How to end friendships over differences? || Acharya Prashant (2024)

Acharya Prashant

Video Information: 02.02.2024, IIT-Hyderabad (Online), Greater Noida   Context: ~ How to end friendships over differences? ~ What is the nicest way to end a friendship? ~ What are 3 signs that indicate it's time to end a friendship? ~ How do you deal with differences in friendship? ~ What is toxic friendship? ~ Is it okay to cut off a friendship?  Music Credits: Milind Date  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Transcript

00:00As we grow up, our way of thinking does not align with our friends, we will have contradictions

00:08at many points, we start to hate them, but the way we stick with us, at that time if

00:15you want to break the relationship, she want to break the friendship, how to do that?

00:22So you have friends and then as you move along and spend an year or two, you find that your

00:34thoughts don't align and those differences make you hateful, you said?

00:42Yeah.

00:44And then?

00:47But the way we stick with us.

00:49Yes.

00:50The way we stick with us, they be a friend of us, but they don't want to be as dear friends.

00:57Okay, okay, okay.

01:00So you do not want to be with them anymore, but those friends are still sticking to you.

01:07That's very nice of them actually.

01:16You see, there are, if you may call them rules, certain rules in life.

01:29If you have being with someone in periods of your unconsciousness, then don't just drop

01:46them as you grow more conscious.

01:55If you have been with people in your childhood, if you have played with them, you have been

02:02friends with them, even if in the way of a little child, you have related to them as

02:11kids do, seen kids relate to each other, there's not much wisdom in that.

02:21We cannot say the kids are relating very consciously to each other and the kids will grow up.

02:32So the oracle of life, just invented that, it says that do not drop these people just

02:44because now you feel that you are better than them in some sense.

02:51If you were them in the periods of your inner darkness, try to share the light with them

03:06if and when you receive it, or was the relationship only about sharing darkness?

03:14How about sharing light as well?

03:19So you said your thoughts don't align with them anymore.

03:23I'm assuming that you have developed in your thoughts.

03:29I'm assuming that your thoughts have gained clarity and depth and those of your friends

03:39or peers haven't.

03:42That's a big assumption, first of all, but even if I proceed on that assumption, it becomes

03:49your responsibility to bring to them what you have received.

03:58Try your best.

03:59Now, after that, if they still decide to look the other way, then that's their choice.

04:09But don't just discard them like used stuff.

04:19There was a time when, you know, we tallied and hence we pallied, we conquered in our

04:28thoughts and hence we were pals, no, when two persons walk together for any length of

04:44time, obviously one of them at some point would find himself walking a bit faster.

04:56That's inevitable.

04:59That does not mean that you leave the other one behind.

05:03That also does not mean that you're obliged to carry the other one on your shoulders all

05:07your life.

05:09And even if that person is sitting on your shoulders and beating on your head, no, I'm

05:14not saying that.

05:17I'm not talking of contractual bondage.

05:27What I'm saying is that it's a measure of humanness to try to help people, especially

05:35the people who have been with you when you were younger, less brighter, less conscious.

05:47So it's a thing of discretion and it's a subjective decision you have to make.

05:54You have to ask yourself, have I tried hard enough to somehow save the relationship?

06:08Have I given the relationship its due?

06:11And obviously no relationship carries infinite weightage.

06:18Infinite weightage is only to the one you are.

06:23But still others are not, as we said, objects to be used and trashed.

06:34They deserve a certain sympathy, a certain effort from your side, and an attempt to look

06:45at the world as they do.

06:48You see, we all live in our subjective universes.

06:53Technically that's called the ego.

06:55So we all look at the world in very different ways, depending on where we are located, internally

07:03located.

07:05So it helps to get into the other's mind for a while, to understand the other's frame of

07:13reference and see how that person is looking at the world.

07:18I'm not saying that one frame of reference is better than the other.

07:23No, I'm not saying that you start accepting that person as he or she is and say, fine,

07:32you remain the way you are and you'll still remain dear to me.

07:37Obviously there has been an attempt to educate the other, improve the other, in that sense

07:42change the other.

07:45But no attempt to improve the other can succeed without compassion.

07:51You cannot forcefully change the other, that's violence.

07:57Even if you want to change the other, you have to understand where the other is coming

08:03from and you also have to appreciate that not too long back you were much in the same

08:13position as the other.

08:16So there is no point being condescending or playing holier than thou.

08:25Am I making sense or is it very disconnected to what you have in mind?

08:31No, no, actually the answer is perfect.

08:37But avoid the other extreme as well.

08:39As we said, we are not advocating some kind of moral bondage or permanent obligation.

08:52We are not saying that you have to carry the other on your shoulders, even if he is

08:58unwilling to see change or improve.

09:03At the same time, we are saying don't just throw away people like, you know, banana peels.

09:11The banana is in and the peel is away.

09:15That's not how humans are supposed to operate with each other, right?

09:23Give it a try, give it your best shot and persevere for a while.

09:27Have patience with people.

09:31Nobody changes in an instant, people take their own time.

09:41And they deserve that they be given a certain time to see, think, experience and change

09:53at their own rate.

09:56Thank you, sir.

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