I. Pick your friend the way you would pick a car.
As you get older you will have more choices in whom your friends are and who you hang around. In elementary school or middle school, you may be friends with children's that live close by or go to the same school or church or play on the same athletic team. When you get older, you can be more selective. You have the ability to be careful and pick who you want to be around and those you do not want to be around.
Whether you like it or not you will be judged by the people you hang around. You say “that’s not fair”. Nobody said life is fair. It’s not fair so get used to it. But I do agree it’s not fair that we judge other people by who they hang around. Unfortunately that is how our world operates. So as long as you understand the rules you know how to play the game. Now pick your friends wisely.
You would not want to put money into something that is unreliable to drive so why pick a friend that you don’t know what you are going to get from day to day? Most adults can tell a story of having a car some point in life that they just hoped would start each time the key was put in the ignition. Once the car started, it was a relief until the next time you had to start the car again. Time after time if it wasn’t the engine it could be something else.
Most of us had a first car that had problems. We would almost beg and pray for the car to make it to Point A to Point B. Then the next day the cycle would start all over again. You knew the car did not have a lot of life left, but you wanted to milk it for everything it had. If you have not had this kind of a car you are missing a real character builder.
Friends are the same way. Pick those friends that are going to be reliable and you know what you are going to get. This is not saying they have to be perfect, just know what you have with their friendship. When you invest in a friendship if it is not reciprocated you may have to move on and develop friendships with other people. You can’t let certain individuals get you down and you can not let them destroy your confidence.
You must also know that there will be times when the relationships with friends will be strained and will be tested. If you are expecting your friends to be available and to be there for you, there is that possibility of getting let down. You know that people are not perfect and it is unfair to expect your friends to be perfect. There is probably going to be conflict and let-downs in the friendship at some point, but that doesn’t mean the friendship had to be over. Be prepared to weather the storm if the friendship has any rocky events you have to get through.
You must remember that your personality can be shaped by whom you hang around. Whether you believe it or not your friends are a match and an insight to who you are. If you don’t like the way you act and look you probably should check to see who your friends are. You have heard since you were little and will continue to hear about choosing good friends. It is one of the keys of being on target with where you want to be in life.
I know if I am around friends of mine that try are positive and care about other people it naturally rubs off onto me. If I am around people who are negative and selfish, that is going to rub off on me. Even as you get older your friends still influence who you are. I have been around enough different schools to see teachers and coaches who are good for each other because of their work ethic and attitude. There are teachers and coaches who really care about the children they get to work with and overlook the little annoyances that are a part of every school. I have also seen the opposite in teachers and coaches who have bad attitudes and look at things through a negative lens and have a poor work ethic.
Who you are around on a constant basis is contagious. Are you the type of friend that is contagious in a positive way or negative way? What do you add to the relationship?
I heard our preacher in Montgomery, Alabama, John Smith use this illustration back in the earlier 90’s and I have used it ever since. It has lost a little of it’s meaning because we don’t use pay phones as much today.
He talked about being a “quarter friend”. When you are down to your last quarter and you have to call someone for help who do you call to come and help you? If it that quarter was all you had and you only could make that one call from the pay phone who would you pick up the phone and call?
Then next thing is to ask yourself if there were people that were your close friends and they were down to their last quarter who would they call? How many of your friends would use their last quarter to make that phone call to you? How many of your friends would think you would be that reliable and that dependable to count on that they would use their last quarter for you?
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In this book and in my talks I will discuss my cancer. There is part of me that does not like to bring it up since I have lost my mother to cancer in 2009 and brother to cancer in 1984. Their ordeals were much tougher. They had to go through long sessions of chemotherapy and other forms of treatment to try beat the cancer they had. You will hear in this book of my cancer and some of the trials, but I in no way had to endure what my mother and brother did.
I bring up the cancer because of the story of friendship. When I was diagnosed in June of 2000 I had three children and we tried to set the surgery up as quickly as possible. We notified my family and some of our friends in Tuscaloosa where we were living. Since I was coaching at the University of Alabama I knew the word would get out in the coaching fraternity. I wasn’t really excited about making it public knowledge anyway.
We had the surgery on a Tuesday morning and had to stay in the hospital for a few days to recover. Around Friday afternoon I quickly lifted up out of my hospital bed and anxiously said to my wife, “I forgot to call Andy.” Andy Lane was one of my best friends since college and we were roommates for a short time after I graduated while living in Nashville.
Andy was the type of guy that would always be there for you and you could count on him as a “quarter friend.” We had many hilarious stories together. My mom used to get such a kick out of Andy that she would make me tell “Andy Lane stories” whenever I came to visit her in Chattanooga. Especially if she had visitors that made it all the more reason for her to ask me to tell “Andy Lane stories.”
I was embarrassed that I didn’t call Andy about my surgery. I sat there for a minute and thought about what to do next. The story on my cancer had also been in the Nashville paper so Andy had probably seen the news or at least had the information. I felt bad about not telling him first. Still feeling the effects of the pain medication it was hard for me to have the energy to call Andy right then I asked my wife to remind me to contact him the following week.
Fortunately we had a lot of visitors during the week, but we were looking forward to some peace and quiet on this Friday night. That night about 8:00pm there was a knock on our hospital door. In walked Andy Lane. He said was driving home from work and thought “I could go home or turn right and head to the interstate and make the drive to Tuscaloosa” (a 4 hour drive). It did not surprise me one bit when Andy had that decision to make whether to make the left hand turn and go home or make the right hand turn and come see a friend in need. That is the kind of person you want as a friend that they would be in the car and think, “Ok, if I turn right it is a four hour drive, but I need to see…..in the hospital.”
He stayed the night and slept on a cot in the room. He ate the wonderful hospital food and man he really lifted my spirits. The night visiting with Andy was indeed special, but the act of friendship is something I will never forget. The “Andy Lane’s” in the world are few and far between. Andy knows the value of friendship and knows what it means to be there for someone in need. Pick your friends wisely and when you pick make sure to pick an Andy Lane type friend.
“It is wonderful to have friends that last for a lifetime because they have grown up together and have so much in common, Many times, due to different circumstances, these friendships are no longer. It is then time to make new friends that you can share good times with, and trust to be loyal and honest, as well as sincere. Picking the right friends is not easy and it takes a bit of searching to find them.”
http://www.wikihow.com/Pick-Your-Friends
“You must constantly ask yourself these questions: Who am I around? What are they doing to me? What have they got me reading? What have they got me saying? Where do they have me going? What do they have me thinking? And most important, what do they have me becoming? Then ask yourself the big question: Is that okay? Your life does not get better by chance, it gets better by change.”
Jim Rohn
