Nairobi News

It’s good to have friends, lot’s of them if you can. Ancient stoics even valued friendship more highly than romantic love. Friends help you when you are in need. Friends are fun to hang out with. Friends also listen to you when you are severely stressed out and need to vent.

We tend to assume that our friends have our best interests at heart but is that really the case? It’s actually not. The latest incident involving Bahati and Mr Seed actually got me thinking. In case you are still in the dark, here’s what happened (according to Mr Seed’s interview on Mseto East Africa).

Bahati had a major gospel concert on New Year ’s Eve. Bahati’s wife had been bitten by the entrepreneurship bug and decided to sell coffee at the event. Interestingly, Mr Seed’s wife Nimo also wanted to cash in by selling coffee and other foodstuffs at the event as well. Diana was not happy about this so she asked Le Hubby to ‘take care of the problem’.

So despite Mr Seed being one of his closest friends and actually the most talented artiste on EMB records, Bahati decided to call the cops and have Nimo evicted.

REAL FRIENDS

Just like you, my first reaction was ‘what the hell?” All these people were ‘friends’ and the matter should have been resolved amicably and quickly. So, why did this end up happening? It’s simply because one person wasn’t a real friend to the other.

Real friends are in fact very rare. You might not like to hear this but many of your friends don’t actually like you. In fact, there are two kinds of friends. There are those who feel you are better than them hence they are constantly jealous of you. Then there are friends who feel they are better than you hence they feel they are doing you a favour by being your friend.

Let’s talk about the first type of friend – the one that thinks you are better than them. This kind will only hang around you for convenience purposes. Basically, there is something they are gaining from you. Deep inside, they are jealous, wondering why they are not like you. They are good at dishing out flattery and pretending they are happy for you but deep inside they are not.

Got a new good-looking bae? They are jealous. Got a promotion? They are jealous. They won’t show their feelings but one day they might feel so bitter that they stop hanging out with you altogether.

KEEPING FRIENDS

Sometimes they’ll stick by you and be your side kick forever but when you are away, they will be masters of talking about you. Of course, the content of their gossip about you won’t be the good stuff. It will be the negatives – it will be content full of malignity. It will be criticism and passing out information that you wanted to remain secret.

Then there are friends who feel they are better than you. These ones tend to see you as a loser. They keep wondering why you are not as smart or as successful as them. They’ll take every little chance possible to serve you criticism laced with insolence while pretending its good advice they are offering.

So should you be friendless? Of course not – even if you wanted to – you can’t operate all by yourself. You need others. Just make sure you keep radiating unearthly volumes of awareness at all times. Have eyes on your kisogo. Study your friends and watch yourself around them.

Never let your guard down and stay wise. Many great people have fallen for placing too much trust in their friends.