finding your tribe is one of the most important things you can do in college and as a young person. the people you surround yourself with will shape how you think, what you believe is possible, and ultimately who you become.
it's easy to get caught in the wrong process when it comes to finding your people. you might optimize for status—who went to the best school, who's working on the most "impressive" thing, who has the most followers. you might fall into enabler culture, where everyone just hypes each other up instead of holding each other accountable.
the truth is, finding your tribe will mainly come from trial and error and discovering yourself. there's no formula. you have to figure out what you actually care about, what kind of person you want to be, and then find people who align with that.
what matters
i think it's about finding people that speak your language, but people that can enable you in a healthy way—they hold you accountable, they question your goals, they poke holes in your thesis. people that genuinely want to see you succeed and in an authentic way are a star in their role.
what's underrated is being a star in your role and finding success in the uncommon path or the uncommon space that you operate in. it's common to see people with a shared definition of success—and not just success, but doing it the "right way."
but really what should be talked about more is figuring out what your unique set of skills is. not just a binary yes or no on whether you're good at a skill, but what is your unique overlap in different skills and different experiences? and also how complex is the problem you're looking at—in the sense that you've really studied the problem and not just a surface level interest based on the social credibility of that problem.
accountability is everything
it's insane how powerful peer groups are—but only if built correctly.
peers that endlessly cheer you on will prevent growth. find ones that hold you accountable.
a huge failure of young people with ambition is their inability to create systems that hold them accountable. a simple counter example: a friend group that constantly glazes you, which makes it difficult for you to recalibrate your current trajectory. even sam altman fell susceptible to internship chasing at one point.
accountability is the driver behind whether or not you accomplish your goals.
find peers with similar goals, but also find peers 1-2 steps ahead. otherwise, it's the blind leading the blind.
the best accountability partners are ones on the same path as you—or slightly ahead in their own way, but still slightly behind in a way that you provide value to their accountability system too. it's a two-way street.
it's key to surround yourself with peers that question your goals and stay updated with your progress. and it's an iterative cycle that should happen constantly if you truly expect to make drastic, noticeable changes in your life—especially the ones that are built over long-term consistency and stable habits.
the bottom line
building something is an individual journey. but the people around you determine whether that journey leads somewhere real or just in circles.
if you surround yourself with the wrong people—endless enablers, or people optimizing for their upside instead of yours—you're cooked. find people who challenge you, question your goals, and genuinely want to see you win. that's your tribe.