Silliman says in part,

"Hell is other people, the man said, but very very few people. Certain people. The ones we call at 4 a.m., the ones we write letters to in our head, the ones where all our conversations are catalogued, the ones we've known so long and so well they're part of the reason we are who we are."

So true, that. A very few people shape us. In a novel I'm reading at the moment (Shogun, James Clavell), a powerful fuedal lord says that a good enemy can be better than a friend in terms of helpfulness; in another novel by the same author (King Rat), the narration talks about dwelling within pain, so as to dominate and bear it. These seemingly random thoughts come together in my head to say that

to be aware of what is influencing you and why is to have the power to change it, or to use it as you will

Somehow, I suspect something of Anthony Robbins got thrown in that subversive meltingpot that is my subconscious, too. I listened to some of him day before yesterday.