Creating High Consciousness Friendships

[Nullref]

My best friend and I are starting to have differences in lifestyle that are problematic for friendship.

I know, this is a common theme for many posts in this section of the forum. Most people just decide to drop there friendships, but I am wondering if this really has to be the case. Let me explain.

I highly value our friendship, we are very close, have deep conversations and so forth, but he lives an unconscious lifestyle,

I have been turning down invitations to go to the bar, get food, play video games with him, so on and so forth. It is important to me to drop these hedonic activities out of my daily life as to increase the quality of my consciousness, and to facilitate personal growth. These are the same activities that we used to use as a way to spend time together. On top of this I have a meal plan that I strictly follow so that sends any food related gathering out the door.

What I am contemplating for myself going forward, is the following. Are there high consciousness ways for us to spend time together and enjoy the close relationship we have built with each other over the years?

I don't have a great answer to this question even if my friend was a high consciousness, self-actualizing individual.  If any of you have 'high consciousness' friends/relationships how do you spend your time together? What does your friendship relationship look like?

I have discovered that I don't really need friendships all together. I don't see them as a need for my personal growth. However, I would feel disintegrated if I knew this preexisting friendship ended because of my lack of trying maintain it.

You guys are smart, so please let me know if you are seeing a deeper problem here that I am not aware of.

[Max_V]

@Nullref I'm in the same kind of situation you are at. I've cut ties with friends I had on my other High school because they were all about drinking, roasting people, toxic humour, etc. 

But there is one friend that I have had since middle school. His name is Colin, he is my best friend. We used to play a lot of video games together as we are both kind of more shy introverted guys. Now that I'm cleaning up my diet, quit video games and cut back a lot with watching Anime, We are both on very different paths, which makes it very hard to relate in any way. I kinda love the guy though, he is one of my best friends I've ever had and we've been through tough times together, which makes it even harder to see the contact we have decreasing.

 

[Danielle]

Few months ago I was very strict about having 'high consciousness friends' so I could preach to them about non duality, how everyone's asleep, you know - the usual. Recently I noticed that it was a trap I fell into- labeling people as this and that and not having time for 'chimps'. 

If you truly enjoy the company of your friend, don't label him as this and that , it's an oversimplification. You wrote you talk about deep things so I suggest you talk to him about your vision, your path, why you're doing what you're doing - get his imagination going! The chances are, he'll listen and get curious about why you're chosing to act in this particular way. 

Also, there are ton of benefits by being friends with 'low cons.ppl' - you  can reflect their behavior onto yourself, see all your defense mechanisms pop up etc. 

Pro tip: nothing will train your awareness as much as being friends with low consciousness people  

Edited November 23, 2017 by Danielle