I want this to be true, but I don't think it is. I really do think a lot of people just kind of drift through life, being reactive rather than proactive, with little in the way of goals or ambition. I don't necessarily know if there's anything wrong with that (topic for another day), but it does seem valid to say that they're not interested in "improving". Maybe that's the wrong word; maybe "optimizing" captures it better. Regardless, some of my best friends are those who I share surprisingly little in terms of common interests. But what we do share is that we don't want a life adrift, and we're working hard to achieve the things we care about. To me, that's what "improving at life" means.

It's not that simple. What the article describes is a very common problem with people who get healthy and lose a lot of weight. Their 'friends' often end up hindering their goals though often not on purpose.

When I talked to a friend of mine about her weight loss the hardest part for her was losing all her other overweight friends. They would constantly ask her why she was getting up at 5am or eating healthy or training for a marathon and then would make comments that it's pointless. They didn't drift apart because their interests changed, she had to cut them out because they were holding her back.