Harriette Cole: Meeting these awful women made me doubt my own best friend

I didn't realize until now that she has surrounded herself with mean girls.

DEAR HARRIETTE: My best friend is one of the sweetest people I’ve ever met. She recently introduced me to her other friends, and I was surprised to find out that they’re pretty much a group of bullies. They don’t seem like very good people at all.

We hung out with them for about three hours, and they spent at least two of those hours talking badly about other people. They even gossiped about their own friends!

Now I am feeling unsure about whether or not my best friend does the same to me when I’m not around. I don’t trust mean girls, and it worries me that I have befriended someone who surrounds herself with them.

Could my friend be a mean girl as well? Should I approach her about how uncomfortable her other friends have made me?

Too Much Gossip

DEAR TOO MUCH GOSSIP: Recall how your best friend treats you. Look back in time to recall specific moments you two have shared together. How has she treated you? This is important because you want to judge her based on her actions, not those of her friends.

That said, you do need to check her on her friends’ behavior. Talk to her about the time you just spent with her and her other friends. Highlight moments when you were taken aback by their behavior — the gossiping especially. Ask her if she notices that they do that a lot. Tell her you consider that behavior to be rude and unkind. Ask her directly if she participates in that friend-bashing talk.

Listen to your friend to get a sense of where she stands in this. Find out why she chooses to spend time with these people. Let her know that you have no interest in seeing them again, but more, you are concerned that they are likely talking about you — and her — behind your backs.

DEAR HARRIETTE: I’m content with the job that I currently have, and I express this to my friends and family often. I’m happy with the flexibility, the work-life balance and the experiences that the job has afforded me.

For whatever reason, my friends and family keep pushing me to apply for new jobs that I would never be interested in. They are pushing me to apply to anything that pays more than my current role.

What they don’t understand is that salary is not everything to me. I would prefer to keep the lower-paying job that is in my field rather than work in a field that I have no interest in for a higher salary.

How do I keep them off my back?

Content With Job

DEAR CONTENT WITH JOB: Your friends and family cannot live your life for you. Period. They can make their opinions known, which they obviously do, but that doesn’t mean you have to follow their advice.

Work-life balance is something many people struggle to find. The search for money often upsets the balance of even potentially reaching that comfort zone.

If you are content and you have figured out how to take care of yourself, so be it. Where it can get messy is if you love what you do and how you do it, but you continue to need supplementary financial support from family and loved ones because your chosen line of work and current position do not afford you enough resources to support your lifestyle.

Harriette Cole is a lifestylist and founder of DREAMLEAPERS, an initiative to help people access and activate their dreams. You can send questions to askharriette@harriettecole.com or c/o Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.