BLOG 40: Happy for you...I REALLY AM!!!!

HAPPY FOR YOU…REALLY I AM!

Each success only buys an admission ticket to a more difficult problem. Henry Kissinger Nobel Peace Price Winner & US Secretary of State (1973-1977)

Once you have friends there are really only 4 areas of your life you have to work on to be really happy.

• Love
• Work
• Health
• Finance

And having friends means that you have unerring support to guide you through the process of achieving success in these areas. Friends are great ain’t they?

However it is curious how you can always tell who your friends really are, not just by whether they are there for you when things are tough – but if they can be genuinely happy for you when things go well.

It is seldom discussed (cause it’s one of those things that make you seem ungracious) – but it is actually rather hard to be genuinely happy for someone else’s success.

Our language is littered with phrases such as:

• What goes up must come down
• Be nice to those you pass on the way up as you’ll meet them on the way down
• The harder they climb, the harder they fall
• Got a bit above their station – haven’t they?

Watching the assent and demise of those who achieve success has become a bit of a sport. Gossip magazines (of which now we have a plethora) do well, not so much because we wish to see the successful on red carpets or yachts – but because we delight in seeing the extra weight they have gained, the bad outfit they chose and reading about the relationship traumas they’ve endured. Then we know they aren’t up there looking down on us. Then we are assured all that glitters is not gold and it’s okay for us to be mediocre.

Success brings with it a load of unforeseen pressures. It brings with it a neurotic panic that those who don’t go for success will never know. For it is an established truth that once you register on the success radar you have just opened yourself up to public ridicule for the slightest infraction.

Basically – once you step into the spotlight and they love you… keep it up least they pelt you with rotten eggs!

For most of us, it is much easier to give in to our fear of failure. If we expose ourselves as extra- ordinary once, then we MUST keep pulling rabbits out of hats. It’s so much easier to ‘do okay’ and stop there as exposure as an achiever carries risk.

Unsurprisingly when a friend does prove that they ‘have what it takes’ and becomes successful in love, work, health or finance – being willing to provide validation of this achievement is not a role many of us willingly embrace.

Be honest, when was the last time you REALLY were GENUINELY happy that a friend gained loads of money (more than you’ll ever have), or lost loads of weight and now looks REALLY hot (better than you could ever be) or got that promotion (whilst you linger in your none too exciting role) or found the love of their life who is ACTUALLY perfect (whilst your amour hogs the remote and is asking when dinner will be). WHEN was the last time you stopped making someone else’s success become a reflection of how YOUR life is going?

Being a good friend in times of success is actually not something most of us are very good at. It’s a little like those cracker eating contests… try as you might to do something as seemingly easy as put four little crackers in your mouth at once… you just can’t do more than three. It just can’t be done with ease… you didn’t imagine you couldn’t do it…you thought you were better than that.

Is it really that much easier to be a friend when a friend is in need? Yes it is. There is a pay back for being there when someone else’s life goes tit’s up. There is a feel good factor about helping those who are worse of than you.

If a friend gets made redundant you can boost them by telling them to look at the whole thing as an opportunity to restructure their life. This while thanking heaven secretly that it ain’t you. If a friend gets bad news from the hospital you can become a cheerleader to the athlete they must become to beat the disease. This while touching wood that you will never share that affliction. If a friends savings disappear cause their seeming stable bank foreclosed, you can get all the info they need to make a claim with the receivers or even bail them out short term. This while sighing with relief that you were not also seduced by that banks advertisements and did not open an account. And if your friends heart has been broken you can offer tea and sympathy and remind them that there are plenty more fish in the sea. Then slip under the covers with your spouse and MAKE them tell you that they promise that you will NEVER be ‘out there’ again.

Yes – it IS so much easier to be a great friend when you are better of than your mates. And yes, it is good to see those who are having a bad time being inspired our support and pulling them selves out of their ruts. It feels GOOD.

It just is a little like 4 crackers in the mouth when the support we give our successful friends makes them even more successful. Somehow that doesn’t feel as good – does it? Easier to smile thinly, say well done and move onto a more equal footing.

Don’t think for a moment our successful friends don’t know that is what we are doing. They do. They really DON’T want to rub your face in it – but they do desperately require their achievements to be validated or it all seems a little shallow. Thing is we humans are social animals. We fare better if we have support – by which I mean encouragement and praise from our peers.

My ex ran a shop and used to employ a kid who had alopecia. He used to say to me, “the kid is bald, fat, Jewish and gay – does he HAVE to be the world’s most useless employee too?” They used to go for beers though and the kid was really funny – they got on. But my ex had to sack him… he was a useless employee. They stayed in touch though. At first when the kid started working with a famous comedy duo, my ex was quite pleased for him. But then the kid went on to appear in pop videos and became a regular on TV. My ex found the kids ascent less easy to take. My ex started being less available for a beer. Of course by the time the kid – Matt Lucas if you haven’t guessed – went on to achieve great fame… My ex refused to talk to him.

Pathetic really. But understandable. It was easier to be the benevolent ex-boss who sacked you nicely and bought you a beer, than being the nobody from the past of a famous TV and West End star.

Think of a friend who is doing really well. The sickly lad who became an athlete. The work mate who won the lottery. The eternal spinster who found a guy at last! The office slacker who now runs a successful business of his own. Do we really begrudge them their achievements?

We all really do have to try a bit harder here. NO ONE SAID FRIENDSHIP WAS EASY! It’s time guys; it is time for us to suck it up. Being a friend means being there when things go well too.

We really shouldn’t let someone’s success with money, health, at work or in love turn into a wedge between us. Okay someone else’s success does highlight your own shortcomings, but isn’t it nice not to be the emergency services for a friend for a change? Try and remember that a friend in need is often a pain in the ass as well as a drain on your resources. Enjoy your friend’s success.

A friend doing well probably requires nothing more from you than heart felt congratulations. We can do that for them can’t we?… we can be proud of them, boast like an Asian mother about them, and… (most importantly)…. Make them get the beers in !!!!