According to a lot of research, there is one factor almost more than any other that determines the overall levels of happiness and success we experience in life. In this episode, we explore the impact of the people you spend the most time with.
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Transcript
Well, hello there.
Speaker:My friends, my name is Jonathan Doyle.
Speaker:I am so pleased.
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Speaker:created to do really, really important, beautiful, powerful things on this planet.
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Speaker:staff, whatever it is that you need.
Speaker:Go and check that out today.
Speaker:My friends are going to talk about something I'm so big on.
Speaker:I'm so passionate about this.
Speaker:We're going to talk about the power of a peer group.
Speaker:We're going to talk about the fact that, you know, the group of people that are
Speaker:significantly in your life are going to have such an outsize impact on you.
Speaker:It is so crucial.
Speaker:You know, the old sort of data, the first data that really came out of
Speaker:the 1970s and 1980s was kind of around this idea of you become the five
Speaker:people you spend the most time with.
Speaker:They sort of began to look at people's outcomes in life, their
Speaker:health, not just financial, but their health, their spirituality.
Speaker:Uh, how long they lived all sorts of different things.
Speaker:And they kind of figured out that you'd ended up being almost
Speaker:identical to the five people that you spend the most time with.
Speaker:So another speaker sort of said recently that, uh, that basically your life
Speaker:becomes a reflection of that, that the standards of your peer group will be
Speaker:your standards here, that the standard of your peer group will be your standards.
Speaker:And you can prove it, right?
Speaker:Because I say to people.
Speaker:I'll give you the two extremes.
Speaker:Go into a prison.
Speaker:And find somebody that's been involved in the criminal justice
Speaker:system, most of their life.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Who from a pretty young age, and I'm not talking about whether it's
Speaker:fair or just, or all sorts of AI.
Speaker:You know, equity issues and how unfair different structures in society are,
Speaker:but let's just look at that person.
Speaker:And what you're going to find is that their five closest friends
Speaker:are pretty much all going to be in a relatively similar situation.
Speaker:They're all going to either have had some contact with the criminal justice system
Speaker:or their standards for life, how they go through life are going to be the same
Speaker:standards of the person in the prison.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:It just becomes, I mean, it's not likely if you go meet this prisoner and say,
Speaker:who are your five closest friends and they go, well, we'll get the Dalai Lama.
Speaker:I've got the, yeah.
Speaker:The president of the United nations.
Speaker:Uh, you know, you're not going to hear that right.
Speaker:Now you run to the other end of the spectrum and you find your
Speaker:average kind of billionaire.
Speaker:And what do you find?
Speaker:And I'm not, I'm not using that example to say that that's the most important
Speaker:thing in life, or that's the peak of life I'm using it for illustrative purposes.
Speaker:You find your average billionaire.
Speaker:And of course, what do you find?
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:He funded their five closest friends are probably not in prison.
Speaker:I mean, It depends if they're financial traders who knows.
Speaker:Uh, but you get my point right there.
Speaker:Five closest friends are going to be probably billionaires.
Speaker:So we need to start to think very much about the five people we
Speaker:are surrounding ourselves with.
Speaker:And so I want to give you two quick strategies.
Speaker:What have you do?
Speaker:What do you do if you go, Jonathan, this is awkward.
Speaker:You.
Speaker:Aye.
Speaker:Aye.
Speaker:Aye.
Speaker:You know, you telling me that I have to just abandon my friends.
Speaker:Know I'm not all I'm saying is I like to talk about time allocation, which means.
Speaker:If you notice that your friendship groups are not serving you, if
Speaker:you notice that your peers are not helping you to here's the filter.
Speaker:If you are not growing, changing, developing, doing more.
Speaker:Uh, experiencing more contributing more to the world if they
Speaker:are not helping you to grow.
Speaker:And become a more passionate, alive, you know, really living
Speaker:out the destiny that's within you, then you just allocate less time.
Speaker:You just begin to allocate less time, you know, catch up as often.
Speaker:You just slowly disengage.
Speaker:It.
Speaker:Doesn't have to be dramatic.
Speaker:You do not need to ring anybody and say, Hey.
Speaker:I was listening to Jonathan during the daily podcast.
Speaker:And he said, we can't talk again ever, ever.
Speaker:Don't do that.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:It's awkward.
Speaker:And people get upset with me.
Speaker:So that's the first strategy, time allocation, just allocate a bit less time.
Speaker:And then you usually, at some point, you'll get this thing going.
Speaker:You've changed.
Speaker:You know, You don't meet.
Speaker:You know, you're not hanging out with us anymore.
Speaker:And I like to say.
Speaker:You don't own people and excuse you.
Speaker:Don't no one owns you.
Speaker:Like you don't have to go well, yeah, you're right.
Speaker:I'm really sorry.
Speaker:I mean, I get that.
Speaker:You have to, maybe if it's a longterm friendship, you, you can
Speaker:communicate just say, Hey look.
Speaker:I'm really trying to make some changes in my life.
Speaker:Um, I I'll give you another example.
Speaker:Hopefully this is helpful.
Speaker:I quit drinking, right?
Speaker:I used to drink professionally.
Speaker:And when I quit completely and made this massive change.
Speaker:I noticed that a lot of my peer connections were drinking pretty heavily.
Speaker:And it's standard.
Speaker:Like you talked to anybody, that's got that story.
Speaker:Then you're going to find that they suddenly went, ah, what do I do now?
Speaker:Like all the people I've been hanging with.
Speaker:So I've sort of navigated that, but you suddenly begin to notice that
Speaker:you just can't spend as much time.
Speaker:Like you can't do the things that you used to do.
Speaker:And that's the price of admission to a life of significance and influence.
Speaker:Like, if you want a different life, you've got to do different things and
Speaker:there's going to be some trade-offs and some challenges and some pain in that.
Speaker:So listen to the second thing is a, is simply.
Speaker:Just to build a different peer group and there are two ways you can do that.
Speaker:And I've, uh, The one I've just the second one I want to talk to
Speaker:you about in a sec is really cool.
Speaker:Um, The first one is just to begin to ask yourself, you know, who do
Speaker:I want to spend more time with?
Speaker:Where are those people?
Speaker:And start spending more time with them.
Speaker:So,
Speaker:And I play a fair bit of golf and I play at a, at a very, uh, very
Speaker:fancy, exclusive golf course.
Speaker:And, you know, just hanging out with a lot of the people there, you meet some
Speaker:really interesting people in, in, in finance, in business, in law, in politics.
Speaker:And just being around those people is really interesting.
Speaker:You just get, you know, you learn a lot, you hear a lot.
Speaker:you get a lot of connections.
Speaker:So I just begin to spend more time with certain people now hear me, right?
Speaker:I'm not saying that I'm just, you know, buying a polo pony and, uh, you know,
Speaker:moving to Jupiter beach in Florida.
Speaker:That's not happening.
Speaker:Not yet.
Speaker:Um, I mean, I ride reasonably well, but ponies are expensive now.
Speaker:The next thing you can do is, you know, once you've begun to gravitate to.
Speaker:Some new people is.
Speaker:Build.
Speaker:If you're going to use social media, you can actually curate and build a
Speaker:really good peer group in that context.
Speaker:So I just want to say to you, if you're on social media, Pay attention to who
Speaker:you're following, because I want to say to you that who you're following
Speaker:is very much like a peer group.
Speaker:And, you know, if you just find people that you really admire, find people
Speaker:that you want to be like, find people that really inspire you and draw you
Speaker:to a higher level, whether that's financially, spiritually, physically,
Speaker:relationally, whatever it is.
Speaker:You know, find people that draw you to a higher level and curate that peer group.
Speaker:So I've got a group of people on my Instagram.
Speaker:Who every morning, you know, it's part of my routine.
Speaker:I get up and it's not time wasting for me.
Speaker:It's like, what are these guys doing?
Speaker:What are they thinking?
Speaker:What are they saying?
Speaker:How are they doing life?
Speaker:This is, um, I really like the U S billionaire cosmetics lady, Jamie Kern,
Speaker:Lima, and she's very real and just amazing bootstrap the business to a
Speaker:billion dollars and sold it to L'Oreal.
Speaker:And today she's just doing a video about.
Speaker:Being up all night with, with a, with a child.
Speaker:And it's so real, no makeup.
Speaker:She's just there going, you know what?
Speaker:It's really.
Speaker:It's really difficult and it's really hard, but I get to
Speaker:choose my mindset and she's just talking about me and that's good.
Speaker:And that's what I'm trying to do here.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:For different audiences.
Speaker:Like just, just tell the truth.
Speaker:Just say interesting, important things that help people grow.
Speaker:So curate your peer group on social media.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:Summary, you're going to be the result of the, your life will be the result of the
Speaker:five people you spend the most time with.
Speaker:Please don't get upset, please.
Speaker:Don't message me going.
Speaker:You're saying that we think we're better than other people.
Speaker:I'm not saying that I'm slow, literally saying.
Speaker:You know, you get handed this one life.
Speaker:You're not handed someone else's life, you're handed your life and
Speaker:you have to be accountable for the results and the outcomes in your life.
Speaker:And you're allowed to have a vote.
Speaker:You're allowed to have an opinion.
Speaker:You're allowed to go, you know what?
Speaker:This is what I want.
Speaker:I want this.
Speaker:I want to contribute here.
Speaker:I want to grow here.
Speaker:I want to be different here and the people in my life and not helping me.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:You get to choose now, you don't get to choose around family or
Speaker:marriage, that sort of stuff.
Speaker:You don't get that choice.
Speaker:Once that choice is made and family, wasn't a choice you
Speaker:even got to vote in either.
Speaker:So you love your family.
Speaker:You choose your friends one more time.
Speaker:You love your family.
Speaker:You choose your friends.
Speaker:All right, go and check out the links.
Speaker:Please make sure you subscribe.
Speaker:Book me for coaching speaking, conference events and law.
Speaker:Be there.
Speaker:God bless you everybody i'll see you on instagram at jd speaks and uh, have a
Speaker:fantastic day this is jonathan doyle you and i are going to talk again tomorrow
