TELL ME WHO YOU WALK WITH, AND I’LL TELL YOU WHO YOU ARE

Despite many people mistakenly believing this phrase to be biblical, it definitely is not!

The value and recognition of friendship among people probably began to be truly discussed around 2 to 3 thousand years ago. In fact, it is believed that it was around this time that the original phrase emerged, which is said to have come from the Assyrians and says “Tell me who your friends are and I will tell you who you are.”

Whether biblical or not, this phrase holds profound truth. Whether in the anthropological, philosophical, psychological, or neurological field, there is complete veracity in this statement.

Understanding the value of friendship in our lives has a lot to do with self-awareness. Our friendships represent much of who we are, and it is necessary to perceive the quality of these relationships if we are concerned about our own well-being, both in the present and in our future.

For many behavioral studies, it is becoming increasingly clear that happiness is not only found in experiences, material possessions, or personal and transcendental philosophies, but rather much more related to the choices of who we decide to spend our time with. Furthermore, there is no shortage of studies demonstrating how important it is to observe the people we live with and how much they are related to the decisions we make throughout life. Our friendships are directly and indirectly linked to who we are, what we are, and what we intend to be. All of this is part of our evolutionary condition, both psychologically and biologically.

Our ancestors continuously endeavored to establish and preserve their friendships to maintain their tribes for very objective and strategic reasons. Living in tribes was the safest way to help each other survive, whether for protection and hunting, in fights against rivals and predators in the case of men, or to better care for and feed their children in the case of women. At that time, it is believed that friendship was nothing more than an exchange of favors and experiences.

Over time, the evolution of the human being brought other connotations to friendship. This is mainly due to the transformation that the brain underwent during these thousands of years, especially when verbal and non-verbal language became a conscious part of it, further aiding coexistence, and with it, social dependence became increasingly more important for survival.

Throughout this evolutionary process, there was also a chemical transformation that also helped in cognitive and behavioral improvement.

With the development of neuroscience, it was soon realized that friendship was not only a matter of species preservation and reproduction, but there are also several chemical factors that unite one person to another. Among them is the presence of oxytocin, a hormone that works in one of the most instinctive parts of the human being. Produced by the hypothalamus, this hormone was discovered in 1909 when English pharmacologist Henry H. Dale noticed that the hormone led to uterine contraction in pregnant cats.

Although it is a shy hormone—because it is not produced when we are present with strangers and when we are being observed—many studies have been dedicated to its effect and its relationship with social life, and the result is extraordinary. In addition to promoting feelings of love, social unity, and well-being, it is responsible for the affection between man and woman, being produced in the most diverse situations. For example, during orgasm, it helps stimulate the woman to contract her uterus, and this causes the sperm to reach the egg more quickly and increases the chances of getting pregnant. It makes people more affectionate with each other since it is present as a condition of affection, and it is also responsible for the unconditional love that a mother develops for her child.

In addition, oxytocin facilitates social interaction and alliances that condition the construction of friendships. When we meet people who are similar to us, who belong to the same world and like the same things, the production of this hormone also increases. Just as by the need to establish relationships and bring to oneself the feeling of belonging and recognition. In this sense, it also helps us to move through different groups and therefore can facilitate the introduction of new things and people and expand our horizons—generating a renewal of ideas that is beneficial to all relationships, including old friendships.

If we are with someone who has some characteristics that we understand to be important and we come to trust them, the level of oxytocin in your brain also increases.

In other words, because of oxytocin, the brain learned to value human relationships, and this goes from survival to cooperation and socialization. Conditioning the brain to seek to maintain relationships with other humans. Oxytocin causes us to develop empathy, and because of it, we dedicate time and effort to a relationship.

But not only that. Oxytocin also helps to answer a question that always arises about the possibility of friendship—without involving sex—between men and women? According to studies on human behavior and neuroscience, this question is worth discussing, after all, if there is an answer to it, it is: yes, it exists and it does not exist. To explain it, we must also go back in time and remember that our ancestors had as their goal in life survival and the preservation of the species, and therefore the origin of this feeling is undeniably sexual. As in other animals, oxytocin is present since it generates that attraction and is released during sex. However, as explained earlier, throughout this evolutionary period, there was a cognitive transformation and the capacity of the human being to be conscious makes all the difference with other animals. In other words, during this period of evolution, we became much less instinctive and much more rational, that is, unlike other living species, we are not endowed with instincts, but free to make choices, which makes us capable of separating things.

Science has its explanation in its studies when it realized that at some point from language consciousness, oxytocin also acquired its social function. As already explained, the human brain also changed in terms of its sexual references. A greater number of oxytocin receptors spread across various brain regions, including areas that have nothing to do with sexual desire. Therefore, oxytocin can be released in relational occasions of the same sex or the opposite sex, but today the brain can discern between a romantic date, sexual activity, and friendship.

It is also now known that biologically there is a difference between men and women in terms of friendships. In this case, women produce more oxytocin than men and, according to research, this explains why their friendships are deeper, and certain regions of the brain light up more intensely when there is the possibility of meeting someone new. Justifying the intensity of female friendships and also being related to being less tolerant, which helps to limit long-term friendships, which is opposite to men.

Today there is also no doubt about the importance of the early stages of our life in the cognitive formation of the person we become as adults and the chosen companions are important throughout life, but in adolescence, they can be decisive in forming identity as an adult. It is also evident that from the earliest games as children, friendships are fundamental to our mental development and always, in some way, influence our behaviors, modify our thoughts and habits, help us create a broader perspective, motivate us to make certain decisions, are important in our development of verbal and nonverbal language, influence our opinions, being even part of the references we build from the way we dress to educational and professional choices.

In the book Connected—The surprising power of our social networks and how they shape our lives, James Fowler and Nicholas Christakis go further and demonstrate how much the friendships of friends also come to influence us over time, according to them: ‘Our main point is not so much to show that your friends affect you. That is common sense. We show how people we do not know affect us.’ They present a study that shows that the power of friendship is much broader than we imagine and affirm that our behavior is influenced by people we do not even know, but who are part of the relationships of our friends with their friends.

Neurologically speaking, it is also possible to understand that the brain uses friendship as a facilitator. As I have explained many times in other texts, instinctively brain programming has the need to facilitate life to consume less energy. The question here is that decision-making is something that consumes energy, requires attention, and is also exhausting. To minimize this consumption and make things easier, the brain seeks to mirror with those with whom it identifies some similarity, so it makes comparisons with the people with whom we maintain relationships when choosing.

Whether it’s from the clothes we wear, the haircut, the music, like where and what to eat, as well as what brings us pleasure, are the result of this set of information given by relationships. In other words, it is important to understand that, mistakenly as many still think, we are not fully in control, either of our happiness or when making choices, the truth is that decision-making is full of biases that are far from our judgment. People do not literally remember bad experiences as well as good ones and vice versa, this has much to do with the present emotional state. In this sense, our emotions modify a memory and interfere with choices that could be rational or irrational; that through relational biases, consciously or unconsciously, are referenced as a condition for choices that, otherwise and in other companies, we could even avoid.

Moran Cerf, a neuroscientist at Northwestern University, conducted several studies on the influence capacity that friendships condition us, and in one of his studies, he discovered that when two friends are close to each other, their brain waves begin to produce similar patterns. According to him, ‘The more we study involvement, the more we see repeatedly that just being around certain people really aligns our brain with them.’ With this, he concluded that the people we relate to have a significant impact on our development regarding reality, and for him, this goes far beyond what was expected, because we become more and more similar to each other.

Having friends is good, it helps us to be human and is fundamental for our development as individuals. But the story that the more the better is not truly a good statement. There is a limit, and human nature itself reserves the right to limit our friendships. Based on a study conducted at the University of Oxford, scientists realized that even for a human brain, there is a maximum number that we can handle at the same time. This is because maintaining a friendship requires a lot of cognitive effort, after all, in addition to memorizing information about that person (image, name, and personality data) that will be triggered when there is interaction, there is also all the information processing to deal with the relationship.

In this study, they concluded that we are able to deal on average with a network of up to 150 people, above which cognitively we cannot have an approach that is not simply casual. Within this study, there are various levels of friendship, so, in summary, we are able to have at most 5 close friends, those closest, almost like siblings. About 15 whom we empathize with who are somehow important to our lives. About 50 that we keep as social relations, and finally about 150 whose names, faces, and common interests we could remember.

‘He who walks with wise men will be wise, but a companion of fools will be destroyed.’ (Proverbs 13:20)

It is clear that this not only happens when speaking only of established friendships but also when being with people with whom we have certain similarities, for example, in a group of people we have just met, it is possible that because of one of them, we can be emotionally and sentimentally influenced. A person present there can influence mood, enthusiasm, discouragement, joy, sadness, or even if one of the people speaks quickly, this can increase the pace of conversation; this occurs even in an audience with many people, where we can feel lighter or funnier depending on the reaction of others present.

Considering everything we have seen so far, it is clear that throughout life, whether in the family environment, in romantic relationships, or in the professional environment, we are surrounded by people who are really worth keeping as friends, but there are also many toxic people. Living for some time with toxic people can lead us to act like them, in a toxic way as well. Therefore, indeed and without any doubt, it is necessary to know oneself to not fall into traps that many relationships can lead us to. Many times we understand that there are gains with the choices we make regarding the people we want by our side, but that in reality and indeed, the reality is that we are losing and losing a lot of ourselves.

In this sense, self-awareness is always necessary even to develop the habit of questioning who the people are around us and is part of our relationships and with that, seek to perceive what the influences of those around us are and how essential they are for our dreams, well-being, and for the quality of life we ​​so desire to achieve. There is no shortage of toxicity and negativity in the social and professional world, and these seem to have an even greater power to exhale pessimism and defeatism. Bad feelings are very contagious and difficult to heal.

Finally, there is no shortage of studies to demonstrate how friendships can be decisive for our lives as well as for finding happiness. Therefore, the decision to choose a person to spend time with is not only and just advice but pure science. Therefore, if you want to maximize happiness and minimize sadness and stress, first be aware that true friendship with people who are really worth it is rare but necessary, so value them. Second, if you are considering building a good life, then, in one way or another, be sensible with yourself, so that you only incorporate into your relationships those people who have characteristics close to your virtues.

Avoid undermining your decisions by being around people who undermine your energy, disassociate yourself from toxic friendships or relationships and people who, in fact, you do not want around, because in some way they harm you. Finally, always evaluate yourself, seek self-awareness, and value who you are, seek within yourself the certainty that it is you who is in control, and this is indeed the most important decision and will determine not only you but who you really want to be by your side. In other words, the power of friendships extends beyond what many imagine. From influencing our brainwaves to shaping our identity and perspectives, the relationships we cultivate play a crucial role in our lives. However, it’s important to recognize that not all friendships are beneficial; some can be toxic and detrimental to our mental and emotional well-being. Therefore, self-awareness and the ability to discern between genuine friendships and harmful relationships are essential for cultivating a healthy support network. By valuing and investing in true friendships, we are contributing not only to our own happiness but also to the building of a more supportive and connected society.

“In our journey through life, friendships sculpt us more deeply than we realize. They shape our thoughts, emotions, and even our choices. Yet, amidst this influence, it’s crucial to discern between those that uplift us and those that harm us. By nurturing genuine and healthy connections, we not only strengthen our own path but also contribute to an environment of compassion and mutual support. Let us cherish and cultivate these true friendships, for they are the ones that truly enrich our existence.” (Marcello de Souza)

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Hello, I’m Marcello de Souza! I started my career in 1997 as a leader and manager in a large company in the IT and Telecommunications market. Since then, I have participated in important projects of structuring, implementation, and optimization of telecommunications networks in Brazil. Restless and passionate about behavioral and social psychology. In 2008, I decided to delve into the universe of the human mind.

Since then, I have become a professional passionate about deciphering the secrets of human behavior and catalyzing positive changes in individuals and organizations. Doctor in Social Psychology, with over 25 years of experience in Cognitive Behavioral and Human Organizational Development. With a wide-ranging career, I highlight my role as:

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My solid academic background includes four postgraduates and a doctorate in Social Psychology, along with international certifications in Management, Leadership, and Cognitive Behavioral Development. My contributions in the field are widely recognized in hundreds of classes, training sessions, conferences, and published articles.

Co-author of the book “The Secret of Coaching” and author of “The Map Is Not the Territory, the Territory Is You” and “The Diet Society” (the first of a trilogy on human behavior in contemporaneity – 05/2024).

Allow me to be your companion on this journey of self-discovery and success. Together, we will unravel a universe of behavioral possibilities and achieve extraordinary results.

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