How Relationships with People Affect Your Habits (part 2)
In this article, we will continue to talk about how relationships with people affect your habits. If you haven’t seen the first part, I recommend that you read it first.
Your Friends and Your Habits
Friends are important aspects of our lives. They make us laugh and feel we belong somewhere. They also offer guidance and emotional support whenever you require them. However, whether you know it or not, the relationship you have with your close friends may be having a huge influence on your habits. When you spend tons of time with your friends, your tastes can rub off on one another. This may not be a huge influence, but it can affect you in more significant ways. For example, it can affect how you save, how much money you spend, or how you eat. Your friends also determine how healthy you are and how healthy you remain. This does not mean you should not be friends with people who have genetic health problems, but you should be friends with health-conscious people. Are most of your friends’ overweight? Do they only view exercise as a chore? Do they love junk meals? If your answer is yes to all of these, you can see how difficult it will be to eat right and work out when you spend your time with this set of friends. Eventually, you will begin to pick up their bad habits too. Your friends have a huge impact on the way you show love. If you have friends who see fighting with their spouses as a norm, it could be easy for you to pick up these habits. You may start looking for your partner’s wrongdoings even when there is nothing there. What’s more, if you get advice from your friends regarding your love life, it is easy for them to steer you towards their path. After all, they only give advice based on what they feel is right. It can also affect how you choose to spend time like sleeping at home or going on vacation. In addition, your friends can affect your choice to partake in healthy habits. If you hang around friends who believe in healthy eating and exercise, you may start to exhibit the same. These are positive habits, and this sort of influence is not a bad thing. However, if your friends do the opposite and believe that it is normal to smoke and do drugs, you can pick up these habits. This can also affect your happiness and health negatively.
Your Habits and your Spouse
Your spouse is another important person who has a large influence on your habits. This happens easily, considering you love each other and presumably spend most of your time with them. You may find yourself using phrases your partner commonly uses and even seeing slight personality changes. This could be good or bad. Your partner can affect the way you see yourself. If you have a partner who talks down on you and constantly gaslights you, eventually you begin to see yourself in the way they portray. Research has proven that your spouse’s drinking habits influence the way you consume alcohol. Statistically, men tend to reduce their level of drinking after they settle down while women drink more. A University of Cincinnati study states that when a woman settles down, her alcohol consumption tends to rise. This is reportedly due to the drinking habits of her husband. Corinne Rexzek oversaw the study that observed the drinking habits of women over a 47 years period. Researchers determined that the rate of drinking in married women was higher than that of single women but more than widowed and divorced women. In contrast, men are more likely to minimize their intake of alcohol once they settle down. They also drink less than other single men. The above is one example of how your spouse can influence your habits. There is a high chance that these same concepts may apply to other bad habits too. For instance, if you live with an extremely clean spouse, there is a high chance that it will improve your messy habits. If your spouse takes exercise seriously, there is a huge possibility that you may do the same. Having diverse habits can sometimes be beneficial when you settle down with someone. For instance, if you have terrible spending habits, you may enjoy some of the improved financial lifestyles that come with marrying a frugal spouse as you balance each other out. On the other hand, things can become problematic when your habits rub off on each other. It is easy to forget your values and instead adopt all your spouse’s habits. For instance, if you live with someone who watches television and spends time on social media in excess, there is a huge chance that you will make more room for these habits in your life. The same applies if someone who only eats junk food occasionally marries a person that eats it daily; they may both start consuming junk food frequently. Furthermore, if you are treated positively, it can positively affect who you become alongside your habits. Without a doubt, having a supportive spouse, family, and friends leaves you with less to worry about. You will be happy and have fewer negative things to think about. In addition, since you know how much influence all of these people have on you, it is important to be strategic when choosing relationships. Since you can’t choose the family you are born into, you can intentionally choose your spouse and friends. Before you decide to get into a relationship with anyone, regardless of if it is for friendship or love, ask yourself the following.
● Do their values align with mine?
● Are they going to have a positive influence on my life over the next few years?
● Do they mirror the behaviors of the people I want to see myself with in the future?
By providing genuine answers to these questions, you will learn to be more strategic in choosing your relationships. This will further have a direct influence on the kind of future you are striving towards.
The inspiration for this article was information from the book «Lose bad habits» B.M. Lyons
Photocredit: MetroUK
