Support

So after posting about opposition I started thinking about support. I mentioned that we need to ignore people who oppose what we do and that only try to drag us down. I think we should take it a step further, and take people like that out of our life. If you let yourself be surrounded by negative people, you will begin to feel less and less positive about yourself. We need to surround ourselves with people who will support us, and people who will encourage us. If you want to develop good character, make friends with people who already have it. If you have trouble in one aspect in your life, make friends who can help you with it. If you have trouble lying, make friends with people that have integrity. As much as I hate to believe it, and I know we all do, you end up becoming who you surround yourself with. 1 Corinthians 15:33 says that "Bad company corrupts good character." If you are constantly around bad people, you will start to develop the bad qualities they have. I sometimes believe that I can still be good even while I am with bad company. It doesn't work like that. When I am with bad company, I start thinking and acting like those people. The people you are around will shape you, no matter how strong you think you are. I've experienced it in my own life. When I hung around people that constantly cursed and criticized everything, I realized I started thinking like them. I didn't curse, but I started to think very negatively about things. I had to watch what I said, and still do, because they influenced the way I thought about things. I had to struggle to not say curse words, because they had said them so much it stuck with me. I find that when I spend time with positive people who have qualities that I want to have, I am a lot more comfortable and I start thinking positively. You need to make friends with people that will lift you up, not people that will drag you down. Surround yourself with people who respect you and encourage you. Make friends with people who actually want to be your friend, and who care about you. You don't want to be around someone who will leave you when you are going through bad times. You need people who will stick with you even when times are bad for you. You need people who will stick with you when everyone else falls away. That's a true friend. As you surround yourself with these kind of people, you will start to realize that you start becoming like them. You will start to have qualities that you want that they have. That's how you become successful. People who support you and stick by you will make you feel better about life and help you become who you want to be. We need to find people who will support us and not oppose us.
-Smart