficial.

ONE LAST SHOT

Sit down with them and express to them that while you really are changing you believe it’s for the better. Try to explain to them that you still love them and it would mean the world to you if they supported you on your new path. Speak from the heart. Do your best.

Sometimes the friendship will survive and you will both accept each other’s evolution and support each other on your paths. Sometimes the friendship will go beyond the point of no return. Your friend will continue dragging you back into your old patterns and disapprove of the path you are on now.

It’s a harsh realization that you can’t change people if they don’t want to change. As an old adage goes: “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.” You can try to explain your side of the story, but you can’t make the other party accept and/or support it.

If that’s the case you should take the insulative approach to your friendship.

Maybe you still have quite a few common interests and opinions with your friend. Meet up with them and chat about them. Go out and do activities you both like together, talk about stuff you both like and have fun. The only rule: During the time together don’t mention your new path. Be in the moment and enjoy your friendship.

It’s the status quo, however, for me, it never lasted long. It’s a good transitory period, but when you are truly excited by your new path you are itching to share your experiences with someone — and your friends often seem the most appropriate. You will then hold yourself back and upon mentioning something about what you’re doing now your friend will shut you down immediately. It’s unpleasant and you can start getting out of the relationship at this point. However, if you can manage this “no talking”, it’s still better than losing an old friend.

GET OUT… NOW!

Your last red flag for definitely getting out is your friend bringing your new path up in a dismissive way despite you not talking about it. They may mock you, try to discourage you or even sabotage your efforts. Unfortunately, this is the time to definitely get out of this toxic relationship.

You have two options: cut them off immediately or let the relationship slowly die down.

Some people prefer to go cold turkey and cut people off, yet I tend to lean more on the “gradual exit” side in this matter. It’s less painful for both parties and it reduces the chance of getting caught up in the same relationship again.

Relationships are built on communication. Letting them die down equals to let the communication go silent. You start to reduce the amount of communication between you two. You don’t write them every time something happens. You stop sharing what’s going on in your life. If they write you, you still reply, but without going into too much detail and getting tangled up in a long conversation. Eventually, they start writing you less and the relationship dies down.

With this mind, please don’t be a douchebag. If you see them on the street say hi to them, ask them what’s going on in their life and wish them well. No matter what happened between you two, there probably wasn’t any malicious intent behind it. Forgive people. Wish them good luck.

CONCLUSION

Severing friendship ties is an uncomfortable process that could leave you feeling guilty or egotistical, yet when the relationship is toxic you have to get out. Before cutting people off take a good, honest look at what you are doing and whether or not this particular friends is actually criticizing you in a constructive way — maybe you are the one doing something wrong. Only after you establish you are on the right path, and the friend cannot accept that, go forward with dissolving the friendship.

Also, remember there’s no nobility in deliberately repressing your personal evolution because someone else is not willing to do the same. There’s nothing virtuous in choosing the mud just because the one in the already in the mud refuses to get out. At the end of the day, you have to do what’s best for you and your life. If you can’t leave toxic relationships you don’t love yourself enough and loving yourself is the prerequisite to a fulfilling life.

Once again, I will leave you with a brilliant quote by Jordan B. Peterson: